The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Disney film)/Headscratchers

La Divina Tragedia!!Disney version


 * Random Troper: Okay, this is a long one, but this has always bugged me about the Disney Animated Canon adaptation.
 * According to Word of God, the three gargoyles, Victor, Hugo, and Laverne, are really the manifestations of Quasimodo's inner voices. However, they appear to move around independently at various moments.
 * Furthermore, the film is set in the 1700s or before. At one point, Laverne sends a flock of birds into the air, calling out "Fly, my pretties!" in homage to the Wicked Witch sending out the flying monkeys in 1939's classic The Wizard of Oz movie. Also Hugo, at one point, makes machine gun noises while spitting rocks.
 * Not to mention they drop a catapult on the soldiers, help dump the molten...whatever-that-was down, and do a few other things that simply could not have been done if they were not real, as Quasi was elsewhere or preoccupied with other things.
 * If it is Quasimodo's inner voices that bring the trio to life, and Quasimodo lives in the 18th century or before, before machine guns were invented or even the original L. Frank Baum book of The Wizard of Oz was written, then how can the gargoyles make references to them? The gargoyles shouldn't have any knowledge that Quasimodo shouldn't have...
 * With some 'comic' characters in Disney, anachronisms make sense, as it's implied that Merlin of The Sword in The Stone or the Aladdin Genie can either time travel or see into the future. But Quasimodo, as far as we know, is not capable of doing either, and therefore neither should the gargoyles. Unless they're not really his inner voices and are, instead, comparable to the singing frog in Warner Bros.'s classic 'One Froggy Evening': they're really what they appear to be to the protagonist ... but ONLY to the protagonist. To everyone else, they're just run-of-the-mill (ordinary statues, an ordinary frog).
 * This Troper thinks it's probably the latter idea (the singing frog), and the anachronistic humor is simply Disney's attempt to cash in on the Genie. This Troper also has a lot of things that bug her about this movie. For instance, how did all that molten lead get cleared out of the streets in what looks like minutes or a couple hours at the most?
 * Well, the story IS being told by Clopin, so it's possible he's the one who's telling has the gargoyles attack. As for how the move around: It's been showed Quasimodo is quite strong, how do you think he managed that? By ringing bells and carring gargoyles!
 * This Troper doesn't remember where he heard it, but he did hear once that the gargoyles were, in fact, Quasimodo's guardian angels.
 * Also, if they are in fact just figments, how the hell did Djali see Hugo make the kissing face at him?
 * Djali's just a goat. Maybe he just didn't know better and began seeing things when he saw Hugo's human-like face.
 * Human-like? Hugo looks like a pig!
 * This troper thinks that the gargoyles are a combination of Unreliable Narrator and Imaginary Friend, it's all in the hunchback's head
 * I've always thought this personally myself. We're assuming that Clopin is telling the story, but he obviously couldn't have known as much as he did since he wasn't there for most of the story. He must have asked Quasimodo for details, and Quasi mentioned the gargoyles doing these sorts of things, since to Quasi they would have been "real". They may not have done any of that at all, and Clopin is only telling the story as he was told.


 * Oh, and another thing: if Quasimodo's mother is Roma, why is Quasimodo white? This Troper holds a theory that perhaps she found Quasi after his (white) parents abandoned him and took him in as her own, though that's just WMG.
 * Consider also that he probably doesn't see that much sun locked up in the tower all day.
 * Yeah, but he still has red hair. Personally, I agree with the second troper; his Roma mother probably found the abandoned baby and pitied it, since the baby was an outcast (because it was deformed) just like herself.
 * My personal theory was that the father wasn't Roma, but I like other idea.
 * Mine is that Quasi was conceived when a white man raped his mother. If you assume that one of the Roma men with her in the beginning of the film is her boyfriend or husband, and take into account that the Roma people were/are treated horribly by the rest of society, it's not too farfetched a theory.
 * This is why you folks should read the book instead of trusting what the movie says. Quasimodo's parents are never mentioned in the book- all we know is that gypsies at one point had Quasimodo in their possession before they stole a normal looking baby and left him in its place. So no, there was never any reason to assume that he was a gypsy or would look like one.
 * But we're not talking about the book; we're talking about the movie, which actually shows Quasi's parents (and has very, very little to do with the book, seeing as it's an animated family movie).
 * Actually, all we see is a gypsy woman looking after him, and two gypsy men travelling with her. We assume she is his mother, but nothing confirms this. She says to him "Hush, little one." If she was intended by the writers to be his mother, they easily could have had her say "My child." Frollo is the only one who says that the gypsy woman was Quasi's mother, and it wasn't like she and Frollo knew each other well.
 * Also, nothing confirms either of the men as Quasi's father either. One even says "Shut it up!" (hardly the sort of thing you'd expect a father to say about his child), while the other is more worried about being spotted than comforting the baby.
 * I always just figured it was part of, for lack of a gentler way of putting it, his deformity. His parents aren't hunchbacked or squish-faced, but he is. So maybe the light skin and hair is just part of the deal.
 * It's genetically possible for two white parents to have a black child. It's not too implausible for Quasimodo to have recieved red hair, white skin (which is also explained by him remaining mostly indoors) and his physical deformations from an unlucky inheritance of particular genes.
 * I don't think they're Quasimodo's parents. Frollo just referred to her as his "mother" because she was his female care-taker. Their colorful clothes suggest they were carnival performers, which makes this troper wonder if they intended to use Quasimodo in a circus freakshow.
 * This troper has always theorized that Quasimodo's real parents, who were white, probably abandoned him and the gypsy woman we saw in the beginning took him in, intending to raise him as her own. I'm also fairly certain, after hearing him refer to the baby as 'it,' that the gypsy man is definitely not the father of Quasimodo
 * Seriously, all this discussion and no one has suggested that Quasi might have been stolen? Sure, he's deformed, but that didn't mean his real family would toss him out indefinitely unless they really were cruel. Gypsies back then were known for stealing babies for revenge because of how they were treated and how their reputation was slandered by the whites/upper class/priests/just about everybody.
 * Uh, I'm pretty sure that Roma didn't steal children at all, and that was most likely entirely made up like all the other racist stereotypes about them.
 * But child stealing does happen in the original story, so it is possible that the film makers were influenced by that.
 * At the time when the original story was written, people weren't too concerned about political correctness. Flashforward to the 1990's in America when that was a completely different story. It would have been pretty egregious for Disney to promote offensive stereotypes that late.
 * It's highly unlikely that she would have given her life for a kidnapped child
 * I'm going with the deformity caused unusual coloration because that's the less squicky option and this IS a Disney movie.
 * This troper has always thought it was a combination of two of the things listed here: having a white dad along with staying locked up in the bell tower all day.


