Wreck-It Ralph 2: The Disney Princesses Unite!

A few days ago, this post popped up on my feed:

A couple of important things to note:

(1) Alan Tudyk is back! Given that his original character, King Candy/Turbo, was the villain and (spoiler!) got his just desserts, and also given that Alan Tudyk has become Disney Animation Studios' good-luck charm -- I was worried that he wouldn't be in this film. Worries no more. 

(2) Taraji P. Henson's character looks awesome.

(3) Perhaps, most importantly, our first look at the Disney Princesses all together is here!

Here's a bigger look at the picture:

📷: Purewow via Disney

Again, there are a couple of things to note here:

(1) This is awesome. And you will never get me to say otherwise. I imagine this to be some sort of super-cool Princess secret society. Or, resort/spa where they can relax and get away from princessy-duties.

(2) Excluding Vanellope, there are 11 princesses present:

• (2a) Interestingly, Anna, Elsa and Moana are all here -- even though they haven't been officially inducted into the princess court.
• (2b) All the First Wave princesses are present -- Snow White, Cinderella, and Aurora -- even though their voice actors are no longer with us. (I always assumed they'd have different actors, so it'll be fun/interesting to see who they cast.)
  Also--Aurora is in her pink dress. Don't get me started.
• (2c) 3/5 of the Second Wave princesses are present: Belle, Jasmine, & Pocahontas are there, but Ariel and Mulan aren't. More on this in a second.
• (2d) 2/3 of the Third Wave princesses are present -- Tiana and Rapunzel, but Merida isn't. (I'm not counting Moana yet.)

Given the panorama-type view of the shot, it's possible that the three of them are just off-screen (and maybe we'll see them in the trailer tomorrow). 

Shockingly, (she said sarcastically), the internet is a little upset about Mulan not being included -- thanks, Buzzfeed!

Which, I know they ask about Ariel in the sub-title, but still. It doesn't take a whole lot of effort to count the princesses and figure out that not *every* Disney princess is there -- I counted 3.  But there's a lot of ignorance misinformation in this post. 

WHERE’S MY BITCH FA MULAN https://t.co/B2c6JUAtbx

— josh (@bernaldont) May 31, 2018

Like that whole jibber-jabber about how Mulan isn't *technically* a princess. Yes. We talk about this a lot in my class -- i.e., how do we determine a Disney princess? Do you have to be born one? Can you marry into royalty? And what about different cultures? After all, princesses are primarily (not exculsively!) a Western concept, especially in the way Disney portrays them. Is Jasmine a princess, as the daughter of a sultan? Is Pocahontas a princess, as the daughter of a chief? (Maui would clear this up.)  But I digress. -- The point is: when Andy Mooney created the princess franchise in the early 2000s, they had to come up with some criteria. After all, Tinker Bell was included at one point -- but then they went and did the whole Fairies franchise ($$$), so she was out. Any female character who is included in the Royal Court, is an official princess, regardless of birth, marriage, or any other factors. See below:

📷: WDWThemeParks

All 11 princesses are there -- and yes, this is before Frozen and Moana, but there hasn't been another "induction" since.

So then they point to these cast photos that were taken at the 2017 D23 Expo (which I thought I blogged about, but I can't find it. Which makes sense. I was so. very. pregnant. in July of 2017 and also running around after a 1-year-old.)

What these images tell us is that, from left to right in the second picture, Paige O'Hara (Belle), Irene Bedard (Pocahontas), Mandy Moore (Rapunzel), Auli'i Cravalho (Moana), Sarah Silverman (Vanellope), Kristen Bell (Anna), Kelly MacDonald (Merida), Anika Noni Rose (Tiana), Linda Larkin (Jasmine) and Jodi Benson (Ariel) are all there. When I first read this story, I assumed Ming-Na Wen (Mulan) wasn't there because of Agents of Shield commitments.

I'm just going to ignore this comment from the Buzzfeed post -- But interestingly the voice actors of Snow White, Cinderella, Elsa, and Aurora were not present, even though they are in the shot from the movie. -- because, you know, LOGIC. (Snow White came out in 1937, guys. It's a safe bet that Adriana Caselotti isn't still alive -- she passed in 1997 -- and even if she were, she'd be pretty old.)

