predelection

LOVED THIS REVIEW!! I was interested in how the movie was but definitely didn't feel like spending the time to watch it myself, so I'm very pleased to have gotten the full scoop from a trustworthy source and an engaging writer.

The Little Mermaid just had all the right things to capture the heart and imagination of mini-me. I love mermaids and I would love to be a mermaid myself. (I never understood why Ariel wanted to be human??).

Love this predelection lore!! I agree mermaids are awesome!

I think the live-action remake was fine, but was held back by the original movie. It seems to me that Disney struggled between doing a shot-for-shot remake of the original and writing a new mermaid/human star-crossed lovers political romance drama and I think the live-action movie suffered for it:

Great analysis and I think this is such a common trap for remakes etc. to fall into. If you go for a shot-for-shot remake, it will never be as good as the original so long as the original was already good, because the original is a beloved film that people get only more attached to as time goes on. You might as well capture the spirit but do something new. I don't know if you watched Devilman Crybaby, but that's a great example IMO of something that delivered entirely on the original spirit of the work it was adapting (Devilman) and even kept all the same key beats/events, but still was bold and was extremely distinct in pretty much every other way possible, which served it very well.

Second, all the minor changes made to the original story belied some much more interesting fantasy/drama concepts that they were unable to expand upon or fully execute because we had to go through all the animated version dialogue and scenes.

What a shame!!!!

The live action movie was set in the Caribbean which I LOVED since it fits the story well - and I think this concept would have been even stronger if they were bold and didn't make Eric a prince. The dialogue referenced Spain (and I think also Europe?) so it felt like it was a proto-historical setting, but the island was obviously not a real Caribbean island and I feel this decision made it lack worldbuilding commitment. Eric could still have been an important figure on the island, maybe their metaphorical "prince", but it just seemed weird and stilted to have a small Caribbean island with a formal monarchy (and royal court??). I think it would have been refreshing for a guy to be a prince for his qualities instead of hierarchy.

I like your edits... ready for your "script doctor" post for the movie!!

Eric was adopted in this movie (and had some weird daddy-issue thing with his deceased adopted father??) so once again I feel like they had a vision for a new movie they sidelined in favor of trying to keep too many original movie ideas.

Again, love the analysis. This seems right... I wonder if it was corporate meddling... like the creators had a vision but were forced to do away with most of it because the powers that be demanded it stick closer to the original in X ways.

A lot of hate directed towards this movie was because it was #diverse, but setting it in the Caribbean, which is an incredibly ethnically diverse place, really fit!! Good change!! (Also makes Sebastian's accent seem less like the "joke" it was originally written to be imo.)

SMART!!!

Another no-impact change was that Ariel destroyed Ursula's necklace (instead of Scuttle) to get her voice back and also was one who killed Ursula (instead of Eric). I almost forgot about these changes which demonstrates that the original animated version could have done this, but just chose not to, probably for sexism reasons. However, these changes only seem significant in the context of the original animated movie. If Disney committed to a new mermaid princess movie they could have done all these things anyway AND MORE without having to pedantically "empower" Ariel with minor action changes and deal with annoying racist Disney fans complaining the "real Ariel isn't black" or whatever.

SO TRUE!!!! I get that remaking old movies is an easy money grab, but ugh. I want new things please. GIVE ME A NEW MERMAID MOVIE WITH AN ORIGINAL EPIC BLACK WOMAN PROTAGONIST!

I didn't really like the live action version of Eric though. I thought he talked way too much and they randomly gave him his own musical number which a) was a complete fail both in lyrics and melody, b) the actor did not have to vocal talent to perform (even when obviously auto-tuned), c) was weirdly shot so he was just stumbling around on a misty road until he was magically transported onto a ship that I think was supposed to be symbolic?? because his mom (new character!!) banned him from sailing and also he was immediately back in the castle in the next scene.

Honestly there was simply no way that this low-hanging-fruit remake would ever produce music that could compete with the original, so adding a new song is a truly baffling choice to me.

Maybe his character would be more interesting to a non-lesbian but I really didn't see the point in all the extra Eric stuff. I don't think he was all bad, I just didn't have the patience for all the extra Eric content that was thrown in there. The daddy AND mommy issues, uncomfortable with his social privilege issue, the unfulfilled dreamer issue, like GOD what is NOT wrong with this guy and why won't he stop dropping angst bombs in the middle of daily conversation. His constant navel-gazing and word-vomiting was really irritating and immature. I think the aim was to make his character come across as "sensitive" but to me it came across as "blabby" and I was just sitting there thinking "this is 'nice guy' propaganda... what's wrong with a manly and stoic Eric"?

