5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories

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5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories

Disney's adaptations are so sugarcoated you'll lose a foot if you watch too many in one sitting. But you can hardly blame them, seeing as how old-timey storytellers apparently didn't write fairy tales for kids -- they wrote them to keep jaded serial killers entertained while waiting on death row. For example ...

The Original Frozen Features Demons, Eye-Stabbing And Reindeer Terrorizing

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures

Just in case you only recently emerged from your backyard bomb shelter: Frozen is the tale of two royal sisters, Elsa and Anna. Elsa has the power to create snow and ice at will, but rather than simply sending her to the School for Gifted Youngsters, she's locked away in her room. After Elsa accidentally kicks off an eternal winter and runs away to live in an ice castle, it's up to Anna, hunky reindeer-loving Kristoff, and a sentient snowman to find her and save the kingdom. Elsa ends up accidentally freezing Anna's heart, but it's all cool because love is the ultimate defrost cycle.

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Walt Disney Pictures


Although it would help if you wore some proper fucking winter clothes.

But In The Original:

Frozen was inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's "The Snow Queen." The story opens when a demon creates a magical mirror that hides the beauty in whatever it reflects, while intensifying its nastiness. When said demon and his pals attempt to carry the mirror to heaven to troll some angels, they drop it and it shatters. Enter best friends Kay and Gerda. Similar to Anna getting struck by Elsa's powers, tiny shards of magic glass spear Kay in his eye and his heart. This has the side effect of transforming him into a Joffrey-caliber little dickhole, Which is pretty understandable, actually. Ever put a contact in backwards? Well, you try getting slivers of demon glass in your eye, you'd be grumpy, too.

Kay is then kidnapped by the Snow Queen, and Gerda sets off to find him. Along the way she, too, gets help from a reindeer and its owner. But this ain't hunky Kristoff and his wacky pal -- it's a psychotic little robber-girl who tells Gerda, "I tickle neck every evening with my sharp knife, which frightens him very much." Between the ice theme, the eye-stabbing, and the animal torture, we're not sure if this is the source material for Frozen, or the inspiration for the first season of Dexter.

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


We guess "Oh fuck, my eye! Jesus Christ, that hurts!" wasn't as catchy.

The Original Sleeping Beauty Features Attempted Familial Cannibalism

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures

In the 1959 film, the evil fairy Maleficent curses baby Princess Aurora to prick her finger on a spinning wheel on her 16th birthday. Said prick will cause her to fall into a deathlike sleep (medieval spinning wheel sanitation was simply atrocious), to be awakened only by true love's kiss. After some dragon-slaying and a few clear violations of consent, Prince Phillip saves the day and everybody lives happily ever after.

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


"Snore once for yes, twice for no."

But In The Original:

In "The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood" by Charles Perrault, the princess and the prince start boning pretty much as soon as she wakes up -- because apparently girls get morning wood, too, if they nap for a century or so. Sleeping Beauty has two children before the king dies and the prince inherits the throne. Oh, and did we mention that the prince was half ogre, on his mom's side?

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


Burn, Prince Phillip! Seriously, though.

When the young king goes off to war, his ogre mom orders her steward to serve up Sleeping Beauty and her two children, one by one, "with piquant sauce." But the clever steward instead cooks up a lamb, a goat, and a deer, because if you hide the taste of your meat with fancy sauces, you'll never be able to taste the difference anyway. When the queen regent discovers the steward's treachery, she fills a vat with snakes and toads and plans to cast the royal family into it. But the king arrives home just in time, and rather than admitting that she tried to whip some family style gumbo, the ogress dives into her own pot and dies. We nearly typed 'croaks' there, but if we steal all the puns, what will the comment section do?

The Original Mulan Features Whoring And Suicide

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures

When Mulan's frail, elderly father is called away to war, she dresses up as a man and goes to fight in his place. When everyone realizes she lacks the 'proper equipment' to play soldier (though if you ask us, having no testicles seems like one less big glowing weak spot for the enemy to target), she's kicked out of the army. But after saving the day at the emperor's palace, all is forgiven and she returns home to her overjoyed father. She also ultimately ends up in a relationship with her hunky former general, because you can't spell 'empowerment' without 'men.'

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


"Hey girl, I treated you like shit for most of the movie. Your village or mine?"

But In The Original:

The legend of Mulan comes from a 5 A.D. poem entitled "The Ballad of Mulan." Surprisingly, things turn out better for Mulan in the ballad than they do in the film, because her comrades don't even find out she's a girl until after they've all returned home as heroes. And even then they don't give much of a crap about it -- they're just sort of like, "Boobs? Everybody likes those!"

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


Mulan, seen here confronting the fan artists who liked boobs too much.