 * Here's something that's bugged me about the Disney Animated Canon adaptation- Fidelity to the novel be damned, Phoebus always came off to me as a walking studio note to add a straight man love interest. He contributes absolutely nil to the story that couldn't be done by other people- Esmeralda could've easily called sanctuary on her own, and even his rallying of the people was originally Clopin's big moment- and turns the ending into an Esoteric Happy Ending. Seems to me, the story would be much better off without the extraneous character.
 * And Esmeralda could have gotten together with Quasimodo, instead of the 'studly' blonde guy. Way to totally undermine your 'look beyond the surface' theme there, Disney, just pair the two sexy people up and leave the deformed guy heartbroken.
 * Who says people have to go by "inner beauty" by itself? Esmeralda treated Quasi with respect, and didn't treat him like a hideous monster, but even the nicest of people usually aren't attracted to guys with giant growths on their foreheads. What kind of "happy ending" would leave two people together just because one feels obligated by guilt and gratitude to be with the other, despite a lack of physical attraction?
 * I think the Phoebus/Esmeralda pairing was fine. He loved her for her beauty, wits, fighting abilities, and desire of justice. She loved him back for these things too.
 * And also, 1) the act of letting Phoebus and Esmeralda be together shows Quasi is a strong person, and reflects nicely on him, and 2) the "don't judge people on looks" aesop includes "don't grudge pretty people" just as much as "don't hate ugly people". Duh.
 * Quasi puts Esmeralda on a pedestal- he thinks she's perfect- and Frollo sees her as an object. Pheobus was the only man who treated her like a person.
 * Quasi isn't old enough for Esmeralda, or indeed for romance. He's been emotionally stunted: he's caught at a preteen level. Didn't any of you pay any attention during "A Guy Like You"? As annoying as that song is, it expresses what's going on in Quasimodo's mind at that moment. Paris is on fire. Frollo's gone around the bend. Who knows how many people have died already? What's Quasimodo thinking? Is he thinking, "What's happened to my master?" Is he thinking, "Is there anything I can do to fix this?" Is he thinking, "God is punishing me for my sins"? No. He's thinking what a twelve-year-old child in the throes of his first crush would think. First, "Is My Girl okay?" And second, "Does she just like me -- does she just want to be friends -- or does she really like me?" The other people of Paris are no more real to him than his little painted wooden figurines. He's not ready for romance. He's not old enough.
 * That is the single best explanation of that disparity that I have read. Excellent analysis, fellow troper.
 * Always Save the Girl is a well-established trope. I agree that he is emotionally stunted, but...well, this is Disney. Rapunzel should have been equally stunted, but she wasn't.
 * Assuming you're referring to 'Tangled,' the relationship Rapunzel had with her "mother" was different than Quasimodo's relationship with Frollo. They both used fear and manipulation to keep the children they raised cooped up in their respective towers, but Rapunzel's mother at least tried to make it seem like everything she did was out of motherly love, as opposed to Frollo who's whole angle seemed to be "I was kind enough to take you in, since your parents didn't want you," Also, Rapunzel has even been raised to view her captor as her mother, and even calls her this, whereas, Quasimodo is brought up to view Frollo as his master.
 * Why didn't they use Gringoire then? He's a comical nice guy in the original version, albeit cowardly. He's a poet; romantic scenes are just easier. Why'd they leave him out?
 * Because they needed an action hero to stand up to Frollo, help Quasi and Esmeralda, be torn between Frollo and the innocent people, and lead the rebellion. A poet couldn't do those things.
 * It is important to the story that Quasi does not get Esmeralda. A major point of the story is comparin Quasimodo and Frollo; "Who is the monster and who is the man." It's an important point that Quasi and Frollo both want Esmeralda and can't have her. What makes one of them a monster and the other a man is how they react to this. Which one is strong enough to let her go, and still be her friend, and which one simply decides "if I can't have her then no one can."
 * You aren't the only one. There's quite amount of Fridge Logic that really really makes Esmeralda seem like...a complete bitch.
 * She's hardly a complete bitch because she went for the well-meaning, handsome and genuinely heroic guy instead of the well-meaning, genuinely heroic guy who was hideous. If Phoebus were anything like his portrayal in the novel, then perhaps, but because this version of Phoebus is not a sucky person, Esmeralda can hardly be said to be a complete bitch.
 * Quasi loved her because she was the first female, (and the first human, for that matter) who didn't treat him like crap. I'm not sure that this is enough for a relationship.
 * Well you could also consider that Disney as well as the fact that he was, able to leave the Cathedral without fear, and had Esmeralda and Phoebus as friends. Plus he gets a girl in the sequel.
 * But if they made Phoebus a romantic straight man for commercial reasons, why was he was completely ignored by the marketing, which focused on Quasimodo, Esmeralda and the gargoyles?
 * Phoebus wasn't made for commercial reasons: first, as another troper explained it very well on this page, it was very important to the story that Quasimodo didn't get Esmeralda, so his kindness could be contrasted to Frollo's monstrosity; second, Phoebus embodies the part of regular citizens that do not agree with the unjust mistreatment of innocents, and who eventually rebel against it, something that only he could embody as he's the only regular citizen apart from Frollo among the characters of the story. And it's this sense of justice, not his looks, that gets Esmeralda to fall for him (when she first meets him, she's wary of him, but she starts to feel differently after he saved the family from the fire).
 * Esmerelda having ended up as Quasimodo's main love interest would have also just come off as Disney trying too hard to illustrate the moral that one shouldn't judge a book by its cover.