I feel like one of the issues is probably that in the original, it was just taken for granted that Ariel would like Eric, because girlies be attracted to handsome men. Eric didn't have to actually do anything except stand around and be kinda sexy. Which, despite the obvious gender roles and heteronormativity of these movies, is part of their girlboss appeal IMO. Usually women are the characterless trophies for the main male protagonists, so it's kind of fun to have the male love interest be essentially just a prop for the female protagonist's plot-centric struggles.

But I think discourse has turned against these kinds of stories, for understandable reasons, such as the aforementioned heteronormativity. But sometimes it makes sense to have a story like this, because the crux of the story really isn't the romance. Like in The Little Mermaid, the story is really about Ariel defying the laws that bind her, exploring the greater world, dealing with being a (hah) fish out of water, and learning to truly fend for herself without parental protection for the first time. Classic coming of age story! It's not really a romance story, it's just that her attraction and potential future life with Eric serves as a good vehicle for the coming of age stuff. So it's kind of a waste of cinematic focus to spend time and effort on Eric's backstory and personal struggles... this isn't about him.

Anyway, I think the liberal media zeitgeist has for now swung towards "umm all romance movies should have two well developed characters that have good reasons to Love each other".... that's what I'm at least partially blaming this Eric nonsense on.

it's a little more modern and cool for them to all meet under a magical mermaid moon to rule the oceans than "mandatory music recital". Sadly it's never mentioned again, which I found really disappointing... I was wishing for more cool mermaid magic!! Once again, an original, fun concept that was briefly mentioned then tossed aside because we had to move on to reenacting the animated movie!!

Epic!! Too bad they didn't do more with that!!

Eric's mom was under-developed but I don't hate the idea of inverse mirror Triton/Eric's mom both being against their child's relationship with a member of the species they blame for their problems.

Yeah this is interesting! So much potential...

My sister and I both liked the change to the end scene where Eric and Ariel are sailing away on their honeymoon and they have both humans and mermaids waving goodbye to them on the shoreline. It was a much better visual expression of "part of your world => part of our world" synthesis, and I came away with the impression that Ariel choosing to become human didn't mean she had to give up the mermaid world and that she could always go back and forth between the two and that this choice and connection was important to her.

This is nice!!

Melissa McCarthy was genuinely bad as Ursula. It's such a fun, iconic role, but she did not lean into it and have fun. SHE WAS NOT EATING IT UP. I WAS NOT LIVING.

🤣

The real conflict of the story is that Triton is a controlling father who has to learn that he won't lose his daughter by letting her live her own life, but that he will lose her by trying to control her which will drive her away....WHICH IS THE MESSAGE OF THE MOVIE SINCE THAT IS WHAT HAPPENED IN THE MOVIE??? Ariel had agency with or without her voice. Sacrificing her voice for legs was an act of agency because she did what she wanted to get what she wanted. And her quality of life/enjoyment of being human was not restricted or limited in any way by being mute.

SO TRUE!!! GO OFF!!!

It didn't even stop Eric from falling in love with who she was as a person when he was previously only in love with her voice.

This is such a great point I didn't think of. Since Ariel has such a magical voice, getting to hear her voice is like getting to see that she has a super sexy body or something... not that it's bad, but it's the kind of thing that overrides a person's actual character because it's such an overwhelmingly attractive trait. The main function of Ariel being mute is that she's unable to explain her situation, obviously mainly for the #drama, but it also serves to force Eric to deal with her as she is. True love!

But also she also ate a live fish right in front of Flounder and Ariel????

LMAO.. SO AWKWARD.

Sebastian's character design was extremely cute and I loved him so much BUT FOR SOME REASON THEY CUT HIS KITCHEN SCENE!?!?

Too violent maybe.. this is the future liberals want!

The live-action version of Under the Sea was good, dare I say, it could have been perfect if not for the fatal flaw that permeated every underwater scene... the complete lack of background visuals.

That low budget lmao... but honestly I'm very surprised and impressed how much the rest of it held up for you! Makes me want to check it out...

Like I said before, I think they had some great original concepts that could have made a really fun new mermaid magical adventure/romance movie, but this potential was sidelined so they could pantomime the animated movie. Sad! I would really have loved to see the original mermaid fantasy drama/romance movie that was hiding inside this remake.

Great summary... I LOVED THIS POST!!! Thank you for yet another fantastic media review!!! ❤️