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sigh How many film adaptations have there been of Peter Pan  at this point? Like, I get it, Disney. You're remaking everything. But Peter Pan , more than any other Disney film has just been done before...so. many. times. And it's really hard to (1) do something different -- like Hook , which I don't care how it did at the box office, is an absolute treasure and (2) to be faithful to Barrie's original script/vision for the story. Because then Hook would have to be quasi sympathetic (not an out-and-out villain), and Peter would have to be a bit evil, since Barrie's point was that children can be callous and cruel and selfish.  So...yeah. Variety didn't offer many details on the plot/story, or even if Jude Law would also be playing Mr. Darling -- which if he isn't, is a travesty.  Also...I feel like Jude Law is just casting Jason Isaacs 2.0 ? via storywarren * Like, doesn't Isaacs-as-Mr.-Darling look  like Jude Law?! I haven't seen the 2003 version of Peter Pan   in a while, but I remember really enjoying it... *Sidebar: If you visit the link for the photo credit, the author, Helena Sorenson, seems blown away that the producers decided to cast Jason Isaacs as both Mr. Darling and Captain Hook, like it was some amazingly inventive idea. Which....Nope. (She also reduces Peter Pan  to a story about "the wonder of childhood and the bittersweet beauty of growing up" so...) There's been some debate over the deeper meaning behind the dual-casting, but Peter Pan was originally a stage play, with Gerald du Maurier (uncle to the boys who partly inspired Peter Pan ) playing both roles. On the one hand, this was purely for financial reasons -- pay one actor to play both parts -- but it also works like the dual casting in Hamilton . Daveed Diggs plays both LaFayette and  Jefferson because (1) they're not on stage at the same time; and (2) the audience has already established a connection with the actor. It might be more akin to Anthony Ramos playing both John Laurens and Philip Hamilton, as the audience is already mourning Laurens at the end of Act I, and that connection spills over (given Philip's ultimate fate). But on the other hand: Peter Pan  is inherently about growing up -- specifically Peter's fear of growing up and being a "man" -- and both Mr. Darling and Hook represent the exact type of adult Peter fears growing into: ineffectual and dishonorable. Whether Barrie realized that or whether it was a subconscious, Freudian decision isn't fully clear...

About three weeks ago, there were several Twitter threads that went viral over petitions to retheme Disney's Splash Mountain, and some concept art that showed how Disney could do it. I've been working on a post responding to that, and I'll hopefully finish it and post it anyway, since we now have a decision about what Disney is doing. Yep, that's right. The Internet won actually won. Well -- maybe. According to the Disney Parks Blog , this retheme is a project " Imagineers have been working on since last year." Okay. Let's pause for a second. Before we go any  further, let's make one thing explicitly clear. There are many  things Disney does well -- their customer service is the industry standard and their animated films have won 13 out of the 19 Academy Awards given to feature-length animated films. They are trailblazers and innovators in many ways -- but not really when it comes to cultural politics. Angharad N. Valdivia says it best: "...to be sure, Disney does not pursue new representational strategies unless it is certain that profits will increase without alienating the bulk of its audience."  " Unless it is certain that profits will increase without alienating the bulk of its audience." Hold on to that thought. Let's go back a bit further. via Etsy Splash Mountain is one of the "three Disney Mountains": Space, Thunder, and Splash. For as far back as my memory goes (which isn't 100% reliable, mind you) -- they were the only three "real" coasters in Disney World, certainly in Magic Kingdom. [There was a push in the late 1990s-early 2000s to open bigger thrill rides as Disney tried to compete with other parks and attract "older" crowds: Rock n' Roller Coaster and Test Track opened in 1999; Tower of Terror opened in 1994, and Expedition Everest in 2006.] But Splash Mountain has been in Magic Kingdom since 1992 (!!!), and even longer in Disneyland, since 1989. It's a testament to my Dad's love for Disney, that I remember when Splash Mountain opened at Disney World. We weren't there for opening day or anything, but I remember that it was still new enough for the lines to be insanely long. Perhaps not Galaxy's Edge long, but long enough for the early '90s. I think we must have waited at least 2 hours in line -- I remember the sticky Florida heat, the fans and misters Disney had set up to cool guests