 * What was such a large cauldron of molten metal doing on the belfry? I'm not an expert in bellcraft, but I'm pretty sure they would mold and repair the bells somewhere in a special workshop, wouldn't they?
 * Super-strong Quasi moved it?
 * Perhaps the bells are repaired on-site? They're pretty freaking huge, and I can't imagine they're that easy to transport to a separate workshop.
 * This troper wants to know why is there so much lava?? Who keeps that much lava juice? does he keep it warm all the time? Where does the lava come from? where does it go in the end?
 * I would like to remind those who have read the book and inform those who have not, that Quasimodo defended the cathedral with supplies and tools from a wall repair during the day before the evening when Notre-Dame would've otherwise been overrun by the tramps. IT IS noteworthy that Quasimodo did pour lead onto some of the tramps and he DID drop the beam off the edge, which, true to the book, was used as a battering ram.


 * After Frollo attempts to have Phoebus executed, Phoebus steals a horse, rides to the bridge at least some hundreds meters from the start, gets shot and falls to the river. Immediately after he submerges that spot begins to get showered with arrows by soldiers from directly above. How the hell did they manage to get there in a matter of seconds and even bring the old man Frollo with them? Did they teleport?
 * Really fast horses? :P


 * Not the movie itself, but the surprisingly common Frollo/Esmeralda shipping. No... Just NO!
 * It makes a lot more sense if it's in context to the book, where Frollo's definitely more of a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds and Anti-Villain than a Complete Monster, and Phoebus is an asshole, so it's not like Esmeralda has very good options. But who are we kidding? The real reason is because he's voiced by Tony Jay.


 * This Troper cannot be the only one who was wondering about this, but...what was with Hugo and his interest toward Djali? Did he think Djali was a girl because of the earring? Does he swing that way? Is he just screwing with the goat's mind? It's never explained, and there doesn't seem to be a reason why Hugo does this aside from Rule of Funny. Even then, this Troper doesn't get it.
 * Djali is a goat. Hugo has little horns like a goat. Maybe he thinks he is a goat also? Or that Djali is a... whatever the hell Hugo is.
 * If you want a disturbing thought, combine this with the 'the gargoyles are figments of Quasi's imagination' thing. Apparently Quasimodo is into interspecies slash?
 * Well, being locked in a bell tower all your life and being sexually and religiously oppressed can do weird things to a person...
 * There is pretty-well supported fan-theory that the gargoyles reflected Quasimodo's Id (Hugo), Superego (Victor), and Ego (Laverne). If this is to be believed, then it would not be so hard to believe that Quasimodo's id would be pretty twisted considering he was being raised by a living,breathing, personification of extreme-piety.
 * Maybe it's a Shout Out to the original book, which had Pierre Gringoire, a character who was married to Esmeralda but found himself more in love with her goat.
 * That is an extremely creative, original, and intriguing explanation. I like it!


