Planning on seeing it tomorrow.
Honestly I feel sorry for Ruby Gillman that DreamWorks had to be the one to own and distribute this film when Illumination should've gotten it.
It's currently flopping bad right now at the box office (doesn't help that you have Elemental, Spider-Verse 2 and Nimona crushing it.)
I hope the fanfiction is good for this thing.
With Dreamworks probably dropping it as soon as legally possible, there's no way for a television series to smooth over the film's flaws, so that'll have to be the best the world can get.
I did like more of the film than I disliked, but the bad parts are exceptionally baffling.
On that topic of fanfics and AU's, I finally stopped being lazy and wrote how I'd have made.
What I would have done is made the Trident a sort thing that gets passed around between the two tribes as the symbol of who's in charge that gets shifted every generation between the two for centuries that neither can fully utilize(mermaids discovery they can charge it with their voices, but can't wield it while the reverse is true for the Krakens), with the intention of them working together but both became too petty to reveal the flaw or try and compromise and it went on for long enough that said knowledge has been lost.
Modern times, Ruby is a seaperson and KNOWS this, but not the part of being sort of royalty or kraken since he parents wanted to raise her AWAY from all of the drama involved with that(she'd also know how to use some her powers like camouflage to alter skin color and tweak body proportions which real life cephalopods can do). Chelsea would be the super popular Spoiled Sweet girl who turns out to be the mermaid princess living alone in an cool apartment set up by her parents who pretty much micro-manage her life or at very least her future and are emotionally distant/neglectful. The contrast would be that Ruby has nice stable if humble home life, but wants more out of life while Chelsea seems to have everything, but any kind of sincere warmth in terms of friends and family except when on the surface(of COURSE all of the sea people are nice to her she's the mermaid princess who's being groomed to be queen) where people don't know about her. She bonds with Ruby for the same reason as Peach and Mario, she's the first other seaperson she's ever met and I'd remove the whole nerd vs popular thing where Ruby is just awkward instead of an outcast.
I'd make the grandparents the villains for basically the reasons you mentioned. Kraken granny being a proud warrior race person, but in a toxic where she views people that aren't like that as beneath her and the hypothetical mermaid granny controlling and toxic in that wealthy socialite stage parent kind of way. Chelsea's mom I'd make that she genuinely loves Chelsea, but is just so emotionally beaten apart that she's become a door mat to her mother as a result of "not having a voice"(she can talk, but can't sing to power the trident) with the grandparents then trying to bring their grandkids into the roles(Kraken granny by appealing to Ruby's want for more out of life and a schism from discovering her moms lies about her heritage, Mermaid granny by forcing Chelsea to come back against her will even though she's built a happier land on life). The contrast I'd make between Ruby and Chelsea would be that the latter already KNOWS how toxic the whole pointless drama between their grandparents is(the common folk are very much OVER the whole thing, but are unable to do much of anything against the "ruling elites" who have the powers if you will), while Ruby starts to question it and eventually have a fully Broken Pedestal when she sees her granny's attitude towards mermaids(big moment for this would be Chelsea having an emotional breakdown due her families control issues and running away with Ruby's granny hurtfully mocking Chelsea's mom about it).
The main conflict would be a succession crisis caused by the parents with Ruby's mom marrying someone her mom disapproved of due to not being a "proud warrior" and more of a humble down to earth guy and Chelsea's mom not being able to sing making it so neither holds the trident leading to the climax I'd change so that it's a storm happening during prom/homecoming that due to bad magic stuff spirals into a typhoon that both Chelsea and Ruby prevent with the human population discovering their secret and being cool with it. As an added thing to do I'd make Chelsea and Ruby openly lesbian as a diss on Disney's low effort and easily censored LGBT representation.
Not sure if it's any more original per se, but it beats the whole as another poster described,
Would probably still not be some kind of big hit, but at least do better and maybe acquire a decent cult following. Right now, people are pretty disappointed with it and the numbers paint a very Grim picture.
