Some new thoughts on Disney's "The Little Mermaid"

[obisgirl]

I re-watched “The Little Mermaid” yesterday with my girlfriends.  They have the blu-ray now. After watching the movie, we saw some deleted scenes and had some thoughts:

Did anyone know that King Triton and the sea witch Ursula were supposed be brother and sister?  This was the biggest OMG! moment after seeing the deleted scene — which were only storyboard art sketches.  This was supposed to be introduced in the first scene of the movie in a longer musical number ‘Fathoms Below’.

Then, I started to think really hard about this and why Ursula in the movie wants to become Queen.  Ursula is Triton’s younger sister and feels she deserves the throne and uses magic to attempt a coup against her brother but Triton finds out about it and banishes her.

We don’t know how long ago this happened but in my head, it happened before Ariel was born. So when Ursula comes upon Ariel later, she sees her naive niece as the ticket for her revenge.  

There’s that and I kept on wondering while watching the movie, is there a personal reason why Triton doesn’t like humans?  I felt like there was more there than humans are bad and they occasionally, eat or cause harm to our kind.

Then, I thought, what if Ariel’s mother was human? Triton fell in love with her, they had Ariel but she was born with fins and as much as Ariel’s mom wanted to be with her, she couldn’t leave her life on land to return with Triton to his undersea kingdom with their daughter.  Triton was heartbroken over and thus, made it a rule for none of his daughters to have contact with humans. Because he knows from personal experience, you fall in love with a human it’ll only lead to heartbreak.

Ariel’s different from her sisters.  None of them fancy a life up above. Only her. This could be because of her human mother and has always felt connected to humans through her.

[Slurpeez]

Then, I thought, what if Ariel’s mother was human? Triton fell in love with her, they had Ariel but she was born with fins and as much as Ariel’s mom wanted to be with her, she couldn’t leave her life on land to return with Triton to his undersea kingdom with their daughter.  Triton was heartbroken over and thus, made it a rule for none of his daughters to have contact with humans. Because he knows from personal experience, you fall in love with a human it’ll only lead to heartbreak.

It’s an interesting theory and might work on Once. Yet, the answer in Disney canon is different. If you’ve seen The Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Beginning, it reveals how Ariel’s mother, Queen Athena, was a mermaid, and died when Ariel and her sisters were very young. The reason Triton didn’t want Ariel or her sisters going to surface was how Ariel’s mother’s died. The clip is below (spoiler alert):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6e14xXxHr4

"That’s how you know you’ve really got a home. When you leave it, there’s this feeling that you can’t shake. You just miss it." Neal Cassidy

[RumplesGirl]

I knew about Triton and Ursula having heard about the Fathom’s Below song.

As to Ariel’s mother: http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Queen_Athena

I don’t know how much is “canon” but I think this is because it’s considered a prequel to TLM but Ariel’s mother is a merwoman, Queen Athena who was killed by sailors

EDIT

Whoops. Slurpeez got here before me while I was trying to find the right Wikia page.

"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"

[obisgirl]

Oooh 🙁 I didn’t know about the prequel movie.  I only saw the sequel to TLM and it was horrible.

[Phee]

Triton and Ursula being siblings is a major plot point in the stage production of The Little Mermaid.

[obisgirl]

First time I learned about it.

[kfchimera]

Disney had this phase of churning out sequels for money, and this is not the worst of them by far. (Cinderella II is awful!).

I liked the idea of Melody but the animation was off and the storyline definitely could have been better.

Who knows what they’ll do in ONCE, but there’s lots to pick from in semi-Disney canon.

(Even funnier are the storybooks compilations that are written for kids, there is one for Robin Hood, the fox, where they’re eating Turkey at Christmas, including Alan-a-dale the Rooster. Isn’t that too close to cannibalism?).

“If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see?” -- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking-Glass

[AtlanticaDream]

I think little mermaid two is my favorite Disney sequel lol but I was only eight when I watched it too, so it has (almost) as much nostalgia value for me as TLM

Proud Keeper of the Dinglehoppers

[RumplesGirl]

I’m of the opinion that there should never be sequels to the originals. Nothing comes after “and they all lived happily ever after”

"He was a lot of things to me" "The only conclusion was love"

[PriceofMagic]

Lion King 2 is reasonably good.

All magic comes with a price!

Keeper of Felix

[Author]

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