 * Okay, this is an odd one, but it's bothered this troper's historical awareness: At one point Frollo bars the miller and his family inside the mill and orders Phoebus to set the place on fire. Phoebus refuses. Why? You or I would never do such a thing, of course -- but you and I have the privilege of living in a place and time where setting a place of business afire with the business owner and his family barred inside is generally considered a Bad Thing. Phoebus does not share this privilege. Phoebus, in fact, lives in a time where such actions were an expected aspect of soldiering. "We know enough if we know we're the King's subjects. If his cause be wrong, our obedience to the King wipes the crime of it out of us" -- I was only following orders really was all the excuse you needed. Civilian deaths, rapes, "naked infants spitted upon pikes" were all regrettable but expected side effects of fifteenth-century warfare. So why does Phoebus refuse to set the mill on fire? It's not like he's never done anything like that before.
 * Same troper: It's also important to remember that in this time, people believed in a microinterventionist God -- one who placed every human being in his or her proper station in life. If you were a lord, it was because God had put you there -- specifically wanted you to be subject to your overlord and the king, and wanted your subjects to be under you. A commoner was someone God had made a commoner: if you were a peasant, it was because He had placed everyone else in a position of authority over you, and wanted you to be in authority only over your own wife and children. Defying your overlord was tantamount to defying the Almighty. By refusing a direct order from Frollo -- whom GOD has placed in authority over him -- Phoebus is in effect spitting in God's face.
 * This Christian troper with an interest in history would like to give a second opinion on the issue. The same church that taught people to stay in their place also taught people that Thou Shalt Not Shed Innocent Blood. It also taught charity to the poor, mercy for sinners, and being personally responsible for the sins you commit. There is nothing contradictory at all for someone raised even in a corrupt church to refuse to burn innocent people alive. For that matter, "enlightened" peoples such as ourselves still commit war crimes, still murder and rape and rob. Is there anything confusing or unlikely about evil people realizing their wickedness and choosing to stop?
 * It's a Disney movie, don't think too hard about it. But it's not out of character for Phoebus to do that, he's already been established as a nice guy who shows sympathy for people he's really not "supposed to". Like Esmeralda. It's not unheard of for people to rebel against the prevailing mindset of the time, anyway.
 * If no one had ever questioned authority, we'd still be living like they did in the movie. Pheobus recognized the miller's situation as humans suffering at the hands of humans, and had the mindset to feel it was wrong.
 * Finally, it's not like Pheobus was a common soldier. He was a ranking captain of the entire garrison (huge promotion over his novel counterpart). He would have been of at least middle class if not a knight. He DID have authority and station to question orders. I found the fact that his men so quickly turned on him more frustrating than the fact that he questioned orders.


 * In regards to Esmeralda's character, Frollo goes on an obsessed-driven rampage to find her. She even hears him say "Find the girl. If you have to burn the city to the ground so be it." She knew he was talking about her and that many peoples' homes would be destroyed, so why didn't she turn herself in? It's obviously not an easy choice to hand yourself over to the authorities (especially to Frollo), but all those peoples' homes could have been spared had she been noble enough to reveal herself.
 * You said it yourself - it's not an easy choice, and Esmeralda is still just a young girl. It's been some time since I've seen the film, so I can't remember if Esmeralda thinks Frollo wants to kill her at that point, or knows he just wants to force her to marry him, but either way it would take a heroic amount of courage to hand yourself over to someone like that.
 * Force her to marry him? Yeah that's....what he wanted to do with her....marry her...right.
 * Exactly. Though Frollo wasn't technically clergy, he was still in a position that forbade marriage (I believe, anyway), so Esmeralda had to know exactly what his intentions were. Turning yourself over to someone you know is going to rape you, especially as a sixteen-year-old girl...that takes more than nobility, I think. You'd need sainthood for that.
 * Sixteen? I've never seen any sixteen year old who looks like that!
 * While I don't know if Esmerelda's age is ever explicitly stated in the orignal story, it is not unlikely that she is a teenager. Whether or not she looks her age can be chalked up to the animators' art style, and in the 15th century, a woman who was 20 years old and unmarried would be considered an old maid.
 * Also, it's not impossible for a sixteen year old girl to be that...developed.
 * I don't care how powerful Frollo supposedly is, more than a few higher-ups would have a hell of a lot to say if he actually tried to burn the city down. There's simply no way he has the kind of clout that could let him get away with torching Paris so he could find some girl he wanted to bone. Even the king probably couldn't have got away with that and lived. People tend to get pissy when their homes get burnt down, and he'd have a lot of people out for his blood.
 * As has been stated on the main page, it is entirely possible the king is off still fighting the wars Phoebus came back from so he isn't around to stop Frollo. By the time he ever did return, either Frollo could have already cleaned everything up and left no evidence, or made up some story about a peasant rebellion--do you really think the king would doubt this and take the side of peasants and Gypsies who claimed Frollo went mad over a dancing girl? And there don't seem to be any other higher-ups--any other nobles or officials must either be with the king or secluded on their estates until the war is over, and the Archdeacon can't do anything due to the separation of Church and State.
 * I think "burn the city to the ground" was hyperbole; he meant "burn as many houses as you have to". The houses burned would be those of gypsies, beggars and thieves, and the higher-ups wouldn't really care if they got pissy.
 * The court of miracles was the hiding place of thieves and gypsies, as far as I understand and beggars were probably there, too, if they weren't busy begging because they have no home.
 * Seeing Frollos actions with the bakery that Phoebus didn´t want to burn and they only got out because of his interference and nobody else was as helping as Phoebus, I guess Frollo actually killed more than a dozen random families. You could see that a big part of the city was literaly burning. I am really bugged why the people needed Phoebus to clarify in the climax that when Frollo sets your houses on fire for no real reason he is evil. In reality the city would have gone V for Vendetta-style right before Quasis lovesong with the senseless references to the future, hanged Frollo like Ludwig XIV and everything would have been solved.
 * In reality, as anything in History from the Medieval pogroms to the Holocaust shows, people (some people, most people, whatever) would not rise spontaneously against the stablished authority's actions but remain neutral ("If they don't go after me, it's not my business") or even collaborate with it, if anything. Frollo wasn't targetting people at random. He was after an oppressed minority that many Frenchmen of the time disliked, the Gypsies, and those who had helped them like the miller's family. Phoebus showed the people gathering in the square that Frollo had gone off-limits by attacking something that was sacred to everybody, not just the Gypsies and their sympathizers, and most importantly, showed them that there was already a lot of people ready to fight against him. From the perspective of a single person, it's a lot easier to join a fighting army (or mob) than to create one yourself.
 * And another thing, turning herself in would not necessarily be the right thing to do either; if Frollo was willing to burn down a whole city to get to one girl, then turning herself in would have been appeasement. People like Frollo should be confronted, rather than given what they want.


