3

The Women Still Live To Get Married

Disney's traditional princess stories knew a woman's ideal life goal: Get married, have a kid, and then die in order to inspire said kid to learn to love again and eventually get married. Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, The Little Mermaid -- for Disney women, living "happily ever after" meant "marrying a cape-wearing dude," even if the original fairy tales had them dying alone.

Walt Disney Studios
It's almost as if fairy tale writers have some issues with women.

Our modern, progressive, empowered Disney princesses, on the other hand, are totally breaking with that stuffy old construct by ... living to get married? Still?

Tangled, for example, presents itself as the story of the estranged Rapunzel discovering her true origins and being reunited with her royal biological parents. But of course she also ends up marrying Flynn Rider, who's not only a professional double-crossing thief, but also the first male human Rapunzel has ever seen. No experimental college period? Not even a Tinder spree?

Walt Disney Studios
Though getting brained with a frying pan is as much a "swipe left" as we can think of.

Brave is no better. The entire conflict revolves around tomboy Merida refusing to marry against her will, because she's in charge of her own destiny, dammit! But all Merida actually achieves in the film is postponing her engagement. Marriage is still her ultimate (and inevitable) destiny -- she just now gets to pick which bizarrely proportioned Scottish teen fails to satisfy her for the rest of her life.

2

Every New Female Character Looks Exactly The Same

You know the "DreamWorks Face" -- the hilariously specific smirk that seemingly every DreamWorks character sports in their movie posters? Well, Disney/Pixar is just as bad. All their female characters have the exact same face.

An unofficial analysis of facial structures done on the new Disney/Pixar characters found that male characters have vastly more depth and variety, while the female faces are almost identical spheres with oversized baby eyes and tiny button noses.

Alex/Tumblr

Alex/Tumblr
They all look vaguely like boobs when you get down to it ...

Yep, the male characters have all sorts of different head sizes, shapes, and details, while the women -- from princesses to video game children to physical embodiments of joy -- are all interchangeable variants on the same basic shape. That probably doesn't send any kind of subconscious message, though.

1

The New Princesses Can't Control Their Powers And Tend To Ruin Everything

In Frozen, Elsa accidentally freezes her entire kingdom with her cryogenic magic, then almost kills her sister by inadvertently ice-zapping her in the heart. In Brave, Merida foolishly trusts a witch and puts her mother under a spell that turns her into a black bear. In Tangled, Rapunzel is born with magical age-reversing hair, but she's never aware of her own healing powers; instead, she's imprisoned and exploited.

Walt Disney Studios
By another, jealous woman.

In every case, the princesses are helpless and oblivious despite their great power, and they ruin everything by being too selfish and emotional. Compare this to Wreck-It Ralph, or Hiro Hamada from Big Hero 6, who use their abilities to defeat their opposition. You can see that same attitude reflected in society at large. Powerful men are awesome, but women are too emotional to be trusted with important stuff like leadership positions. A competent woman wizard? Gross. They'll probably get their magical periods right as they cast a big spell and accidentally turn the whole kingdom into potato chips.

Matt Cowan sells T-shirts. Vicki Veritas writes comedy and tweets. Follow Vicki on Twitter.

For more reasons we shouldn't let kids watch Disney movies, check out 7 Classic Disney Movies That Taught Us Terrible Lessons and 5 Awful Lessons Disney Teaches You About Relationships.

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