snaking through the queue, and I remember being grateful every time the queue wound around into a shady spot. (I also remember my dad grumbling that no ride could be worth a wait this long, but at least it was better than the Thunder Mountain line, which packs guests in like sardine with little ventilation/air circulation.) The basic premise of Splash Mountain -- as one of the things that sets Disney apart from other amusement parks is that rides, and queues, actually tell a story -- is that Br'er Rabbit, bored at home, leaves the Briar Patch to go on adventures. He's constantly pursued by Br'er Fox and Br'er Bear, who through typical villainous trickery, try to capture him -- but the wily Br'er Rabbit escapes every time. Until the last -- when he's caught in the Laughing Place. Br'er Fox ties him up and makes to roast him -- with Br'er Rabbit desperately trying to escape. Cue the big drop of the log flume ride, and when you make it to the bottom, drenched and giddy, everything ends happily, with "Zip A Dee Do Dah" playing as you coast past a riverboat celebration and Br'er Rabbit content at home. (It is a Disney ride, after all.) At ~10 minutes, it's one of the longest rides/attractions in a Disney park, which usually means it's worth the wait. Disney scholars and aficionados will know, of course, that this isn't an independent, original ride -- like, say, Figment's Journey Into Imagination , which exists outside of any Disney movie or TV show. [Sidebar: Don't you dare touch this ride, Disney! Between Figment and the Sherman Brothers' "One Little Spark," this is pure Disney magic.] It's hard for me to guess at what the average Disney-goes knows about this ride -- that is, if they know that Splash Mountain is   tied to a Disney film; if they know that "Zip A Dee Do Dah" comes from that film and not this ride; if they know that film is 1946's Song of the South ; if they know anything about the controversy and legacy surrounding that film. Suffice it to say, and this is what that other post deals with, Song of the South   is  a controversial film and one of the only films to remain in the Disney Vault after Disney moved their entire catalog to Disney+. The film is set in the Reconstruction Era -- not an antebellum one -- and is loosely  based on the Br'er Rabbit stories of Joel Chandler Harris. On the one hand, the film portrays black people happily working on a plantation, even after they've been freed, echoing Br'er Rabbit's sentiment of, " Home sweet home is the lesson today. Oh, I'm thru with moving on now..."  On the other hand, Walt though the film would be a cornerstone of his legacy, and paints the "outsider" characters -- and the storytellers -- as the positives ones, and implicitly criticizes the upper-class whites and their lifestyle. Like, I said. Controversial. Okay, back to June 2020 -- a firestorm of a year if ever there was one -- and the Black Lives Matter movement has shifted national attention away from the Coronavirus Pandemic. Rightfully so. Change is slowly burning -- like Mississippi changing it's state flag , Quaker Oats is "retiring" Aunt Jemima , and Ben & Jerry's offered us both a powerful statement about dismantling white supremacy AND a new flavor of ice cream, Empower Mint. And while this change is good, long overdue, and sorely needed -- it has to be just the beginning. Which brings us back to Valdivia: Disney will not pursue new representational strategies unless it is certain that profits will increase without alienating the bulk of its audience ." Meaning: Disney isn't going to be progressive unless they know it's a fiscally sound decision. Exhibit A: Disney has been making feature-length animated films since 1937 -- but they didn't feature a black protagonist until 2009's The Princess and the Frog . And I genuinely don't believe that it's a coincidence that Obama was elected POTUS in 2008. It seems a bit reductive to equate being ready for a black Disney Princess with being ready for a black president, but I think they are related. So, yes. I believe that the Very Important People at Disney have been discussing this retheme for at least a year -- I'd even bet that it's been longer than that, as the calls to retheme Splash Mountain certainly aren't new. But the timing....just seems too "perfect." The tweets and concept art went viral around June 9, 2020. The Disney Parks Blog announcement is from June 25th. A little over two weeks is just about the amount of time it seems is needed to draw up concept art and draft the press release. After all, if it had  been in the works, why not release the news immediately after the tweets went viral? I don't doubt that this was in the works -- and it's not like Disney execs haven't been busy with other things like a global pandemic disrupting their billion dollar daily operations -- but now  they have "proof" that they won't