 * It always bugged me, when Frollo talks to Phoebus at the Palace of Justice regarding the Court of Miracles, how he slams the block down upside down.
 * It was to emphasize crushing the bugs underneath. They'd clearly gotten along just fine with the block right-side up, so... wham.
 * Indeed; obviously the geometry of having the block right-side up wouldn't have killed as many at a time, or else the bugs wouldn't have gotten there in the first place. Though this troper wasn't even aware it was slammed upside down until others pointed it out.
 * That bugs me too! And then he just LEAVES it like that!?
 * What concerns this troper more is the fact that the church was evidently built shoddily enough for an old man to simply grab and lift part of the stone away as he pleases. Even for that century, that's just shoddy work, and someone probably would have been quite upset over that bad of construction. If the stones were that loose, balconies and stone edges to aforementioned balconies and outer walkways could simply fall apart!
 * The whole church doesn't have to be shoddily built. It's just that one tile that was loose.
 * It wasn't the church. It was the Palace of Justice. You're right about it just being that one brick, though.


 * Why didn't the priest raise Quasi himself? If the priest had raised Quasi, then Quasi would have been known as a nice choir boy, and not the "mysterious bell ringer." When Quasi asked about his looks, the priest would have given Quasi a nice explanation involving inner beauty and God, and Quasi wouldn't think of himself as a monster. Quasi would also have known the truth about his mother--or at least, he'd know that she didn't abandon him. And he'd probably have a much nicer name, one that doesn't mean "Half formed."
 * And even if the priest did have to let Frollo raise Quasimodo, to save Frollo's soul or whatever, couldn't the priest at least check on them regularly, to make sure that Frollo was doing a decent job? Couldn't he still have had some kind of friendship with the boy, so Quasi's only company wouldn't be his morbid stepfather Frollo?
 * Like one person in the Wild Mass Guessing suggested, the archdeacon probably only cared about the reputation of the Notre Dame church, and less so of the plight of the gypsies. By letting Frollo do what he wanted with Quasi, he got rid of having the blood of an infant staining Notre Dame's reputation as well as a free bellringer. He didn't care what Frollo did to Quasi as long as he didn't have to deal with it.
 * Could have had something to do with him already having his hands full, and he probably thought Frollo at LEAST had the decency to not abuse the child.
 * He just caught the guy about to drop the infant into a well! If Frollo didn't have the decency to not murder the kid as a baby, what makes you think he'd have the decency to not abuse the kid?
 * If you listen to the singing/narration in the beginning after the priest tells him not to drop the baby into the well, it is stated that for once in his life Frollo actually was having moral qualms about doing something that bad. The statues at the front of the cathedral further emphasize the immense pressure that Frollo seems to be feeling. All throughout the movie, it is made clear that Frollo does believe in a higher being that deals out judgement. While nearly everything he does in the movie is incredible wrong from the moral standpoint of the modern viewer (or at least this troper would hope so), Frollo sees himself as doing what is right and just. The priest knows this, and thus feels that at least Quasimodo will have a chance at life.
 * Perhaps the Archdeacon was afraid if he interfered in Quasi's upbringing, Frollo would drop Quasi (thus losing his chance to redeem his soul) and maybe even bring the might of the Palace of Justice on the cathedral, as indeed happened later. Or even get the king to turn on the church by telling him the Archdeacon was flouting his authority (it's not like the king would care about an abandoned hunchback, and I seem to recall the particular king at the time was either an atheist or simply not very charitable toward the church to begin with), thus getting his troops involved too. Better to avoid such difficulties and trust in God to see to Quasi's protection.
 * Apart from the obvious fact that they probably didn't want to deviate from the original story even more than they already did... The Archdeacon also probably has a lot of stuff to do around the church. It's possible that he did stop in and check on Quasi sometimes, but it wasn't mentioned because he got so few chances to actually do so.


