Editor’s Note: Whether on screen or off, Hollywood can always be counted on to keep us entertained. This is especially true when it comes to politics. Liberty Nation’s HollyWeird column shines the spotlight on Tinseltown’s A-listers and their wild and wacky takes on today’s events.
Disney has been positioned in a negative spotlight for a while now, and that’s not likely to change anytime soon. The “family-themed” company seems to have gone too woke for its britches and is facing criticism from every direction. The famed princess collection already has been dunned for its overly perfect characters; now, TikTok fans have their noses bent out of joint because Ariel and her royal sisters have cute snoots while poor Ursula and her cohorts have ugly and disfigured snouts.
Disney Characters Confuse Little Girls
A TikToker recently posted a video comparing Disney princess noses to their evil counterparts. Sleeping Beauty, Jasmine, Belle, and Aurora all have the “cute button nose,” which, some say, automatically tells the audience that these characters are the good gals, the ones for whom you want to root. The wicked villains — such as Ursula, Jafar, and Cruella de Vil — sport crooked honkers with bumps and warts, telltale signs that the character is evil and not to be liked or admired.
(Photo by LMPC via Getty Images)
“This must be so confusing for a little girl,” accompanied the post. A commenter chimed in: “This is probably why I always hated my nose and didn’t realize it.” Still another complained, “I noticed this as a kid and I HATED it. Why was it I could only ever find my nose shape on a villain.” Alyssa revealed her shame, saying, “Literally grew up thinking I looked like a witch for this reason I hate my nose bump.”
Not everyone was convinced the stylistic way princesses’ and villains’ noses are drawn is offensive as one commenter posted, “has anyone ever associated hooked noses with villans due to Disney? I’m not saying it’s ok I’m just curious cause I never did.”
This is only the most recent schnoz bash for Disney princesses, though. TikToker Robin Reaction shared a clip with more than five million views last year about the injustice. “Going back to the earliest princesses, we can see their noses consists of a hint of nostril, and then depending on the angle, also like a slight curve,” the influencer said. To really drill in the message, Reaction imparted this information:
“This is in stark contrast to the women in these movies who are depicted as evil and therefore had to be ugly. One of the easiest ways to tell if a woman was going to be evil … is to see if they have a nose that actually resembles a nose.”
Reaction continued, pointing out that the lack of sniffers continued through the 2000s, “and when non-white princesses started to get introduced, they got the same lack of nose treatment,” referring to Pocahontas and Mulan. The video producer had one more point to make: “And I think it’s worth noting that Disney knows how to draw extremely hot people that have defined noses, they’ve been doing it to men a long time.”
The Same-Face Syndrome
The nose is only part of it, though. According to some Disney personnel, there’s a thing called “same-face syndrome” when it comes to drawing Disney princess characters and hiring actors to portray them at the theme parks and on stage. According to Polygon:
“Disney kickstarted its animation dominance with a round-faced, cherubic-lipped, long-eyelashed princess: Snow White, the fairest of them all. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs set a high bar for Disney, inviting critical comparisons to its design and story for years afterward. Critics as far back as the 1950s noticed that Cinderella, Aurora, and other early Disney protagonists shared very similar designs to Snow White. One Variety reviewer pointed out that Cinderella (and also her bland prince) felt ‘colorless’ and ‘doll-faced’ — but that other characters in Disney’s Cinderella, like the wicked stepsisters and the king, were more inventively designed. It’s telling which characters get to look unique, and which must adhere to that same-face syndrome.”
Apparently, the same goes for human actors, who get cast as “face characters.” Sarah Daniels worked at Disney parks and cruises for nearly a decade and was cast as such characters as Alice, Wendy, Mickey Mouse, Ariel, and Tinker Bell. She told the New York Post that “There’s a thousand white women who look like Cinderella.”
The idea is to have a “normal” look — however one defines normalcy. Producers like the women cast as princesses to have the same type of look so that they can easily interchange characters when needed. “I think there’s this weird thing about being a Disney princess,” Daniels said. “Women imagine that being told you’re beautiful enough to be a princess will give them confidence and validation because you’ve done the best you can do. It’s a coveted thing. It’s not a magical thing.”
But when it comes down to it, a nose by any other name is still a nose, right?
Tune in next time to see what else Tinseltown has planned.