alienate the bulk of their audience. As for my personal feelings...well, as far as they matter, there is a part of me that's sad that I won't experience with my kids the Splash Mountain that I first experienced with my family -- and remember so vividly. That being said, (1) there are plenty of other rides that are still the exact same as they were in the 1990s when I first rode them -- again, DON'T TAKE MY FIGMENT, DISNEY. And (2) my kids have no idea who Br'er Rabbit or Br'er Fox are -- but they know and love Tiana. So the ride will probably be more meaningful for them with the new storyline. As a general rule, I'm reluctant to endorse Disney's retheming of classic rides. In particular, I'm thinking of Maelstrom in the Norway pavilion, which was totally revamped to meet the success of and demands for Frozen . Don't get me wrong -- it's a great ride, with amazing animatronics, but...I loved Maelstrom. And I loved that EPCOT was always just a little bit disconnected from the entertainment side. Not everything has to be synergistically connected to a film or TV show -- look at Figment, look at Tower of Terror, look at Expedition Everest. They're all successful and all independent of Intellectual Properties (IPs). And, yes. Expecting a park that was established in 1955 (or, 1971) to remain unchanged is naive and unfeasible -- and even counter to Walt's own dreams for the parks. So I think this change is needed -- and will be a good one. I just hope that it doesn't open the flood gates for unnecessary  changes. (I know there may be other conversations, like this one, about other rides. I don't mean those changes.)

Since Stitch was unaffectionately known as Experiment 626, Disney fans have dubbed June 26th -- 6/26 -- as Stitch Day.

With Summer Term II and a new Disney seminar about to start, I thought it was high time I dipped my toes back into blogging. If I'll be asking my students to write on a semi-regular basis, I should be doing the same. I've got a couple of longer posts in the works, but I thought I'd start with a quick update. Now, disclaimer: I love me some rose gold. After a violent anti-pink phases that lasted through the majority of my childhood and adolescence, I came to the realization that, yes, I actually like the color and I could trounce gender stereotypes and still embrace the color. And what I love about rose gold -- particularly Disney's sparkly version -- is that it's feminine without being too bold: So, objectively speaking, I love the rose gold vibes. What I do not  love, however, is the rose gold look on my iconic Cinderella castle. Now that I've visited both parks, I'm admittedly torn on which is actually my favorite -- but I think Disneyland might have a slight edge, so much so that our first family trip to Disney (now postponed indefinitely) was going to be there, rather than to (the geographically closer) Disney World. But when it comes to castle? Hands down, Cinderella Castle in WDW is my favorite. I mean, LOOK AT HER. She is stunning and turning that corner on Main Street, catching that first glimpse -- never fails to give me goosebumps. Also? That silver/blue color scheme with a hint of gold? Perfectly captures Cinderella -- whose dress I'm never sure if it's actually blue or silver. That's not to say that Sleeping Beauty's Castle in Disneyland isn't  beautiful -- just beautiful in her own way. She's smaller, of course, as is Disneyland (comparatively). She has to be -- she's plopped in the middle of Anaheim. Turning that corner on Main Street, I still get goosebumps, but my initial thought is always, " Gosh, I forgot just how small she actually is ." The color scheme though? The pink and blue refresh works -- it embodies Sleeping Beauty (and Flora and Merrywether) perfectly. The castles -- and their color schemes -- match both their respective parks and  their namesake princesses. So...I am confused by -- and not happy about -- this new makeover Cinderella Castle received for the upcoming 50th anniversary of Walt Disney World. Check it out: WHAT.   What is this?! I get  that 50th anniversaries are symbolized by gold, but this is decidedly rose gold and not, you know, traditional gold, which would have worked given the original color scheme of the castle. It's a bold choice -- and one which makes my iconic castle look she's trying too much to emulate her older sister.  Look, I know it's probably (hopefully?) temporary, and after the 2+ years of anniversary celebrations (because Disney loves to milk a celebration), it will go back to normal. It better.  I know that the Birthday Cake Castle for the 25th Anniversary was loathed by many -- my 12 year old self thought it was fun -- and everything went back to normal. I know people hated the Sorcerer's Hat in MGM, the Mickey Hands on top of Spaceship Earth -- and it was all temporary.  So this had better be temporary too. 🤞