So, yeah. Merida and Ariel will be there -- although no one seemed particularly worried about here in the Buzzfeed post  😢 -- and it's a safe bet that Mulan will be too.

So, let's just enjoy the awesomeness of all the princesses together and hope that we see them all in the trailer tomorrow.

Disney Princesses As: Career Women!

May, 2018: We're still re-imagining Disney Princesses in inventive ways. #somethingsneverchange

The latest one imagines Disney Princesses as modern-day career women:

via ScaryMommy

The collection is by Matt Burt and he's put a lot of thought into the careers for each character.

Chronologically, here they are:

Snow White -- Leading Psychologist

Cinderella -- Animal Rights Activist

Aurora -- CEO of Spinning Wheel Coffee 

Ariel -- Pop Star & Record Producer 

Belle -- University Chancellor

Jasmine -- UN Ambassador

Pocahontas -- Environmental Activist (I mean, duh)

Mulan -- Title IX Lawyer

Tiana -- Award Winning Chef (I mean, duh)

Rapunzel -- Neurologist

Merida -- Two Time Olympian (Archery & Equestrian)

Elsa & Anna* -- Climate Change Scientists

Moana -- Officer in the Navy

*Not official princesses, but, a common mistake.

Okay, one, it's clear that Burt put a lot of thought and rationale into each of these career choices.
Two--I love that each of them is an empowering career for the character -- you've got chancellors and ambassadors and scientists. (Yay for Women in STEM!)

But.

I wouldn't be me if I didn't have nit-picky thoughts.

1. Most obvious -- Tiana & Pocahontas: really, any other career options for these two wouldn't work.

2. My favorite "new career" -- Aurora: I love that she's the CEO of a coffee company. Tongue-in-cheek, but oddly appropriate.

3. No...just no -- Snow White as a "Leading Psychologist" and Rapunzel as a "Neurologist": Nope. Not buying it. While I appreciate that Burt made Snow a "leading" psychologist who cares for her clients but also presents at conferences, I...would not put my faith in her as a psychologist. If anything, I think she'd made a great preschool/kindergarten/elementary school teacher. Her cheerful disposition plus her ability to make people actually wash their hands? Textbook.

And Rapunzel? Yeah, cool. Neurologist, doctor, med school, blah blah blah. But the thing I love about the end of Tangled is that Flynn tells us that she learned to rule and govern her people and was a great princess/queen. So, yeah. I would have liked to see her be a senator or even a female president. 

    

4. Miscellaneous thoughts, from someone who has clearly spent too much time thinking about this:

• I guess I see Cinderella as an Animal Rights Activist -- but maybe she and Ariel join forces together. I don't love Ariel as a Pop Star -- because she's my favorite, and it seems a shallow career -- but...I suppose Ariel is kind of shallow, so it fits. :/ 
• Again, I love that Belle is the chancellor of a university, but again, it kinda doesn't fit her personality. I don't see her as an authoritative decision-maker -- something I think Once Upon A Time captures nicely with Belle as a librarian -- maybe an English professor at best. 
• Mulan & Moana -- For some reason, I'm just "meh" about these. I think it's because they seem too rebellious for such straight-laced careers. I'm pretty sure Mulan would do something -- with the best of intentions, of course -- that would end up getting her disbarred. And Moana? She relies too much on emotion and instinct to be a good naval officer -- I can't see her taking orders well. 

Like I said, I've clearly spent too much time thinking about this! 

Happy First Day of Fall!

Fall is, without a doubt, my favorite season. I was raised in the Hudson Valley in New York, so I grew up with beautiful fall foliage, chilly nights and mornings, and some of my best memories involve going apple picking with my family. Falls aren't quite the same in the South, but the minute that first hint of crispness enters the air...I love it. 

Disney FanArt Drop

Still one of my favorite things from the D23 Expo this year.

And I love that the artist captured/translated their facial expressions. 💖

📷: Nin (@rirrr1731) via Disney Memes

Review: Beauty and the Beast (2017)

Confession: The Little Mermaid will always be my first Disney obsession, and Ariel will always be my favorite Disney princess, but I have no memory of seeing the movie. I have memories of my obsession, and wanting All The Happy Meal Toys, but not watching it.

