For those of you living under bigger rocks than mine (which would be a pretty impressive feat), Disney has released their makeover of Merida for induction into the Disney hall of Princesses, and, get this, they changed her appearance.
They somehow found a way to give her MORE hair, while at the same time de-frizzing it. They made her waist smaller, and did something to her face that… ugh. I mean, I just don’t like what they did. It doesn’t fit. It looks like she’s wearing one of those plastic Guy Fawkes masks in lady form.
This has happened to all the princesses. Every single one of them has gone through this makeover process to give them all a unified style, with lots of glitter and makeup.
Now if you feel it’s “sexifying” the Disney princesses… she’s 16. That is pretty much the thick of puberty, where bodies are naturally doing what bodies do. But okay. Her character isn’t one about getting a man, so the idea that Merida would “sexify” for someone is dumb. I get that.
But what if Princess Merida wanted to dress up for her debut in the Disney Princess Hall? What if she was dressing up, not for the boys, but for herself? There’s a prevailing idea in our society that women being pretty is for other people. Sometimes, you just want to dress up for yourself.
There’s also this weird idea that being pretty and/or thin somehow makes you weak or dumb. That being thin makes you less of a feminist. Being thicker than someone else doesn’t make you ugly, and it doesn’t make you a better person. It just makes you thicker than someone else. That’s it. I agree that making her thinner lost some of the Merida in the makeover, but not that making her thinner makes her less of a person. It just makes her less Merida.
What the outrage over her looks is doing is telling little girls that looks matter. And quite frankly, they don’t.
There’s also a huge outcry because they took away her bow and arrows. Having a weapon does not make you a stronger person. Physical fighting does not make you a stronger person.
A strong person is one who stands up for themselves when it’s hard, or standing up for others when it would be easier and safer to hide. In Hunger Games, Katniss strongest moment was when she was without her bow and arrows (what the hell is it with bow and arrow as a lady weapon? THERE’S an underlying social thing I’d like to explore further). Her strongest moment was when she volunteered to go to the slaughter in place of her little sister. No weapons, no back up. Just a strong person making a strong choice.
And in Brave, the bravest thing that happened was Merida telling her mother “no.” Standing up for herself. Being a person of character. And it had nothing to do with having a weapon.
Now, I am pretty pissed off that the makeover didn’t seem to capture Merida. She missing that underlying strength that makes her a role model. And seriously- WHAT THE HELL IS UP WITH HER FACE? I don’t think the makeover itself captures who SHE is. Remaking her into someone who’s not Merida is pretty gross. But being mad that they gave her sparkles is dumb, and has nothing to do with the quality of a person.
However, for those of you looking for makeovers that maintain the character of the princesses in a specific setting, here are a few of my favorites:
8 Very Cool Disney Princess Pinup Tattoos
HelleeTitch has an amazing Steampunk princess gallery
I love the Gothic one: Different phases of Disney Princess gallery
Disney Princesses go to prom
And my favorite: Disney Characters in realism
There are thousands more in Fanart out there that depict the character of the characters. Go out and take a look- I bet you can find a Merida Makeover that you like.
To be fair, Merida hated being dressed up in the movie. I think her idea of dressing up would be something a little more practical, not less practical. More like getting cleaned up that having plastic surgery on her face. The photos from the welcome celebration (http://blog.disneystore.com/blog/2013/05/merida-officially-becomes-disneys-11th-princess-with-royal-celebration.html) show a much better Merida than the artwork.
Just off the cuff, I’d say a bow and arrow is considered a more feminine weapon because it removes them from the front line of combat.
It’s also less about brute strength. Not that being a good archer doesn’t require strength to draw a tight bow, but it’s blended with finesse rather than just bashing someone with a sword.
Copying something I wrote elsewhere on this topic:
Here’s the sticky problem in my mind. It’s not like we should expect that a character can never change or evolve, they’re not necessarily frozen in time as that exact version we know from the one reference. But when that alteration moves from someone who may be perfectly fine or cool to something that is an idealized or “better” other version it raises the hackles and makes us think, “Well, what the hell was wrong with them before?”
Case in point: my favorite Pixar film is “Monsters, Inc.” I wouldn’t argue best, just my favorite. Boo is such a delightful child character. She’s got black hair and a somewhat olive tone to her skin so it’s unclear if she’s supposed to caucasian toward the darker end of the spectrum or if she’s supposed to have some amount of Asian or Hispanic or Middle Eastern or whatever. And it doesn’t really matter at all, of course. A couple of years after the movie came out I saw some Monsters, Inc. fabric that had Sully and Boo at a fabric store; Boo’s hair was medium brown and her skin was clearly a lighter flesh tone. As I like to describe it, they “whitified” her. I was totally appalled, especially as it was obviously a licensed Disney product and wasn’t just some random individual creating their own art or whatever. And while it may not have been a malicious or conscious choice on the designer of that fabric, there are clear racial underpinnings to that.
Now this thing with Merida doesn’t have the same racial component; at least she’s still got the flaming red hair in a typically Scottish way, but her skin was pretty damn white to begin with. Taking her from a more every day looking type of look to the “sexier” version tweaks the same part of my brain that was pissed off at how Boo looked on that fabric.