As some others have stated though, there IS a good movie about generational abuse(not sure I'd really call it that, but there's definitely a lot of family issues and miscommunication going on), but it feels like two different movies mashed together that they had mo idea how to handle.
Yeah, I do feel bad for this film since it's an original female-led story with a great cast and yet had dogshit advertising and a dogshit choice for a release date considering how stacked this summer is. At the same time, what I've read about this film (including spoilers because I can't help myself) doesn't have me compelled enough to lobby for me and the fam to see it in theaters at the moment.
Self-serious autistic trans gal who loves rock/metal and animation with all her heart. (she/her)Okay, so the box office ain't looking good even though its competition isn't doing so hot either, but at least Ruby Gillman can say she has an A- from CinemaScore.
So...silver linings? (*nervous grin*)
Edited by TargetmasterJoe on Jul 2nd 2023 at 5:08:41 AM
No, CinemaScore
is a US-based surveying company that gets responds from 25 major cities only in the United States (this is not be confused for an online aggregator like Rotten Tomatoes). That grade is the average from various theatergoers anonymously surveyed after walking out of a theater near its release.
X2: Yeah, that's pretty promising in a way. It's possible that maybe the film might gradually improve with word of mouth, since it's theorized that CinemaScore reflects on that better than most metrics.
x5:
For reference, Abominable managed to a television spin-off not too long ago.
Edited by XMenMutant22 on Jul 2nd 2023 at 6:46:58 AM
Listen spoiler etiquette for this movie is gonna be weird so just stop reading if you care.
I really feel like this movie is funny because everyone went in basically expecting Trailers Always Lie but then it's just, no, that's actually the movie.
So like. Where they being dishonest by being 100% honest? Is this a case of audience participation I Know You Know I Know? The mind boggles!
I honestly feel like the movie got chopped up somewhere along the line because it's funny to see the movie where racism grandma was right about being racist take so many steps to include background diversity.
The trailers weren't being dishonest... People just had a better version in their heads they wanted to see. The trailers were honest that the movie's conflict was going to be very generic.
I guess the trailers didn't really betray the generational trauma angle, but that angle didn't entice people as much as the hope of an Opposites Attract LGBT story with a nerdy kraken girl and a pretty Lovable Alpha Bitch mermaid.
Oissu!*checks YMMV page*
*sees Abandon Shipping entry*
*reads spoiler tag*
...Well, I'm a little bit sad now.
5x
The problem is that the first trailer gives us a shallow conflict premise. Krakens vs Mermaids sounds good as a teaser, but then I start noticing how there seems to be only one Mermaid as the villain. I'm like, so where are the rest of the mermaids? This Chelsea character is a classic Alpha Bitch, so I expect her to be surrounded by mermaid followers doing her bidding.
But there's not. Chelsea seems to be on her own despite being popular. And thus, we are left to assume that Chelsea is evil... because she's a mermaid. Not that she's the leader of a group of mermaids. Or that it's this particular mermaid that's evil. No, the trailer frames it as mermaids are Always Chaotic Evil and therefore, Chelsea is evil because she's one of them and not because her personality is the issue.
This leads to the question... what is the actual film hiding from us? There has to be a big twist regarding Chelsea because she lacks the typical villain resources to be a straight up villain as the trailer promotes.
And it turns out, the film did hide a twist... in that Chelsea was supposed to be Ruby's False Friend and was going to be revealed Evil All Along. In other words, she was a twist villain, except that the twist was ruined because the marketing wouldn't stop mentioning about how mermaids are evil just to be a Take That! to The Little Mermaid (2023).
It would be like if Zootopia's first trailer revealed that there was a deep conspiracy run by sheep, and then focus on Dawn Bellwether immediately after stating that fact. And keep in mind, twist villains in Disney films have been mocked and criticized by fans for a while.