I do, however, have a very strong, very vivid memory of seeing Beauty and the Beast in the theater. I remember watching the opening scene, as it zoomed in to the castle, and leaning over and asking my mom if we were at the right movie because the movie couldn't start this way. (Little Me didn't know about prologues and backstory.) She said something like, "of course we're at the right movie," because obviously not every movie was animated (but that's all I knew when I was 7). And I remember loving the fact that Belle read books, because even little Lisa was a total bookworm, and that she was a little different. Adult Me has been a little disenchanted with the movie, but I was so excited for this version. And, thankfully, I didn't have to wait too long to see it. (#godblessbabysittinggrandmas).

There's a very spoiler, full review below the cut, but, spoiler alert, I loved it. Accurate gif of me walking out of the theater yesterday afternoon:

These Are A Few Of My Favorite Things: Harry Potter Meets Disney

Okay. My love for Harry Potter is pretty well-established at this point, and about on par with my love for Disney. (Disney has a slight edge, but, to be fair, it's been around longer.) 

So when you mash up those things, it sets my fangirl heart aflutter. (Like when artists imagine Disney characters at Hogwarts.) 

So, this story has been circulating a lot:

The idea that "you missed something" in the new Beauty and the Beast clip.

(And, yes. I saved a Buzzfeed post about Golden Retriever puppies. Because puppies.)

But. Back on topic.

NO. I certainly did NOT miss anything, you presumptuous headline writers. 

If you combine my Disney and Harry Potter Nerd IQs, I'm actually kind of insulted. As if I could watch the clip and NOT immediately get the reference. 

If you don't want to click, here's the gist. Basically, the words to the opening song "Belle" have been changed a little bit. Gone is the line where the baker says, "Marie! The baguettes! Hurry Up!" 

Instead, Belle's interchange with Random Villager #1 goes something like this:

Actually, I guess his name is Monsieur Jean, so he's not completely random, but still. He's forgetting something. 

At which point, the first time I watched the clip, I turned to my husband and literally screamed "NEVILLE!!!!" My husband, of course, then looked at me blankly like I was a crazy person, as he had no idea what I was talking about.

BUT:

I mean, it could just be a coincidence....

...but that'd be an awfully coincidental coincidence, don'tcha think?

Emma Watson Sings "Belle"

Emma Watson is going to be the perfect Belle.

There. I said it.

I know that I've been fangirling and nerding out over this adaptation since Emma Waston's casting was announced, but I was always a little skeptical of her ability to sing. I mean...it's Disney, so I'd like to think that they'd take this into account, and it's true that Belle's role isn't the most musically demanding, but still. I mean, it's not possible for one person to be Ivy-League smart, beautiful, a talented actress, a feminist activist, an advocate for sustainable fashion AND a good singer, is it?

Apparently, it is:

Also, this movie looks epically gorgeous. I especially love the costuming -- it definitely gives the movie a fairy-tale feel, but continues in the tradition of marrying Disney and Broadway-style.

And Emma Watson is absolutely adorable and quirky and I literally cannot wait to see this movie.

Beauty and the Beast Plot Hole

Disney Memes on Facebook is kinda saving me right now -- it (sort of) balances out all the politics on my newsfeed.

Like this:

This has ALWAYS bugged me.

You have to work backwards a bit -- the fact that Lumiere sings "for 10 years, we've been rusting / needing so much more than dusting" and the fact that the last petal will fall on the Prince/Beast's 21st birthday -- but those two pieces of evidence help you realize that the prince was ELEVEN years old when he was cursed.

Yep. The Enchantress cursed an eleven year old boy for not letting a stranger into his house.

Now, I know that fairies aren't exactly known for their good-will (at least in non-Disney lore) and they can be vain and selfish and don't give a flying flip about someone's age and whether they're a child but...still. This IS Disney, and it's always bugged me.

Plus, that portrait of the Beast as a human is virtually identical to the way he looks at the end of the movie which...how do they know? He definitely didn't look like that at eleven!

Oh. And yeah. Gaston is definitely still the villain of the movie, don't get me wrong. He's just not the only one. He's sexist and prejudiced and basically incites a mob to murder so...yeah. Definitely still a villain.

