First--there's some news on characters other than Moana and Maui.
Perhaps most importantly we know that Moana has both parents alive (hopefully for the whole film):
 |
| (c) Disney via The Nerdist |
Her mother, Sina, is voiced by Nicole Scherzinger (Hawaiian) and is described as "sharp and strong-willed" and having her daughter's back.
Moana's paternal grandmother is also present in the film:
 |
| (c) Disney via The Nerdist |
Gramma Tala is voiced by Rachel House (also a New Zealand actor of Maori descent) and is described as Moana's "confidante and best friend" and as "dance[ing] to the beat of her own drum."
A couple of interesting things to note:
- Gramma Tala is Chief Tui's mother. This isn't necessarily a strictly patriarchal tribe (Chief Tui wants Moana to rule after him, after all), so it would be interesting to see if Gramma Tala ruled before Chief Tui--which would be kick-ass indeed.
- I think it's important to note that, in what is definitely a strategic "we-don't-want-to-be-accused-of-whitewashing" move, all of the actors have Pacific Islander heritage (be it Hawaii or New Zealand) which should (1) mitigate white-washing criticism and (2) bolster claims of diversity.
- As I mentioned above, hopefully all of Moana's family remains alive -- I think it's pretty rare in Disney princess (or, human) films for a parent to die onscreen: obviously, Mufasa dies in The Lion King (a move which is mirrored in Pixar's The Good Dinosaur) and Bambi's mother (thankfully not on-screen, although during the movie) but in the fairy-tale films, one or both parent(s) are absent from the beginning.
(The only quasi-exceptions to this, that I can think of, are Cinderella's father who is briefly depicted and then mentioned as passing in the voice-over and Tiana's father who is, again, depicted on-screen and then it's implied (not directly stated) that he died during WWI).
Regardless, the family unit seems to be doing much better in this Third Wave of Disney Princess films, and being a Disney Princess Parent doesn't automatically seem to be a death sentence. - The family unit of daughter-mother-father-grandmother, while relatively rare in Disney Princess films, isn't unprecedented: the same structure was apparent in Mulan, although we don't seem to be dealing with the same issues of gender privilege in this movie. (In Mulan, males/sons are seen as "more" as females/daughters -- although, whether that's the actual message or the false premise of the film is up for debate.)
- Likewise, the character descriptions seem to indicate that Moana's parents will be actual, round characters rather than stock fairy-tale characters: more like Merida's mother and father than even Rapunzel's parents (who are actually flatter characters than Sleeping Beauty's King Stefan and his Queen). Chief Tui will also, hopefully, be a King/Father who doesn't fall victim to the pitfalls of the Second Wave Disney Princess fathers -- either strict and overbearing (like King Triton) or weak and ineffectual (like the Sultan).
Finally, Alan Tudyk will voice HeiHei who is literally the village idiot who stows away on Moana's boat.
What's interesting though is that The Nerdist calls Tudyk "Disney's lucky charm" -- a fact which my husband and I gleefully pointed out, kind of made him the "John Ratzenberger of Walt Disney Animation Studios."
 |
| (c) Disney via The Nerdist |
Apparently, we were not alone in this realization:
Alan Tudyk is becoming the John Ratzenberger of the Disney Animation side. pic.twitter.com/VMTJLadfN5— Disney Film Facts (@disneyfilmfacts) February 27, 2016
Either way--we didn't need the Internet to tell us that he was a good-luck-charm: Alan Tudyk has so much nerd-street-cred already (he's Wash on Firefly!) and I've been rooting extra-hard for him ever since I him at the Central Park Zoo with his (I assume) parents.
I'm really looking forward to this movie now -- so many good movies coming out in November!