 * And one other thing that bugs me about the priest. At the beginning of the film, when Quasimodo is a baby, the priest is an older, gray-haired, balding man. Twenty years later, when the rest of the movie takes place, the priest looks exactly the same. Why? Why has he not aged a day in twenty years? Medicine wasn't that good, in those days. I can accept that maybe the priest just went gray at an early age. But why hasn't he lost more hair and gained more wrinkles?
 * Hollywood Old. If he was say, 55 at the start and had gone gray and had a few wrinkles and was 75 at the end he would not look that different.
 * Plus, according to the commentary he did visibly age. You can see more wrinkles, I believe.
 * Pretty sure his hair is a much lighter shade of gray, too. Actually, this Troper would say that at the beginning it was dark grey, whereas in the twenty years later part, it was more white. Which is a good indication that he has aged considerably.

(Incidentally, I always thought it was a sophisticated touch for a Disney movie that the things prayed for include not just material wealth and fame but love and blessings -- we're used to hearing that love and spiritual-wellness-or-whatever are what's really important and should be valued over worldly things, but this seems to make the point that even if you've figured out what it is you should be wanting, it's no less selfish to be preoccupied with attaining it when other people are suffering.)
 * In the Song 'God Help the Outcast' the people were asking God for wealth, and fame. Perhaps they were asking for the wrong things...
 * That's... part of the point of the song?
 * Really? This troper didn't get that at all.
 * Of course it's the point. The worshipers list their requests for themselves ("I ask for wealth, I ask for fame, I ask for glory to shine on my name, I ask for love I can possess, I ask for God and His angels to bless me") to provide contrast for Esmeralda singing/praying on behalf of others ("I ask for nothing -- I can get by -- but I know so many less lucky than I").
 * And not only is the woman asking for love, but it's love "(she) can possess," framing it in a way that indicates that she sees it not as a gift, but as something she can own. She's not simply seeking someone to love, she's being selfish.


 * In the movie, just who exactly gave Judge Frollo so much power that he can literally burn down Paris for the sake of finding a single gypsy woman, with very little to justify it except a vague accusation that she's a witch? Last I checked, 15th century France had a king who would probably have some major questions to ask of anyone ransacking his capital for the sake of a single gypsy.
 * Its a Disney movie. You could argue that the Cathedral should've been occupied by MORE than just Frollo and dear Quasi, yet wasn't. And why did a judge live in a cathedral? Was that place just abandoned or something? Where were the other priests? Wouldn't they have something to say about a hunchback living in their place?
 * Frollo lived in the Palace of Justice, as shown in "Hellfire." My theory is that he visited Quasi every day for lunch to make sure his dirty little secret was kept out of sight, and to metaphorically beat him down so he wouldn't get any self-esteem.
 * Also, just for completion's sake (since Frollo living in the Palace of Justice means it doesn't matter who does/doesn't live in the cathedral), Notre Dame isn't empty besides Quasi and the Archdeacon--we see other priests/monks during the bridge passage (the Confiteor) between "Heaven's Light" and "Hellfire".
 * As has been stated on the main page, it is entirely possible the king is off still fighting the wars Phoebus came back from so he isn't around to stop Frollo. By the time he ever did return, either Frollo could have already cleaned everything up and left no evidence, or made up some story about a peasant rebellion--do you really think the king would doubt this and take the side of peasants and Gypsies who claimed Frollo went mad over a dancing girl? And there don't seem to be any other higher-ups--any other nobles or officials must either be with the king or secluded on their estates until the war is over, and the Archdeacon can't do anything due to the separation of Church and State. Also, for what it is worth, I recall from the book that the king was in hiding during much of the events (I forget why) and thus there really was no one to stop Frollo from doing what he did.


 * Question, how did that rope Quasi swooped down on to save Esmeralda at the end of the movie seemingly lengthen by a hundred feet or so?
 * Rule of Cool.
 * An honest-to-God miracle. Quasi's in a cathedral, the soundtrack's chanting hymns in Latin, and a few minutes later we see a gargoyle (believed to protect buildings from evil) collapse and kill the villain. Minor divine intervention is there at the climax, why not a bit before?