Disney Fashion -- Golden Globes Edition

I'm not normally one to obsess over fashion trends and who-was-wearing-what at the latest awards shows -- but when you invoke Disney Princesses....I'm going to at least take a look.

And people love to invoke Disney when it comes to awards show dresses -- some are a bit silly and there's more to "princess fashion" than Disney.

But Maisie Williams (a.k.a. Arya Stark from Game of Thrones) won the Disney Princess Award of the Night, IMHO:

PC: Maisie Williams' Instagram

The caption reads: "channeling belle with a side order of tiana."

That top knot! That yellow dress! That posture!

Slay, girl. Slay.

Runner-Up goes to Zoe Saldana in her Cinderella-esque gown -- although that might just be a coincidence.

Emma Watson as Belle -- New Images Leaked Online?

Okay. By now, you know how much I'm looking forward to Disney's live-action version of Beauty and the Beast starring Hermione Granger Emma Watson as Belle.

This weekend, new images from the film were allegedly leaked online -- specifically, images of Emma Watson as Belle which aside from that one shot in the trailer, have been unsurprisingly scarce.

[I say "allegedly" because I'm not entirely sure that they aren't Photoshopped/fan-creations. My first few hits on Google (e.g. ComicBookMovie and Harpers Bazaar led me to broken links....maybe because they're not as legit as fans want them to be?

This is the "still" that makes me the happiest -- if I had to guess, I'd say it's from the opening sequence where Belle is wandering through the town and ends up in the bookstore, only to pick out about "far-off places, daring sword fights, magic spells, a prince in disguise!" I suppose it could be the Beast's library (although she wears the green dress for that scene in the animated movie), but it's almost identical to the town bookstore (the ladder helps).

Emma Watson is so perfect to make "The beauty and The beast" 😍😍 pic.twitter.com/wIYwV05KKv

— Lorena Alves (@lorena_alves04_) September 30, 2016

This one...I am less excited about. Not sure why. It looks very stiff and posed, and an odd image to "leak." The one above could almost be a trailer shot or movie still, but this one...looks like it should be a promotional image. This is the one that concerns me about doctored photos -- we've been fooled before!

Emma Watson’s Belle Dances With Beast in New Beauty and the Beast Images pic.twitter.com/xlgqtnm0Od

— Great-Stuff (@Splurgehub) September 30, 2016

At the very least -- her hair is styled consistently in both photos (center part), so that's something.  

New Sneak Peek of Beauty and the Beast!

This video started circulating on social media yesterday -- basically, a teaser trailer for a "Sneak Peek" at the live action Beauty and the Beast that's on the special 25th Anniversary Platinum Edition. (Which is the fancy Disney marketing way of getting/trying to get you to buy a DVD you probably already own.)

The clip is, obviously, a teaser for the full video, but you still get a glimpse of Emma Waston as Belle at a table read -- and also Dan Stevens' Beast (complete with grumbly, growly voice!). The scene is, I think, Belle and Beast in the library, poring over a book -- and seems to come from the Broadway musical rather than the film. (In the musical, during "Something There," Belle finds the book and tries to get Beast to read it, at which point he confesses that he can't read, and they begin to bond/fall in love over the book/reading lessons.)

All that to say: if they're deviating, however slightly, from the animated film, I hope that they correct some of the not-so-great aspects of the film. Like, I hope the Beast is maybe emo and not bordering-on-abusive angry. *fingerscrossed*

Also--Disney, I see how you're purposefully withholding images of Emma Watson as Belle since you know that's what we want.

I hope there's a trailer with Moana. Like, a real, full-length trailer.

More Beauty and the Beast Thoughts

I've been doing a lot of thinking about Beauty and the Beast today...mainly after reading this Entertainment Weekly article, "Beauty and the Beast trailer: 5 Callbacks to the Original Film."

I have a weird relationship with this film...as a child, I loved this movie. Like a lot. (It was no Little Mermaid, though. That was, and remains, one of my top three favorite Disney movies. And Ariel is probably my favorite princess, since Tink is a fairy and Elsa is a queen.) After all, Belle was a bookworm -- she read books! Just like me!

