Thursday, August 1, 2013

Get This Off My Chest...

(NOTE: Before you continue, read this post.  You won’t understand what I’m about to say (er, criticize) unless you read the post I'm linking to.)

At Comic-Con this year, ABC announced that their hit TV series Once Upon a Time will return for its third season and revealed a preview trailer, which you can view below.

Both videos are from YouTube.

ABC also showed a clip at Comic-Con verifying that a certain ginger mermaid will appear in the series…


I don’t want to repeat my beliefs about Once Upon a Time as I previously stated them in this post, but I’m not happy with this decision for four basic reasons.

But before I list them, let’s make it clear that ABC, being owned by the Walt Disney Company, has access to all of it’s parent company’s characters.  Which is why Ariel (or Maleficent, Belle, Gaston, etc.) appear in OOUAT.

Now, why do I hate Ariel being in OOUAT?
  • Creators of Once Upon a Time, you do not have to use Disney characters in your show!  Feel free to use Andersen’s mermaid, but does it have to be Ariel, Disney’s own take on the character?  To be honest, I think it downgrades an already splendid, original show when you just “recycle” our beloved Disney characters instead of trying to create your own.
  • Continuity.  That’s a big deal with me.  When I go to see a sequel to a movie or read one of a book, I expect the characters to be the same.  If a character is a completely different person, then it’s just not believable!  A character is a character.  Ariel is Ariel.  Same with story.  Disney’s The Little Mermaid is Ariel’s story.  So this OOUAT Ariel?  She may have the same look and name as the Disney Ariel, but will she have the same story?  No.  OOUAT twists all our favorite fairy tales around and together (which is the show’s strongpoint), but it messes up the Disney characters they use!  (Though granted, I’m glad they stuck with the dinglehopper thing.)
  • I’m afraid they will mess her up somehow.  I mean, seriously, TDM and I love Ariel so much!  I would hate to see them mess up her character…I mean, I still can’t get over the OOUAT Maleficent fail.  I’m just extremely picky about how my favorite characters are portrayed.
  • Finally, Ariel will always be forever Jodi Benson.  That’s just a fact.
So there you have it.  Apply the first three to any of the Disney characters used in the TV show (just change the name from X to Z) and voila!  You have my opinions about this show.

Reaction: not happy.
Source

What are your thoughts on all this?

See you all real soon!

6 comments:

  1. Hey I just came across your blog, and thought you might be interested in some Disney facts that I found. If you know any other good Disney facts, I'd love to write about them, or better yet, have you write them since you're the expert :)ineverknewbutnowido@gmail.com

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    1. Hey Wil! Thanks for commenting. How did you find my blog? I'm always interested how people find it so I can figure out ways for others to too! :D
      I love Disney facts! Great blog you have. I might be checking it out way more often 0-- I just love trivia and facts of all kinds! :D
      Feel free to just check around my blog and write about anything fact-y you read or see. As long as you link me, I don't mind at all!
      Thank you. No one's called me an expert before :)

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    2. Bestie has corrected me -- she's apparently called me the Disney expert lots of times. Okay, so I meant a stranger hasn't called me an expert before :P

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  2. I personally adore this show..because of how they change the stories up and make them different. It makes it more suspenseful and interesting, also makes the characters more human and less of a cartoon. I really love how they all interact within one world. Honestly for the most part..they haven't screwed up the characters' personalities all that much. The only part that's really truly different is how they are in the real world that we live in. They have different lives because well..they don't live in the fantasy world. My favorite Disney characters, like Mulan and Snow, are actually pretty accurate. Mulan is still very strong and has a similar back story to the Disney version. Snow has changed a little, making her a stronger warrior and more of an independent in comparison to the 1930's version of her. Hook is still perfectly malicious (just really attractive), The Mad Hatter is still portrayed as "not all there", and the Evil Queen (Regina) is seriously BRILLIANTLY perfect. If they took different character's (not Disney), the show might not be as popular because they're so well known. They do sometimes include the original stories to the characters, not just the Disney versions. I just really love how intertwined all of the stories are, and how all of my favorite childhood characters have "grown up" and become much more complex than the kind of one dimensional Disney versions. Yeah, Maleficent was kind of a flop, but she was a pretty minor character and only had a couple episodes. Ariel has been in demand by fans for a LONG time. I personally don't really care for her, so I don't really care about what they do with her character. But I'm sure they're going to make a pretty neat modern interpretation of her personality and story.

    I really do encourage you to watch more of the show. You start to really get invested with the stories and the characters and it's extremely complex. It's one of my favorites, and I really haven't met too many Disney fans that don't care for it, to be honest lol.

    That's all my opinion! Sorry to kind of go on for a while hahaha xD

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    1. Oh, I forgot to point out (a few days later.. *face palm*) that they have indeed used non Disney characters before, such as Rumpelstiltskin, Hansel and Gretel, and Red Riding Hood. :)

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    2. I'm not putting off replying, honestly -- I was gone for three whole days at Bestie's house unable to reply, but today I get my wisdom teeth out, so as soon as I am "normal" again :P I shall attempt to reply to your awesomely long comment :D

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