Discussion Trivia / FrozenII

I have not taken part in the edits, but here are my two cents:

The question is whether the VA for Iduna is younger than the character she portrays, at the age at which the characters appears.

Iduna only appears in the flashbacks, where she is probably around 30-35 years old (she is probably around 12-14 when she leaves the forest, and the flashback seems to take place not too long before the beginning of Frozen, which happens 16 years before this movie, so the flashback happens roughly 20 years after she left the forest). Evan Rachel Wood was 31-32 when filming the movie. So the ages do match, give or take a few years, and Playing Gertrude does not apply.

However, Iduna's voice is heard in the ice memory of her and Agnarr's death conjured by Elsa. At that point, she is in her forties, so Play Gertrude does apply.

I don't think we have any clues of the age Iduna has in the ice memory Elsa sees of her in Ahtohallan during "Show yourself" (Iduna does not seem to noticeably age in the ten years between the flashback and her death and right now I don't remember if there is a telltale difference in her costume or hairdo). Story-wise, Elsa could be seeing her either as when she was little or as when she last saw her. So that one is inconclusive.

tl;dr: In my opinion, Playing Gertrude does apply, but only for Iduna's last words that we hear from the ice memory, not the flashback, and possibly during "Show yourself".

I think I agree. She's age-appropriate for the scene in the beginning, so that part does't seem to be the trope. While I suspect that the "Show Yourself" vision is of Iduna as Elsa last saw her, it's speculative enough that it probably shouldn't be added.

The ice statue part is borderline. If she's 12-14 in the scenes where we see her as a child, then she would be about 47 when she dies, give or take about a year. And the statue is of Iduna when she had an eighteen-year-old daughter, and while ERW was technically old enough for that if she had a particularly early teenage pregnancy, it's pushing it. If there's a consensus reached on here, that part can probably be added as an example of the trope without too much editing back-and-forth.

I couldn't agree more. It totally counts as an example of Playing Gertrude. Given the fact that ERW was born in 1987, 7 years younger than Kristen Bell & 16 years younger than Idina Menzel! Adult Anna & Elsa may not have shared scenes with ERW but it doesn't really depend on that. All it depends on is the age of the actresses, regardless of whether they actually share scenes with each other or not. Technically, Elsa ran into a vision of her mother, so it's definitely a prime example. Whatever the case, it still qualifies as Playing Gertrude. I mean already it's listen on the Playing Gertrude page and there was no debate there. So why does this debate have to occur here? So can we please officially keep the playing gertrude example on the Trivia page? I'd genuinely appreciate that. 😉

The conversation could be held on the trope's discussion page instead of this one, but because there's been some back-and-forth in the edits, there has to be one before someone gets suspended for an Edit War.

While specifically sharing scenes isn't required, it looks like a key part of the trope is that the age of the actress doesn't fit the plausible age of the character in relation to her family, particularly her children. ERW's casting and Iduna's design works fine for the first flashback where Anna and Elsa are children because it makes sense for Iduna to be that age at the time. The vision in "Show Yourself" can be from any time, so similar story there.

But the scene with the ice memory from the boat does seem to be an example, because it takes place when Iduna's oldest child is eighteen, and ERW is pretty young to be the mother of someone that age.