But Beauty and the Beast is also the only film I've changed my opinion about after teaching this course for a few years -- it's the one film where I find most of the criticism to be accurate, raising some really interesting questions and issues.

It's also the film that has the most plot-holes to me -- where "fairy tale logic" breaks down the most.
(For example: where does Chip come from? Lumiere says the servants have been "rusting, needing so much more than dusting" for ten years -- but at the end of the film, when the household objects all turn back into servants, "Chip" looks like a little boy about 6-8 years old. And his mother, Mrs. Potts, is an adorable white-haired old lady who looks like she might have a thing for Maurice, Belle's father. So where exactly did Chip the little teacup come from? It doesn't seem like he was born when the castle was cursed so...)

But another one of the big plot holes seems to be addressed in the trailer. As the EW article points out, one of the links between the live-action film and the original animated film is the Beast's slashed portrait:

"We don’t see the Beast in this teaser, but we do see what his claws can do. In the original, he slashes a portrait of himself in his pre-Beast form. Here, it’s a portrait of him as a young boy with his parents."

Okay. So here's my issue with the original, animated film. Here's the portrait of the Beast from the animated film:

Okay. Cool. He looks like a handsome prince, a fairy-tale staple.

But.

Again, as Lumiere tells us, the servants have been "rusting" away for 10 years. So far, so good.

But.

We also know that Beast has until his 21st birthday to break the spell -- otherwise, he'll stay a Beast forever. This is pretty much the year our story starts -- which explains why Beast is extra moody and the servants extra needy desperate eager.

Now, I may be an English major, but even I can handle that math: If Beast is 21 now, and they've all been enchanted for 10 years, that means Beast was ELEVEN years old when the strange woman knocked on his door, demanding shelter.

Guy in that portrait above? Definitely not eleven years old. (In fact, he bears a remarkable similarity to what non-beast-Beast looks like once the spell is broken.)

Also--the plot basically hinges on the fact that an eleven year old boy is punished for not letting a stranger into his home. Clearly, wherever his parents are (another plot hole), they managed to teach Beast a little thing known as "Stranger Danger" before they left.
[Sidebar: I suppose you could argue that the spell freezes them all at the age they were at the time of the enchantment, but I remain skeptical. Because, again, Chip. Clearly a little kid. And, after 10 years of being a teacup, you would think that he would have matured a little bit...but then again, I've never been magicked into a teacup, so what do I know.)

Regardless, I very much appreciate the fact that Beast's portrait has been appropriately aged-down:

Which, hopefully, means that Stephen Chobsky noticed the same glaring plot holes that I did. 

EDIT: And which, apparently, a lot of other people on the Internet did as well. 

Now, if they'll only address how the villagers didn't seem to know about the giant castle and the emo Beast living in the forest, we'll be in a good spot. (Because if you can march to a castle, on foot, as a giant angry mob, it's clearly not that far away.)

Tale as old as time, song as old as rhyme...

...Beauty and the Beast. 

The teaser trailer.

It's finally here.

I may or may not be having a fangirl freak-out moment over here.

I have been super excited about this adaptation -- and particularly the casting choices -- for awhile. I know that there was talk about Emma Watson playing Beauty in a Guillermo del Toro version (which would have been much darker, for sure), but when Stephen Chbosky (author of The Perks of Being a Wallflower and who worked with Emma Watson on the film adaptation of that book) signed on to write the screenplay, I got even more excited. 

Like most Disney projects, details of this one were kept tightly under wraps. While Luke Evans and Josh Gad were pretty active on social media (relatively speaking), the one thing that the Internet really wanted to see -- Emma Watson as Belle -- was the one thing we didn't get. 

Until now:

It's small, but it's something. (It's also the only shot we get of an actual character in the film.) My husband complained that the trailer didn't reveal much -- that he wanted "more" than just scenic shots and voice-overs. 

My response? "It's called a teaser trailer for a reason." At which he astutely compared it to the teaser trailer for Cinderella, which was basically just a shoe and a butterfly, so at least we got a little more. But not nearly enough. :) 

via Buzzfeed: 17 Times Disney Princesses Had No...Chill

**Disclaimer: NSFW Language**
If you're offended by that. As a child of two New York drivers, I tend not to be. (I also tend to find Bernie Sanders' accent very familiar and comforting, which I realize is probably not normal. It just sounds like family dinners and holidays to me.)

