You guys all brought up some good points. There's nothing wrong with a villain being unapologetically evil, of course. My best friend, who has an awesome blog called the Princess Blog, had a different take on this movie than me because she really liked the "be careful who you trust" message, and felt like the constant redemption arcs in children's media lately could even be giving kids unrealistic expectations. After all, in real life, of course some people are just bad, period. But with all that said...I think what, like others have said, it comes off as, admittedly probably unintentionally, as a racial subtext is that both the marketing and characters' words kept saying mermaids in general were evil, even though in it was actually more like a specific individual. Some relatively minor tweaks to the script could've helped that if it was clear that the conflict was about the Mermaid Queen as an individual being an evil monarch and not with the entire species. Like, what if during her exposition, Grandmamah talked about how The Mermaid Queen was a horrible tyrant who abused even her own people? Even just saying "I know not all mermaids are evil but..." would help a bit. Considering all the evil actions in the movie were actually done by one individual, it seems especially odd that both the movie's marketing and some of the dialogue in the movie made it sound like all mermaids were evil, as opposed to "THIS mermaid is evil!".
Edited by Kae-Leah on Jul 4th 2023 at 12:08:36 PM
![]()
That's correct. It's canon in both the Broadway stage play and the live-action remake that she's his sister. The original animated movie is more ambiguous, as it never says she's his sister, but it still was something they intended to do in earlier drafts etc.
Edited by Kae-Leah on Jul 4th 2023 at 12:11:40 PM
We are going too off-topic here. This is not the Disney animated films thread. Please rerail.
Macron's notesI mean they dropped it in a packed month with advertising that turned people off and the digital release is already around the corner. I don't imagine they have a ton of investment in continuing the franchise.
Shame. I'm sure someday we'll have a giant kaiju girl story that was inspired by this in the author's youth though.
I'm sorry this movie failed and that it's accidentally? racist Aesop turns me off from watching it in theatres at any rate. Maybe vod because I did think the art style was cute and squishy, an interesting look.
see my completed Tangled (Varian) fanfic collection! https://archiveofourown.org/works/24467056/chapters/59049532
Yeah that really is the recurring complaint.
It's true that they're probably doing the Shrek-alike framing where the traditional monster is actually the good guy and the traditional cute magic creature... Isn't.
A part of the difficulty selling that though is it's kind of old hat by now. A lot of kid's media leans into Creepy Good nowadays. That's what you get for letting goths write cartoons.
Edited by ShirowShirow on Jul 4th 2023 at 9:21:17 AM
You are not alone.
Pretty much. It's all down to performance and presentation, which is where the film kind of flopped at as others have pointed out. It seems to be an issue of Dream Works's inability to not get out of its own way when it comes to dissing Disney.
Hey this is the only recent time they've swiped at Disney which leads into a thing I want to put in my response to ![]()
. Things ebb and flow and there is a right time for a thing to click with audiences and another this same thing will be offputting.
![]()
"the traditional monster is actually the good guy and the traditional cute magic creature"
Which honestly makes the movie feel like it missed the mark because Ruby looks nothing like a dangerous monster and is arguably much more adorable and cute than the mermaids whether in small or big form.
It worked with Shrek bc while Shrek wasn't as ugly as the books or other depictions of ogres he was still fat and had gonky facial features
The Krakens should have been like Dave from Penguins od Madagascar, looking like actual cephalaopds in their true form instead of cute four legged alien girls.
Which is a missed opportunity for this film to do something different and original than generic schlock but eh. Maybe another studio will have weird Ugly Cute cephalopod people as the heroes.
Edited by Moroaica on Jul 4th 2023 at 3:56:52 AM
x4: I'm genuinely confused if this is supposed to be a counter argument, because the Inklings generally follow the exact same Cute Monster Girl design philosophy that the final Gillman designs have (even down to the Tentacle Hair, but some do have barnacles). The Inklings are arguably more humanoid because they even have common human skin tones by default, along with prominent noses.
As an aside, some artists that have worked on the film are posting some behind the scenes work.
- Lutgardo Fernández's Mermaid and Mermen
concept designs. On that note, I don't think we ever saw any mermen in the final movie. It could be a blink or miss aspect during Grandmamah's lore dump, but I predominately remember both sides of the Kraken and Mermaid feud were women.
- Danny William's
sculpts from 2017. One early Giant Krakken Ruby model really leans into the Creepy Good aspect.
- Timothy Lamb's depiction of Giant Kraken Ruby
and Ruby with Connor
.
Edited by XMenMutant22 on Jul 4th 2023 at 9:41:45 AM
It's more at the, "Major studios won't do cephalopod characters because too weird" and Nintendo did just that to the tune of MILLIONS of dollars(granted lots of cute monster design like you said, but it just shows it's possible).
I don't know about Vindicated by History or why Girl-Show Ghetto is being brought up with this one since that's not why it's getting thawcked so hard. I think it'll still be remembered as more of an okay film, but not quite to the level if vindication. It's not hated, but more viewed with disappointment.
Ironically, this portrayal of mermaids being predatory monsters does fit with the traditional folklore surrounding mermaids. It's really Disney's Little Mermaid that made the image of mermaids as cute and friendly popular.
So this movie's antagonist is basically a mermaid who looks like Ariel but is more like traditional mermaids.
Disgusted, but not surprised
And the mermaid-kraken war continue into this day.
"is there anything that isn't old hat now? "
Is more "everying is old but not everything is old right now" as other said it goes into cycle when cliche got into a rest time while the new exciting thing goes old.
If anything it look we are entering the phase were old "villians for villians sake" become popular again after the whole "emotional protagonist and trauma" go old already
"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

![[up] [up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png)
![[up] [up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png)
Yes, but this movie does spouse all mermaids are evil and destroying them is a good idea. The Little Mermaid didnt outright say "Everyone in Ursula's species is evil."
As long as this flower is in my heart. My Strength will flow without end.