We talk about this a lot in my Disney classes, but so often, it's the female characters who are the focus of at best discussion, at worst criticism in Disney films. (With the exception of Pixar. Because Pixar has this weird obsession with male leads . And just when we think they're making progress with films like Brave and Toy Story 4 , which feature Merida and Bo Peep & Jessie, we get Onward . Don't even get me started on Onward . I am...not impressed by the trailer.) And while the heroines (and, to some extent, the villains) of Disney Princess movies aren't necessarily fully-fleshed out characters, they're at least better than the Disney Princes . After all, Snow White's prince doesn't even have a name ( I refuse to believe it's "Florian" ), and Cinderella's love interest is known simply as "Prince Charming". It's not until we get to Sleeping Beauty  that the prince even has a name and actual dialogue.  This is, of course, something that's changing in more recent films. Speaking of the 2015 live-action Cinderella , screenwriter Chris Weitz says, "Prince Charming is something of a cypher in the animated (1950) version and the Grimm and Perrault talks. I felt that whereas it was acceptable and even useful to have him be essentially symbolic in earlier versions (it was just enough that he was rich and important and handsome), an audience today demands a bit more in terms of identification." Kristoff isn't technically a prince (yet) -- I'm hoping for a Frozen III where Kristoff and Anna get married and Elsa brings Honeymarren as her date -- but the ideas are the same: it's not enough that he's Anna's True Love, we have to know more about him to understand why Anna loves him. (Frankly, his relationship with Sven is enough for me: he's goofy and good with animals.) And, as Kristen Bell points out to Jimmy Fallon, it's equally important to know why he loves her and to see  him loving her. It's not something we get enough of, and can go a long way in changing the narrative that leads to Toxic Masculinity.

When it comes to watching Disney movies, I find it very hard to take off my academic cap and just enjoy the movie. I'm constantly analyzing and looking for little details. While I sometimes wish I could just enjoy them like I do other movies, I actually really enjoy it -- especially when I see some progress and development in the Disney Princess brand. One of the biggest criticisms lobbed against Disney films is their whitewashing of history -- it started, perhaps, with Song of the South , and didn't really get better with Pocahontas  or The Princess and the Frog . Critics point out that relations between two tension-charged groups -- the Native Americans and the English settlers in the former, and whites and blacks in the latter -- were not as simple or positive as they're portrayed in the animated films; defenders retort that that they're children's films and, as such, can't possibly address the complexities of racial dynamics in 90 minutes nor should they.  Both sides are right: Disney isn't  creating a documentary or a historical film; they're producing a fairy-tale film. (Whether Pocahontas -- a real historical figure -- has a fairy-tale story and whether Disney should have set a film in 1920s Louisiana are entirely different questions.) And the defenders are right, too: even if Disney had a moral obligation to accurately represent history, it'd be almost impossible to do in a 90-minute film.  So the question then becomes -- and I love discussing it with my students -- what should Disney do? How can they not sidestep sensitive issues but still do them justice?  And this is where Frozen II  comes in: the basic gist of the plot (and I think this is mostly apparent from the trailer), there's a conflict between the Arendellians and the native people in the film, the Northundra (who, I think, are modeled after the Sami tribe, the native people of Norway/Scandinavia). The story of the conflict is initially filtered through Elsa and Anna's father, who doesn't know what happened because he was outside the forest and knocked unconscious. But the elemental spirits of the forest basically keep people in and "lock" out the outside world. But here's the significant part: the arc of the film is basically Elsa uncovering the truth of what happened, of why the spirits were angered. And the reason, as Elsa learns, is that Elsa's grandfather betrayed the Northundra, building the dam under the guise of peace and unity, but really doing it to gauge the strength and size of the Northundra tribe. His reason? He was pissed off that they were independent and wanted them to swear allegiance to him. The moment he kills the Northundra leader is the moment the spirits "revolt" for lack of a better term, and there's a more complicated, but beautiful, resolution to the story, one which ends with a message of true peace