But I digress.

Anyway. Buzzfeed posted this a few days ago: "17 Times Disney Princesses Had No [Effing] Chill."

I love the subtitle: "Because crying on your bed always makes things better."

"17 Times" may be a bit of a stretch--since a large portion of the article focuses on the same scene, just different shots of it. 

But it basically is an account of every time the Disney Princesses cry.

Like Cinderella (1950):

Or Aurora (1959):

Or Ariel (1989):

Actually, Ariel cries *a lot* for a Disney princess. Most have that ONE SCENE; Ariel has like 3, maybe 4. Definitely one of the more emotional ones.

Or Belle (1991):

There's actually quite a lot of flinging oneself down on a surface -- a bed, a bench, a rock formation -- and sobbing.

The crying may decrease as we move forward in time...I can think of Rapunzel and Tiana and even Anna getting emotional, but I don't remember any super dramatic sob fests.

Charlotte might be the exception -- and this is like a textbook Ugly Cry:

And, as the Buzzfeed article does point out, these are all teenage girls. And puberty & hormonal changes are hard enough without having to deal with learning your entire identity is a lie or realizing that you just gave up your freedom and dreams to save your father's life.

So, yeah. They cry. 

You know who else cries a lot? Hermione Granger -- the anti-Disney Princess if ever there was one.

I remember reading an article once about Rowling's depiction of Hermione as constantly crying -- and it infuriated me:

"Yet throughout her role development thus far, Rowling allows Hermione to lose sight of her own strength and revert to stereotypic behavior and she facilitates this by employing gender-related stereotypic words to Hermione's behavior again and again. Repeatedly, Rowling has Hermione "shriek," "squeak," "wail," "squeal," and "whimper," verbs never applied to the male characters in the book. [...] Throughout the books, Hermione often bursts into tears.... [...] Her hysteria and crying happen far too often to be considered a believable part of the development of Hermione's character and are quite out of line with her core role in the book. They add nothing to an understanding of her persona or its individual caricature nor, for the most part, anything to the story. Thus, they can only be interpreted as "how [silly, weak] girls act," which is unfortunate from the viewpoint of feminist analysis." --Lana Whited 

As someone who is a self-professed Crier, I find this really insulting. I'll admit it -- I cry. A lot. I cry when I'm happy, when I'm sad, when I'm stressed. It's just how I, personally, deal with emotions -- in part, I think, because they usually run fairly close to the surface. I can compartmentalize and suppress with the best of them, but, as a general rule, I'm very easy to read emotionally.

Does this make me any less feminist? I hope not. Just as not crying doesn't make a person any or more less feminist. Showing a character has crying or displaying emotions -- and like Hermione, many Disney princesses don't just cry -- they show quite a range of emotions, particularly the later we go, chronologically -- shouldn't be a reason for criticism.

Life is, for lack of a better phrase, going to suck every once in a while -- and I think it's okay to show that you don't have to maintain a preternatural level of optimism and cheerfulness when you encounter it. It's okay to falter, to stumble, to be "down." (Look at women in the 1950s -- when they were expected to be cheerful all the time, it did not end well for them.)

Disney Artwork -- Phil Berry

In today's installment of "Disney Princesses as..." I bring you "Disney Princesses as Jedi" by Phil Berry. (Check out his work at his DeviantArt page.)

While I'm not the biggest Star Wars fan, I still think these are pretty cool if only because the princesses seem super kick-ass and not at all like damsels in distress. I also like the little subtle nods to the other characters in the film -- although Pascal, Rajah and Flounder are not nearly as cute and cuddly in Berry's versions.

Rapunzel might be my favorite -- after all, she's using her hair as a weapon, freeing up her hands, so the bad-ass potential is pretty high here.

Runner-Up probably goes to Ariel -- probably because she's my favorite princess in general. 

Berry rounds out his quartet with Jasmine and Belle:

For some reason, I'm not as big of a fan of the Belle one (to each his own!), mainly because if Beast wasn't there, I'd have a hard time knowing it was Belle. Her pose is also less active and striking, but maybe she's more of a strategist. 