 * Why is there a British judge in France? I mean, the two countries didn't exactly have the best relationship at the time.
 * Gosh help me, I have no idea if this is a joke or not.
 * The right answer is to imagine that the whole thing is a translation from French. (Yes, I know the joke when it comes to the French dub.) For what they actually sound like, listen here. (Hellfire starts at this point.)
 * His name is Claude Frollo. Sounds French to me. You might as well ask what an American is doing running around as a knight in 15th century France.
 * I don't recall an American voice being in that movie.
 * Phoebus' voice sounded American to this troper.
 * Yeah, and Quasi sounds American, too.
 * Well the first Americans were British or Quasi lived by himself for his whole life, if were assuming Frollo only visited him at regular intervals like to teach him and for lunch and maybe his deformity caused his more American voice then he probably never knew he sounded different. Phoebus had a slight European ring to his voice.
 * Well, there are quite a few American voices. Tom Hulce, Kevin Kline (admittedly he sounds British), Demi Moore, David Ogden Steirs (He almost always sounds British)...


 * Hypothetically, if Esmeralda were to actually give in to Frollo's offer (eeewwwwwwwwwwww) then wouldn't someone be pretty upset that the city of Paris was almost literally burned to the ground and that thousands of people arrested for treason, just for him to say..."Uh...sorry guys, turns out she's not a witch after all! We're a...just gonna be gone for awhile...so...everyone can go home, now."
 * He could claim that he got her to repent or something. During the many witch trials that happened over the years, an alleged witch could be spared if she admitted to witchcraft and repented. I also doubt that a person in such a high position of authority would say "Turns out, they weren't a witch after all!". In the time period this story takes place in, certain people (particularly religious leaders) were considered infallible, and no one would dare question their claims.
 * Besides, "literally burned to the ground" and "thousands of people arrested" is still an exaggeration. I'd say, several fires and dozens of people is more plausible. Finally, remember that people were trying to break through the chain of guards and free Esmaralda, shouting: "She's innocent!" If Frollo suddenly announced that, yes, he's going to "let her go", everybody would think he'd finally come to his senses.


 * In the direct-to-video sequel, why is the son of Pheobus and Esmeralda completely white? I mean, I know it's possible for a person with light skin to have a light-skinned baby with a dark skinned person, but it's pretty rare.
 * Like you said, it is rare, but it does happen. Just because something is rare doesn't mean that it can never happen.
 * And why is Esmeralda wearing shoes? She was barefoot in the first movie, with the only thing she wore on her legs being a single anklet, but at the end of the film, she loses the anklet after wearing the white dress! And about the white dress, by the end of the first film, it would probably be the only outfit Esme will be wearing since her iconic dress was implied to have been destroyed by Frollo.
 * ... maybe she bought some shoes? City streets are disgusting, and walking around barefoot there is just begging to get coarse, leathery feet covered in cuts and infections. It's pretty possible she was only shoeless because she was impoverished.
 * And her old dress back? Again, Frollo presumably destroyed it and all but one of her other dresses so that he can have her executed properly, hence the white dress.
 * Perhaps she made a new one? Given how it's her main outfit in the first movie, it's probable that if she did remake it her memory is good enough that she can make a dress that's at least almost identical to one she wore frequently.


 * Other than it being just plain nasty, not to mention totally inappropriate for a Disney film, is there any logical reason that Frollo doesn't just rape Esmeralda instead of burning her at the stake for refusing to sleep with him? Given that his whole obsession with finding her is lust-fueled, and that he has no moral problem with murdering her for turning him down (and especially since, if she were to agree to his offer, it would be under the circumstances of “you will be killed if you do otherwise,” which sounds like rape to me), I just don’t see what’s stopping a guy as twisted and perverse as Frollo from forcing himself on her.
 * He believes he'll go to Hell if he does. He blames her for his feelings of lust, believing she cast a spell on him to make him fall in love with her in order to damn him.
 * Yes, but he still hunts her down and tries to get her to sleep with him, just not by direct physical force.
 * Bear in mind a couple of things. Firstly, perceptions of rape. Even in our supposedly modern and sophisticated times, many people would probably only think of a rape as rape if there was violence and a total lack of any grey area involved, as opposed to a simple lack of consent (hence many of society's victim-blaming problems, especially in scenarios like "date rape" or rape by a partner/spouse). The fact that not everyone would think this now is in itself a reflection that we've come a long way forward, not that we haven't still got a huge distance to go yet. In the time at which this was set, it's more than likely that it just wouldn't occur to Frollo that, should he coerce Esmeralda into sex, it would still be rape: a sin. Secondly, at this point in history, it wasn't a reflection on a man if he had sex with a woman outside of wedlock. It was the woman who received the social stigma and abuse. Men weren't expected to remain virgins (unless they were members of the clergy), but women were, until marriage. Thus, it wouldn't be considered a sin on his behalf for Frollo to force Esmeralda into sex; the blame would most likely lie on her.
 * It would have made the film a whole lot more darker and less child friendly than it already was. There's only so much the film can get away with while still keeping it a G-rated Disney film. Or maybe it just never occurred to Frollo that he could rape her. But to put it out there, he does try to rape Esmeralda in the novel, which is saying something.