and unity. Why is this so important? Well, aside from the fact that Elsa and Anna's grandfather is basically a symbol of some ye olden days Fragile Toxic Masculinity, he represents that colonial, imperialist mindset of "white is right" and that native people should swear fealty to him simply because of the crown he wears. In the film, the Northundra are portrayed relatively flat, but they're kind people who seem intent on harmony and peace. (I'm thinking of Pocahontas , where each group views the other as "savage," and equally at fault, when, in reality, the English settlers bear the majority of the blame and fault.) While there's a bit of a problem in locating that mindset in just one character -- in Pocahontas , it's Ratcliffe; once he's gone, all the English settlers are totally fine with everything; here, it's the grandfather who seems to be the sole prejudiced one -- what's important is that Elsa and Anna's grandfather is portrayed as wrong, and his beliefs are firmly and clearly denounced by both Elsa and Anna. Both sisters understand why  their grandfather's actions were unforgivable and also understand what they need to do make things right and restore balance. And, in this case, that means appeasing the Elemental spirits and making reparations by destroying the dam. Is it a perfect depiction of complex inter-racial relations? Of course not. It is, after all, an animated film with a target demographic of preschoolers and elementary schoolers. And there are lots of unanswered questions, but... Does it attempt to handle complex issues better than its predecessors did? Yes, I would say so. And, what's more important, is that I think it lays the groundwork for important future discussions. I think it opens the door to have early conversations about imperialism and colonialism and how some people, even people we thought were good and right, did some truly bad things. From there? There are so many places to go.

This afternoon, my husband I were fortunate enough to have a Double-Feature Date Afternoon. We saw Knives Out  first -- which was a fantastic WhoDunIt and just an overall delightful romp -- and then saw Frozen 2 . Disclaimer: I haven't read any reviews and managed to stay largely spoiler-free. I had read some "first reactions" -- those Twitter responses about people's early responses to the film which are largely vague and non-specific and which don't give away any specific details -- and that was all I knew. Most of them were positive -- I feel like there was one lukewarm response which basically said it "was good, but not as good as the first," (important to note that it was written by a man) -- which reassured me . Disney sequel s are, after all, usually things that go straight-to-vide o and aren't very good. (The only sequels I can think of are The Rescuers Down Under  -- because The Rescuers were. my. jam. -- and Ralph Breaks the Internet ...somebody correct me if I'm wrong.) I knew that the film was darker, had supposedly matured with its audience, and that a good deal of people believed it was unnecessary. I have thoughts. Lots of thoughts. But here's the gist of them: Frozen II is not  the movie I thought it was going to be, and that's okay, because it turned out to be the Disney Princess Movie I needed. And, more importantly, I think it's the Disney Princess Movie that I needed to see as a young girl, that the brand needs, and that little girls (and boys) need. Spoilery thoughts below. Let me start with an anecdote, from a time that's been on my mind a lot lately: Late 2011 to late 2012: I had met my-now-husband in June of 2011, and after a very random and un-me trip to the Philippines for his best friend's wedding, I was pretty sure he was The One. I spent the early part of 2011 with a broken heart and grieving the loss of something that I thought was It For Me (clearly, it wasn't). When I had to start a PhD program in Columbia SC, I was fraught with anxiety because (1) I had just learned the hard way that Long Distance Relationships end badly more often than not (there were other reasons, of course, but still) and (2) I didn't want to jeopardize the future I was beginning to see as a very real possibility. Long story short -- I left the program and moved back to Cary and in with him. For the record, I have never once regretted that decision. I knew it was the right move, and everything has worked out fine. That was, however, less clear to me, especially over the summer and into the Fall. I had had an adjunct position at Duke, which came with no certainty, so in the summer of 2012, I had no job, no prospects, and I was unsure of what would come next. There was a moment, when I was outside cleaning up dog poop, when I just broke down in tears and started sobbing. After all, this was not the Happily Ever After I had envisaged for myself -- this was not how things were supposed