Disney Artwork -- Anoosha Sayed

For some reason, I love those social media posts where Disney Princesses are envisioned as "something." And pretty much whatever you can imagine Disney Princesses as, some graphic artist out there has done it. (Even hot dogs.)

The latest to pop up on my newsfeed was "Disney Princesses as Millenials" by Anoosha Sayed. According to Sayed, the project is "a series of digital illustrations of what I imagine these girls would be like as 21st century teens/young adults." She also " tried to be accurate to their personalities, writing little backstories for each character. I also put [in] little homages to their movies."

While not my favorite reimagining -- mainly because I don't see a whole lot of re-imagining going on, but that's just me -- they are pretty to look at. And they do get you thinking about what each princess might be like in the 21st century. (If you think about things like that. I do.)

My favorite, and probably the most unique re-imagining, is probably Snow White, the Social Media Queen:

I love that Sayed made her full-figured and curvy -- as the 1930s Princess, she's definitely a different body type than the more willowy (and more criticized) princesses.

Runner-up for me goes to Belle, the Fangirl:

 

Belle would be the fangirl. I don't know if she'd be into anime, but okay. She'd definitely be a Harry Potter fangirl though -- a Ravenclaw all the way. Although, she'd probably be a Twihard too...I can see that really being a story she identified with.

And then there's Esmeralda. Who I love is included, but I'm not sure she'd be a ballet dancer...given her gypsy roots, I can see her being more of a burlesque dancer, even jazz, but not really ballet.

 

Disney Princesses w/Hair Matching Their Outfits (via Buzzfeed)

Leave it to Buzzed to have a completely random post about Disney princesses. Ah, the Internet.

This one is brought to you by the concept of "matching outfits with hair" -- which sounds really weird but, as the Buzzfeed headline points out, is oddly magical. (Mostly.) 

Check out some of the images below, and head on over to Buzzfeed for the full list. 

(I think the purple hair actually makes her look really old.)

(Aside from the fact that Elsa is my current favorite, this might be my favorite hair swap. It just works.)

(Belle just looks blonde here...which works with THIS dress, but maybe not any of the others...)

(Okay, is it just me, or does the raven-haired Aurora just look evil?!)

(Odd dress choice for Tiana...I would have done the green dress and matched her hair that way, but either way, she rocks it.)

BuzzFeed Presents: The One Thing You Never Noticed About Disney Characters

I feel like I should be surprised by the number of Disney-related things that appear on BuzzFeed.

But I'm not.

Although this one...a little mind-blowingly weird: the one thing we apparently never noticed about Disney characters. And I'll admit: I definitely did not notice it.

(c) Disney

Spoiler Alert: It's their fingernails. Or, lack thereof. 

It seems to be an inconsistent animation thing, because....:

(c) Disney

...villains apparently get bad-ass manicures. (I mean, look at those talons!) 

And sometimes, on the princesses, it just looks weird:

(c) Buzzfeed

Head on over to BuzzFeed to view the whole gallery/their thoughts on Disney fingernails. :) 

Well played, Tee Turtle. Well played.

So TeeTurtle finally released the other two designs in their Disney/Harry Potter mash-up series -- Rapunzel as Hufflepuff and Maleficent as Slytherin. 

I love them all -- but since I was officially sorted into Ravenclaw (as if there was every any doubt, Pottermore!), I bought the Belle one. 

I gotta say though -- two of these are absolutely spot-on. Maleficent as Slytherin (even though she's not a princess -- is there a princess who would be a Slytherin? Maybe Jasmine...) and Belle as Ravenclaw are perfect. 

And I see/totally get Mulan as a Gryffindor and Rapunzel as a Hufflepuff -- but I would have gone with different choices....as my husband pointed out, I feel like they really missed an opportunity to have Merida as a Gryffindor. I mean, her movie was literally called Brave. And while Rapunzel is 100% a Hufflepuff, I would have gone with either Snow White or Tiana; after all, "those patient Hufflepuffs are true and unafraid of toil." 

I'm sure it's been a very popular series--I'm just sayin' they could do a second series. :P There's tons of inspiration by DeviantArtist Eira1893 -- one of my favorite Buzzfeed Geeky posts.