But by the time Chu Renhuo compiled the popular version of the legend in the late 17th century, the story had changed. Mulan returned home from war to her father's welcoming arms, only to find them cold and stiff. He had died of old age while she was gone. Also the emperor was replaced with a khan who, in true khan fashion, rewards Mulan's service by ordering her to join his harem as a concubine. She's not too pleased at the prospect, and commits suicide. Also there's no sassy dragon sidekick, so really, the whole thing is kind of a downer.

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories

The Original Tangled Is All About Pre-Marital Boning And Eye-Gouging

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures

Gothel kidnaps Rapunzel and locks her away in a tower, because Rapunzel has magical golden hair that Gothel can use to keep her own ass perpetually pert. Fast forward to a grown-up Rapunzel, who convinces a dashing thief to take her to see a lantern show held at the palace each year. On the way there they fall in love, but Gothel tricks Rapunzel into returning to her tower. Gothel stabs the thief, but not before he cuts off Rapunzel's magic hair, and the source of Gothel's immortality. Rapunzel's tears also turn out to be magic, because deus ex machina is a really easy-to-use storytelling device, and she saves her beloved's life.

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


"Cool! Now let's see if there's any truth to these 'golden showers' I keep hearing about."

But In The Original:

In the original "Rapunzel," her hair isn't even magical -- it's just super-duper long and presumably well-conditioned (considering it can double as a ladder). A prince happens upon Rapunzel in her tower and the two instantly fall in love. The prince climbs up Rapunzel's hair every night until the witch imprisoning her puts the nix on conjugal visits. When the prince comes back, the witch nonchalantly tells him that Rapunzel is dead, and he flings himself from the tower in grief. Luckily, there's a bush at the bottom to cushion his fall. Unluckily, said bush is covered in spiky thorns and it gouges out his eyes. Apparently eye-gouging used to be a big hit with the kids back in the olden days.

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Walt Disney Pictures


Now it's all "bondage" this and "dominance" that. Kids.

The prince then blindly wanders around the forest for years, weeping and wailing about his lost love and eating nothing but grass and roots. As luck would have it, he once again happens upon Rapunzel. She's been raising the twins that he impregnated her with, which means Rapunzel was letting down more than her hair in that tower. Rapunzel throws her arms around the prince and her tears magically heal his gross eye-holes, so it's still a happy ending -- just one that requires the special effects team from Hellraiser to accurately portray.

The Original Peter Pan Is Chock-Full O' Murder

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures

Peter Pan is a lovable little scamp who never grows up. With the help of happy thoughts and a little pixie dust from Tinker Bell, he teaches siblings Wendy, John, and Michael Darling how to fly and takes them on an adventure to his island home, Neverland, where they encounter the Lost Boys, pirates, and some charmingly racist Native American stereotypes. Peter Pan duels his nemesis Captain Hook, but Peter focuses more on making Hook look foolish than causing him any real harm. It looks likely that Hook will be eaten by a crocodile in the end -- but eaten in, you know, a fun way.

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


Or Rule 34 way.

But In The Original:

According to J.M. Barrie's 1911 novel, Neverland is apparently some kind of magical purgatory for Peter, who is criminally fucking insane. When Peter and the Darlings first arrive in Neverland, Peter suggests that they murder a pirate just for shits and giggles, bragging that he's killed tons of them before, in addition to cutting off that bastard Captain Hook's hand. "But pirates are the bad guys!" you're probably thinking. Peter's just defending Neverland so the children can safely live there, right?

5 Beloved Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories
Walt Disney Pictures


Or, you know, relatively safely.

But here's the thing: Peter Pan might be murdering children too. When the Lost Boys are first introduced, the narrator casually mentions that since growing up is against the rules, Peter thins them out when they get too old. We're liable to believe the worst about Peter, because elsewhere in the story he seems seriously bloodthirsty. In fact, he almost guts Wendy's daughter, Jane, when he first meets her. However, just before introducing her to the business end of his dagger, he collapses and weeps because Wendy is all grown-up. And that's when we learn the most unsettling fact of all: Peter is the only permanent resident of Neverland. Captain Hook? He's been dead so long that Peter doesn't even remember the name. Tinker Bell? Yep, dead. It's all good, though, because the story closes as Peter finds a new friend in Jane, flying her away to Neverland to momentarily distract him from the isolating hell that is immortality.

Jillian is the author of a plethora of novels -- especially if you count the unfinished ones. She enjoys the word "plethora." Follow her on Twitter.

For more kids stories you should never show your kids, check out 7 Classic Disney Movies Based On R-Rated Stories and The Gruesome Origins of 5 Popular Fairy Tales.

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