to be. This -- and this is the important bit -- was not what happened to a Disney Princess. One of the universal "truths" that has come out of teaching my Disney class, is that everyone  is affected, in some way, by the Disney movies they watch as kids. The Disney critics and I agree on that. What we don't agree on is what exactly those kids take away from the movies. The critics believe it's all the harmful messages about passive women and ugly villains. And that may be true. But it's not universal. What I took away from The Little Mermaid  for instance is (1) that Eric is A Very Good Guy because he has a dog, and is willing to risk his life for that dog; and (2) that a daughter who has a tempestuous relationship with her over-protective, narrow-minded and arguably prejudiced father can still work things out and end in a happy place. So, yes. I watched a lot of Disney movies as a kid -- and I watched a large amount of those "dangerous" Disney Princess movies with fake-feminist heroines and dashing heroes who vanquish the evil and save the day while the princess does little-to-nothing. And even though I turned out fine  -- I'd like to think I'm an independent woman and not a passive damsel-in-distress, some of the more insidious messages still sunk in -- particularly the ones about Happily Ever Afters. Which brings me back to Frozen II . Because much like Ralph Breaks the Internet , Frozen II  is a movie about what happens after  the supposed Happily Ever After. The former explores the evolving nature of friendships -- how people, and thus relationships, change, and how that's okay. The latter takes a more introspective look, but given that Frozen  is, for all intents and purposes, a part of the Disney princess franchise, I think that that's all the more important. Yes, it's true that Frozen II  is darker, both in tone and content. There are fewer jokes, fewer light-hearted moments, fewer silly interactions. Part of that is a benefit of the film being a sequel: we already know Kristoff is goofy in his voicing Sven; we already know Anna is adorkable and relatable and clumsy. But it's also a result of the characters growing -- and, as the few Tweets I did read pointed out -- the audience is growing too. Kristoff is preoccupied with proposing (more on that in a minute) and Anna is less clumsy, more mature -- but still relatable. The reasoning is that the same little kids who saw Frozen  the first time and endlessly belted out "Let It Go" are older now, but the thing about Disney movies is that they're cyclical: there will always  be new little kids watching Frozen  and then moving on to Frozen II . And they may watch them back to back or in the span of a few days -- they may not wait years in between. But the messages will still be there. As we were leaving, my husband asked me what I thought, asked if it was everything I thought it would be. I replied that, no, it wasn't at all what I thought it would be, but it was better: it was the Disney Princess movie I needed to see as a little girl. The moment that resonated with me the most was, interestingly, an Anna moment. (If you know me at all, you know my love for Elsa, based largely on her character development in the first film when she makes a deeply personal decision that flies in the face of what's expected of her; see the anecdote above for why .) But there's the moment for Anna, when everything seems lost -- Olaf is fading, which has is particularly gut-wrenching for Anna, because if Olaf is fading, it's because Elsa's magic is fading too -- and she has hit -- literally -- rock bottom. She's curled up on the floor, grief-stricken in a way that's much more poignant and mature than the end of "Do You Want To Build A Snowman." Her song -- and Kristen Bell, whom I already adored, emotes this song so. damn. well -- captures a very relatable feeling in much the same way that "Let It Go" did: I've seen dark before / But not like this    This is cold / this is empty / this is numb   The life I knew is over / the lights are out   Hello darkness / I'm ready to succumb  As someone who's struggled with anxiety and some moments of depression, I cannot tell you just how important this moment was: here is a young woman -- a DISNEY PRINCESS -- struggling with something real . Not a fairy-tale obstacle, or a Disney villain, but real loss, real grief, real confusion, real despair. [*Edit: I know full well that fairy tales often deal with very dark and very real emotions/themes. But they're often short, and often abstract -- the power of the visual medium combined with a concrete depiction is what I'm going for here.] I'm not saying that past Disney princesses don't feel, don't suffer -- of course they do. But (1) they're usually presented as the melodramatic, histrionic emotions of a teenage girl -- how many of the Disney princess run away sobbing and then