Just out of curiosity, when did Merida need help from a man? The only men as even semi-main characters I remember being in the film were her brothers, father and Mor’du (the last of which was an antagonist, so I don’t see how he would help her?). It’s not the fact that “women shouldn’t need help from a man” that’s trying to be pressed here- it’s more the idea that “people can be independent and strong and do things on their own if they try”. In general, the characters that “don’t get helped by men” also don’t get helped by other women, either.

Well, I guess you also find Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Esmeralda, Meg, Jane, Mulan, Tiana, Rapunzel, and Merida bad role models. THEY ALL GOT RESCUED OR HELPED BY A MAN. Jasmine, Esmeralda, and Merida particularly get rescued quite a bit, despite being “feminist” characters. What a disgusting sexist view, that a woman is bad for needing a man’s help and a man isn’t good enough to help a woman. Goodness, girl, I hope you never, ever need a man’s help with anything, be it life threatening or just lifting heavy furniture. You might have to call yourself a bad role model. Haha.

People with your attitude are why I feel so frustrated with the Disney fandom. It’s okay to shame the old princesses for not being aggressively comptemporized (which is not only annoying, but highly unrealistic) and, really, just not fitting in with modern feminist doctrine that women need to be masculine or outspoken to be good, but you can’t say one word about the newer more self-absorbed, rebellious ones (which is exactly why I dislike most of them- they constantly think only about themselves and are rarely responsible). you present the straw feminist argument that if a woman doesn’t go around physically doing things she “needs rescuing” and is therefore a bad role model.

Aurora is one of the best. She is one of the most selfless princesses. Like Belle, she wants more, but is also too loyal and responsible to go after an adventure or anything. She loves and trusts her aunts, unlike pretty much every single heroine after her who think they know better than their own parents. *eye roll* She does the unselfish act of going to the castle to marry someone she doesn’t know to keep peace between kingdoms because she knows it is the right thing to do. Aurora is basically dutiful. Really, I’m seeing a lot of parallels between her and Elsa’s personalities. They’re both so responsible, selfless, gentle, and sweet. Disney would do well to acknowledge that it’s actually okay to have characters like this- GOOD, even. Not everyone relates to or likes the rebellious/tomboyish/self-serving/outspoken types.

PS They didn’t give beauty to a baby, they gave it to Aurora so she would be beautiful when she grew up. I should think this obvious, especially when they show her grown up in the image.

what about the upcoming elsa? she looks 16. not 21. she looks way WAY WAY younger than Cinderella or Pocahontas.

No problem!

Great insight! Thanks for replying to my comment. 🙂

OOOooooooh I see.

I really hope you guys get the whole series done I love reading about how the franchise evolves, it’s interesting how it all changes with the time.

Cinderella may be coming later (the writer who selected her is currently really busy but hopefully she can come through at some point).

I think the other reason that you might feel this way is that Walt Disney was actually splitting his time with this film and the creation/conception of Disneyworld. What ended up happening is that the art had a lot of research and technology that went into it, making it one of the most beautiful classics in the cannon (in my opinion) and the actual story and plot fell to the wayside.

Either way, a favorite princess is completely subjective. It could say a lot about the kind of person we are, or the kind of person we want to be, or not at all. It’s all a matter of opinion 🙂

Cinderella was going to be written by one of the other writers but they are currently slammed with a bunch of work so they may be posting it later in the series.

We are trying to do all of the princesses but that may not happen — BUT we are trying!

Don’t forget Pocahontas (she looked older). I do think Tiana looks her age though.

True (well, Ariel looked her age). I guess Aurora was the only one that I realized looked MUCH MUCH older than she actually was, so that’s why she sticks out to me.