 * This has been bugging me since I actually climbed Notre Dame... but just how DID Frollo get to Quasi and Esmeralda so fast? Those stairs are not easy to book it up and they're rather steep too (not to mention narrow). So aside from dramatic purposes, how'd he manage it?
 * Good question. I'd chalk it up to, it's Paris, it's before the age of elevators and escalators, everyone is used to doing a lot more walking and climbing a lot of stairs. Even though Frollo's old, he's still in shape. Plus... dramatics.
 * Also keep in mind that Frollo has visited Quasimodo frequently. He's used to climbing those particular stairs.


 * This has been making me scratch my head for years now, so I'm going to throw it out here: when Phoebus gets shot in the back and falls off the bridge into the river, he's in full armor. Moments later, when Esmeralda pulls him out of the water, his armor has vanished. How the hell did Esmeralda remove his armor underwater in less than thirty seconds?
 * Continuity error, probably. Esmeralda either took the armor off because it was weighing Phoebus down, or perhaps Phoebus was trying to take his armor off while he was underwater to get to his wound or in an attempt to swim to the surface without being constrained.
 * In the commentary they mention that they had cut out a segment where Esmeralda actually does take off his breastplate underwater (which is what made him sink like a rock in the first place). Just think of it as a teeny-tiny little time skip right there, I guess.
 * Yeah I always assumed more time passed than we were actually shown, and that Phoebus and/or Esmeralda got the armor off him underwater. Esmeralda's good, but she's not that good.


 * Why would Frollo the hater of all sins and vices go to the festival of fools. They had beer and partying why on earth would he show up?
 * As he says to Quasi when the latter asks to go, he's a public official and thus is obliged to attend. He doesn't actually like it.


 * Two of Quasimodo's Gargoyles, Victor and Hugo, are named after the author of the original novel, Victor (Marie) Hugo. What's the third, female Gargoyle named? Laverne. Why not call her Marie?
 * Because the third one is always named Laverne.
 * If it helps about six bells are named Marie.


 * Okay, so can anyone explain to me why Esmeralda has totally changed in the sequel? For example: The Esmeralda from the first movie would NEVER had just sat there while someone threatened her family. She would have gone all Mama Bear and killed the crap out of the bad guys to save her son. However, what does she do here? Just cowers behind her husband. WHAT!?
 * Is there a sequel?


 * Maybe I didn't pay attention, but why didn't Esmeralda scold the crowd for having humiliated Quasimodo (you know, when they tied the poor creature and tossed vegetables at him while laughing)? I know Frollo is guilty of criminal negligence, but he was not the only one to be blamed there...
 * Possibly because she was more concerned about getting to the root of the problem--not only did Frollo refuse to help Quasi, it was his soldiers who started the riot and turned the people against him in the first place. Not to mention, the people were more likely to listen to and support her if she chastised the man they were already inclined to fear and hate than if she called them to account for their own actions. The way she did it, instead of turning the whole mob against her, she showed them someone would dare to stand up to Frollo, and emphasize that what he did/allowed, the torture of Quasi, was wrong. By implication that would make them start questioning their own actions; outright yelling at them would have actually done the opposite.
 * The crowd was of villagers, who were all sinners. Frollo was clergy. He's kind of not allowed to encourage that.
 * Frollo was a judge, not clergy.


 * How exactly was Frollo going to get Esmeralda out of the stake if she HAD agreed to marry him? The amount of bullshitting he would have had to do would have been epic.
 * Something like, "Wait! God has granted me a vision! This woman must not be harmed! Quick, untie her in the name of Lord God!" Him being a clergy, I doubt it would've been too hard for him to explain.
 * For the billionth time, Frollo, in the Disney film, is not a member of the clergy. He is a judge.
 * At this time, weren't judges also members of the clergy?
 * Actually no. Remeber, people were wrestling at the line of guards, shouting: "She's innocent! Let her go!" If Frolo exclaimed, that "The gypsy witch Esmeralda has repented in her sins and humbly accepted the penance imposed upon her!" nobody would have a problem, and people would've probably cheered, thinking :"Thank God, he finally came to his senses". And guards, of course, don't give a damn about what their master does.


 * How was Hugo able to roast a sausage on top of the cathedral on Notre Dame? I know in the song he mentions that in "A Guy Like You" that Paris is glowing and burning, but damn was the sunset hotter than Tattooine!


 * Why would Gypsies sneak into Paris? Isn't that just going to the center of where everyone wants to kill you?
 * The same reason that Mexicans escape to the US. They'll still be hunted down and distrusted, but at least it's better than their homeland. (assuming that the Roma were Eastern European - Eastern Europe has a lot of Roma, and a long history of utter brutality towards them)