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I am not in any cdrama fandoms, but a certain amount of cdrama material crosses my dash on Tumblr, and I have been led (perhaps erroneously?) to believe that in Ye Olden Days in China, it was a Thing for men to fall in love with slightly effeminate younger men.
This would make Shang’s crush on Ping in Mulan totally socially acceptable, and I kind of love the idea that Shang is actually quite pleased with himself! because he has managed to acquire a socially acceptable crush! (obviously he has a history of unacceptable crushes) and then it turns out that in fact Ping is a crossdressing girl and thus just as socially unacceptable as all his other crushes and Shang is like GODDAMMIT, NOT AGAIN.
Uh, anyway, we just watched Mulan, which is one of my favorite Disney movies from my childhood. It might in fact have been my VERY favorite Disney movie from my childhood, except for Mushu, who I have loathed since his very first appearance in front of my youthful eyeballs in 1998. There’s that wonderful sequence where Mulan cuts off her hair WITH A SWORD, which is probably the worst hair-cutting implement but THE AESTHETIC, and she puts on the armor and rides off in the rain and it’s so serious and dramatic and amazing.
And then in the very next scene FUCKING MUSHU shows up and sucks the gravitas out of everything. I realize that this is the point; he’s supposed to be a comic relief character who appeals to children, but let me tell you, nine-year-old me was Not Having It. If anything my feelings have moderated over the years, and I still think Mushu is one of the most annoying Disney sidekicks ever. The cricket was already a perfectly good comic relief sidekick and the movie should have stuck with him.
(I also felt this way in Moana when the movie teased us with an adorable pig sidekick and instead saddled Moana with an annoying chicken, but at least the annoying chicken did not talk.)
I love almost everything else in the movie, though. Mulan is delightful. Her grandmother is amazing (I really think Disney doesn’t get enough credit for its feisty old lady characters). I love Mulan’s relationship with her father; the tactful way he tries to cheer her up after her journey to the matchmaker goes all wrong… And the songs are so catchy; I particularly like “Be a Man” (“mysterious as the dark side of the moooooooon”) and “A Girl Worth Fighting For.”
The part at the end where the only way for Mulan and her soldier friends to save China is to dress up as women feels in some way Peak Nineties as a commentary on gender, but after all it was the nineties, so what do you expect? And possibly I’m just a little salty that we didn’t get to see cross-dressed Shang, too. Come on! That would have been fun!
This would make Shang’s crush on Ping in Mulan totally socially acceptable, and I kind of love the idea that Shang is actually quite pleased with himself! because he has managed to acquire a socially acceptable crush! (obviously he has a history of unacceptable crushes) and then it turns out that in fact Ping is a crossdressing girl and thus just as socially unacceptable as all his other crushes and Shang is like GODDAMMIT, NOT AGAIN.
Uh, anyway, we just watched Mulan, which is one of my favorite Disney movies from my childhood. It might in fact have been my VERY favorite Disney movie from my childhood, except for Mushu, who I have loathed since his very first appearance in front of my youthful eyeballs in 1998. There’s that wonderful sequence where Mulan cuts off her hair WITH A SWORD, which is probably the worst hair-cutting implement but THE AESTHETIC, and she puts on the armor and rides off in the rain and it’s so serious and dramatic and amazing.
And then in the very next scene FUCKING MUSHU shows up and sucks the gravitas out of everything. I realize that this is the point; he’s supposed to be a comic relief character who appeals to children, but let me tell you, nine-year-old me was Not Having It. If anything my feelings have moderated over the years, and I still think Mushu is one of the most annoying Disney sidekicks ever. The cricket was already a perfectly good comic relief sidekick and the movie should have stuck with him.
(I also felt this way in Moana when the movie teased us with an adorable pig sidekick and instead saddled Moana with an annoying chicken, but at least the annoying chicken did not talk.)
I love almost everything else in the movie, though. Mulan is delightful. Her grandmother is amazing (I really think Disney doesn’t get enough credit for its feisty old lady characters). I love Mulan’s relationship with her father; the tactful way he tries to cheer her up after her journey to the matchmaker goes all wrong… And the songs are so catchy; I particularly like “Be a Man” (“mysterious as the dark side of the moooooooon”) and “A Girl Worth Fighting For.”
The part at the end where the only way for Mulan and her soldier friends to save China is to dress up as women feels in some way Peak Nineties as a commentary on gender, but after all it was the nineties, so what do you expect? And possibly I’m just a little salty that we didn’t get to see cross-dressed Shang, too. Come on! That would have been fun!