fling themselves down to cry? I can think of at least 6 off the top of my head -- and (2) the short span of a children's film doesn't allow for complex character development. My first thought was Rapunzel: here is a girl who suffers 17 years of emotional abuse from her kidnapper-posing-as-her-mother and, with the exception of her freak-out when she leaves the tower for the first time, seems largely okay. Now, I love Tangled, and I think it's actually a pretty progressive Disney Princess film that does a lot of things well, but you can't spend time accurately reflecting Rapunzel's emotional journey because pacing, because target audience, because because because. But in a sequel? When we already know Anna? We can absolutely give those emotions their due. We can show a Disney princess struggling, grieving, despairing,  feeling. And, yes, it's still a Disney movie, so things are going to resolve rather quickly: it's still a fairy tale with a happy ending. But what does Anna do next? I can't find my direction / I'm all alone    The only star that guided me was you    How to rise from the floor    When it's not you I'm rising for?   Just do the next right thing / Take a step, step again   It is all that I can do / The next right thing   She gets up,  puts one foot in front of the other, and focuses on the "next right thing." The power of that message...of that visual...? I can't know for sure how Little Me would have reacted in the summer of 2012 if she'd had that message repeated for her over and over again in her formative years, but I truly believe that it would have been a powerful touchstone for her to draw on in that moment. Hell, it's a powerful touchstone for me to draw on now . Another thought, a little less coherent than my ones on Anna. One of the other comments I had heard floated around was that the music wasn't as good, wasn't as catchy and was basically musical exposition. Which, for the record, I emphatically disagree with. My concern, after listening to "Into the Unknown" the first few times was that it wouldn't be as "universal" as "Let It Go." That is, "Let It Go" became the phenomenon it did because of the universality of the message: the concept of breaking free of the expectations placed on you by others to be true to yourself was taken up by so many as an anthem of personal empowerment -- rightfully so. And I wasn't sure if "Into The Unknown" would have the same universality... BUT. As I was watching the song within the context of the film, I began to rethink that position. After all, what happens after  that moment of freeing empowerment? What if, after you've changed, your situation, your place needs to change? And what if after such a big upheaval or transformation you stay out of comfort, out of complacency, out of fear? I'm sorry, secret siren / but I'm blocking out your calls I've had my adventure / I don't need something new I'm afraid of what I'm risking if I follow you... Paired with "Show Yourself" -- and I think together  the two songs are the new "Let It Go" if you can even have another "Let It Go" -- I think the two songs tap into something just as deep and universal. I don't think the songs are "exposition" -- I think they're the logical sequel to "Let It Go." I also think that this story -- and the music -- works because of the presence of women. I think Jennifer Lee and Kristen Anderson-Lopez helped this story succeed by ensuring that it was, at the heart of it, a female story. This is a story, to me, that speaks deeply to what it means to find yourself as a young woman and the pressures you face*, both external and internal. And that's a nuanced story that the brand hasn't yet had a chance to tell.** (Logically, I feel that Moana  comes closest -- which makes sense, since it's the newest.) *That's (part of) the reason, I think, why Kristoff is so wonderful. I've seen headlines with his lines about asking Anna what she needs (instead of assuming) and his declaration that "his love is not fragile." It's important for boy viewers as well, but works "better" for me than, say, Flynn's saving Rapunzel at the end of Tangled  (largely because he did An Important Thing With Important Consequences without getting her consent). **Again, I think Tangled  comes pretty close to this -- and definitely tells an equally important story in the TV show about how "happily ever after" doesn't mean perfect. But the feature-films will always  have more power imbued in them, and their messages will be, I think, more far-reaching and have the potential for greater impact. All of this to say: Frozen II   is a movie I will happily show my son and daughter many times, because I think it's one they need  to see. So thank you, Disney. Thank you for telling this story. PS: I have thoughts on a much less significant, but equally important, aspect of this movie that I want to circle back to.