So I believe that Ruby Gillman's problem is that it really wasn't clear on what the story is supposed to be about. I'm not sure if it's a marketing issue or that the story needs another rewrite, but the point remains the same. Ruby Gillman has potential to be a Dreamworks classic with actual depth and layers, continuing the trend with Puss in Boots and The Bad Guys... but instead opted to play safe and be a Shrek-lite film.
Edited by Shadao on Jul 2nd 2023 at 7:06:33 AM
One thing I will praise this movie is that... how to explain this... Most works that have sympathy and pathos for Fantasy Racism victims... kinda drop the ball when it comes to actual real life racism. Like the racist caricatures in early One Piece agaisnt (Not saying Usopp is one, I meant the black Buggy Pirate.) the very sympathetic deal Fishmen got. This one has very good real life actual representation... but has the "Fantastic Racism to the point of genocide is good actually." Aesop.
As long as this flower is in my heart. My Strength will flow without end.I had to reread that post because I got the wrong gist there for a second.
It's true though. I'm reminded of the Fantastic Racism shows that were popular when I was a kid, stuff like Alien Nation or sometimes Star Trek: The Next Generation where they explored the optics of race relations through white actors and white actors with rubber bits in their forehead.
I hope if there is a Netflix show or something in the future for this movie, that the mermaids get fleshed out. Since Chelsea/Nerissa is the only mermaid shown, it's possible that there are other mermaids who aren't evil. That would solve the unintentional subtext of "racist grandma was right!"
My best friend saw it, and she and I both interpreted the messaging differently. She was glad Chelsea/Nerissa didn't have a redemption arc, as it sent the message to young people that you should be careful who you trust, not everyone has your best interests at heart, and usually someone who stabs you in the back won't magically become a better person. I agreed that "be careful who you trust" is a good message to teach kids, but found it problematic because it still kinda implied that if your family warns you not to trust someone based on their race, you should listen to them...That would've been solved if, say, Chelsea had much-abused minions and at least one of them turns on her and sides with Ruby in the end.
Edited by Kae-Leah on Jul 2nd 2023 at 8:18:35 AM
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I think it would be interesting if Chelsea invited Ruby to join her group of mermaid friends, saying something along the lines of expanding their club diversity with other sea creatures and make peace with the Krakens. And Ruby accepting that offer means she's separated from her actual friends, in the same vein as Mean Girls, and becomes a more reckless troublemaker. And to ensure that it's Chelsea's personality that's the problem and not the species, a Token Good Teammate would be the one to help Ruby in her darkest hour, saying that she just wanted to give Chelsea what's rightfully hers (i.e. trident), not go back into another war with the Krakens.
I haven't seen this movie, but from what I can tell, it was sort of meant to be Shrek, but underwater. You know, Shrek was a subversive movie where the ogre, typically an evil monster, is actually the hero. And the traditionally good characters are actually evil. Shrek was huge, and people loved it. But there's a few differences.
One, the villain parody (Ariel) seems a little too on the nose here. Maybe they should have been more subtle about it.
Two, the (also subversive) love story was a big part of Shrek. Ruby Gillman doesn't have that, from what I hear. Maybe that's why some people thought that they were going to make the kraken and mermaid lesbians. But that obviously would have been a different movie, and that wasn't the story they wanted to tell here. The story here (like Shrek) was "Monster (in this case kraken) is good guy, traditionally good character (mermaid) is bad guy. Monster wins."
Maybe the movie would have been more popular if they gave Ruby a love interest.
Edited by JunkAction on Jul 3rd 2023 at 12:51:35 PM
@RacattackForce
Gonna be honest? I highly suspect that Abandon Shipping entry is jumping the gun. I wouldn't be surprised if the shipping in question persits in and thrives in fanfic.

This is the thread where you will discuss the currently-released DreamWorks Animation movie, Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken.
Edited by AxolotlFan on Jul 1st 2023 at 6:39:59 AM
Signature, schmignature!