Disney Animated Canon/Headscratchers


 * Pinocchio
 * Fantasia and Fantasia 2000
 * The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad
 * Cinderella
 * Alice in Wonderland
 * Peter Pan
 * Sleeping Beauty
 * One Hundred and One Dalmatians
 * Robin Hood
 * The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
 * The Rescuers and The Rescuers Down Under
 * The Great Mouse Detective
 * The Little Mermaid
 * Beauty and The Beast
 * Aladdin
 * The Lion King
 * Pocahontas
 * The Hunchback of Notre Dame
 * Hercules
 * Mulan
 * Tarzan
 * Dinosaur
 * The Emperor's New Groove
 * Atlantis the Lost Empire
 * Lilo and Stitch
 * Chicken Little
 * Meet the Robinsons
 * Bolt
 * The Princess and The Frog
 * Tangled
 * Winnie the Pooh


 * Are the classic Disney shorts and the Disney Animated Canon films in the same universe? Could you take into account any cameos from film to film (e.g. Belle in Hunchback)? Can stuff like Disneyland's Phillar Magic, that old canadian short with Pinocchio, Snow White and others and basic events where Mickey is seen with Disney films (including Disney products) count? There is House of Mouse, but that might take place in Toontown which, like Roger Rabbit, would take place outside of the shorts and films. Same with Stitch's appearances in films unless they're breaking the fourth wall (?). And Kingdom Hearts is a alternate universe...
 * Why is Disney's latest opening credit castle so dang long!? The past few have been a ten second wipe of their logo, but those seen in 2008 or so almost qualify as Scenery Porn!
 * So dang long? The YouTube video clocks it in at 33 seconds.
 * That is pretty dang long, especially compared to the previous one.
 * What bugs me is, why would anybody build a castle over a river flowing straight through the main gate?
 * Rule of Pretty.
 * Its the Dwarven thing to do.
 * And elven.
 * It's not the main gate. The road comes in from another side. And wouldn't you want a fresh source of water if you were under siege?
 * Who would want to lay siege to Disney Castle?
 * Disney villains, most likely.
 * What's with the 1990's movies and parents? Every father in them is either a Bumbling Dad (Belle's father, the Sultan, Zeus, Fa Zhou, Jane's father), a Jerkass (Triton, Chief Powhatan, Fa Zhou again, Kerchak, and if he counts, Frollo), or a Disappeared Dad (Aladdin's father, Quazimodo's father, Tarzan's father). Only Hercules' human father and Mufasa don't fit either of them, but Herc's father is irrelevant and Mufasa, the only father with any real positive influence, dies. As for mothers, they are either a Missing Mom (Ariel's mother, Belle's mother, Aladdin and Jasmine's mothers, Pocahontas' mother, Quazimodo's mother, Tarzan and Jane's mothers) or irrelevent (Sarabi, Fa Li, Herc's human mother, and Hera). The only mother with any positive influence is Kala, and she's the only active positive parent in all ten films.
 * The first reason would be that in a lot of the original fairy tales, the parents are either dead or unhelpful. In "Beauty and The Beast", "The Little Mermaid", "Snow White", and "Literature/Cinderella", for example, there were no mothers, and the fathers themselves were virtually nonexistent. The second reason, if one wants to probe a little deeper than Disney probably was considering, is that a lot of Disney movies are coming of age, with characters in their late teens. If one looks at the movies from that perspective, then the point would be that the focus of the movie is on the protagonist learning to make a life away from his or her parents. The third reason is that many times, a bumbling or nonexistent parent is a step up from the parent in the source material. Belle's father in the fairy tale agrees to give his daughter to a monster. Belle's father in the movie is helpless to protect her, but still does his best to. Quasimodo's mother in the book really did abandon him because he was too ugly. Quasimodo's mother in the movie died trying to save his life. The final possible reason is the same reason that any story centered around children or teenagers don't have active parents in them. The children and teenagers watching use the story as a sort of fantasy escape, and they want to pretend for a bit that they're tough and on an adventure and don't have their parents along, while identifying with the protagonist.
 * Fa Zhou was a Bumbling Dad and a Jerkass? Okay, there were times when he snapped at Mulan, but it was only about twice, and those could be more chalked up to his Honor Before Reason nature than to being a Jerkass. Chief Powhatan wan only a jerk when he thought his tribe was in danger, and seemed to be willing to reconcile with the settlers after Pocahontas gave her little speech at the end. And Sarabi did at least try to stand up to Scar, so she's hardly irrelevant. You do kind of have a point about everyone else, though.
 * Is it just me, or do all these animated films seem to have its pacing really pick up in the last third of the movie? After the nice pace of so many of the movies, why is it that some of them feel rather rushed towards the end?
 * The 90's Disney movies have been criticized for being formulaic; whether they are or not is up for discussion, but what is known is that they are always divided in three acts; Act I (there is issue yet), Act II (the issue arises and creates a dangerous conflict / the villain steps in and endangers the heroes) and Act III (the hero deals with the villain / the lingering danger in an action sequence). Bonus points if before Act I, there's an introduction that tells the tragic tale of how the story came to be (in Beauty and The Beast, Mulan, Hunchback of Notre Dame, Tarzan..). So I guess your explanation is that the third acts would always have to violently deal with the villain/the issue and complete it quickly enough to not drag out, after the nice pacing and story build-up usually seen in Act II.
 * As additional proof, the third acts don't usually last long. Pocahontas for example had it's third act pretty much stretched out over the course of Savages. Presumably the ones that took the longest are Hunchback and Beauty and the Beast.