As a latin person who is not from Colombia. I found it interesting that Colombians and a lot of other latin countries love and feel connected to Encanto. They choose one country but other latinos from different countries saw similarities or things in common. We Brazilians don't even speak spanish, but seeing Antonio's room look like the Amazon, the music, the plants, the animals, the interracial afro-indigenous family, it's not for us but we can see ourselves on it. Elena of Avalor is also by Disney and blends all latin culture and is really hard to enjoy their takes on the culture. It just feels generic and clearly Avalor is "Mexico but with everyone else's culture on it".

This is the movie that made me skeptical about Encanto.

@@wesleis.oliveira6103 and, like, i watched Encanto with my extended Chinese family and _we_ loved it and felt connected to it too. like only a generation ago, the entire family lived in one big house just like the Madrigals - that alone felt so relatable to us, and then some - even the parts that were different to our culture made us feel closer to the story, oddly enough. maybe it's because it's not spending majority of its story/world-building trying to cater to everyone outside of the culture - in doing so they're able to tell a story that's just so rich and so full that plenty of people outside the borders of that culture can still enjoy and see a little bit of themselves in it. ...man, now i want to rewatch Encanto (again!)

@@wesleis.oliveira6103 Agreed! I watched with my family and although we could recognize it wasn't Brazilian it really hitted home because the culture is close enough. The clothes, the food, the music, the colonial architecture are all different, but a huge family living in the same house, the ethnicities, the forest (I live in semi arid, but still) the personalities are all... Us.

As a half Thai woman I agree, I watched this movie with my Thai mum and the only thing she vaguely recognised was the food and some of the clothing.

Exactly what I felt too. It just felt like a giant advertisement to sell toys to kids.

Honestly, same. Never even realised it was supposed to represent SEA until I watched this video.

@@caitlyncarvalho7637 I never watched the movie so maybe there are some Southeast Asian stuff in it but when I first saw clips and ads, I thought it was some half assed movie based on Chinese culture. And why conlang? Well, if it's a fantasy world only based out on SEA and not actually set on Earth, then why not?

@@caitlyncarvalho7637 Conlang maybe? I don't know a lot of Slavic names to compare it to anyway but the few I've heard of, it feels kinda out of place. But as I said, I'm not an expert.

@@caitlyncarvalho7637 Hard to explain. Like, you know how there are sounds and words that are associated with a language that you then mish mash to make up a name in said language? Like Jirako Sakurasama is a Japanese name I just made up on the spot. It has the R sound that goes to a K sound which kinda looks like a Japanese name on paper. And that's what I feel about Ilosovic. The -sovic sounds stereotypically Slavic but I don't think I've ever heard of that as a Slavic name. I can look it up but I feel that'll bias me here since I know barely any Slavic names.

Disney is passive progressive.

@@emhullum4120 As opposed to?

@@nanashi2146 aggressively digressive. They'd be out of business so hard if they tried bringing back old views and stereotypes of all cultures outside of white Americans.

@@sundalosketch4769 I've never heard the term "aggressively digressive" before that's interesting.

@@nanashi2146 Idk if it's a real term but it sounded fitting hehe

I'll never forget cotton Hill being the only one who knew he's Laotian

I feel you. I'm not SEA (Nepali) but people keep asking me if I'm Chinese and it's kind of annoying, I won't lie. People either think I'm Indian or Chinese. Heck, some random man stopped my mum in the streets to ask if she's FILIPINO. I'm actually done with society now

@@xxgachagirlojalxx6285 It's amazing the amount of linguistic hoops people will jump through when this could all be solved if they just learned to ask "what's your ethnicity?" Like, "are you X?" is never a good look coming from random strangers. Especially the random strangers who think they're more "cultured" and start throwing out guesses for less common ethnicities just to avoid asking if you're Chinese.

I'm gonna ask Caucasian Americans if they're Dutch and see if there's a reaction.

I shouldn't have laughed so hard but maybe i did cause thats way too real!

I wonder what could've been had they decided to focus on a specific culture like Encanto did with Colombia. Think of the missed possibilities 😭

Oh yup. That too. Some weird "armadillo"...? HELLO they are from South America.

@@aeliasstatic4376 IKR , but speaking in Disney language , think of the money they could have cash in doing one by one representation of each 11 SEA countries 😀than piling them all in one movie that wasn't very business minded of them !

@@aeliasstatic4376 exactly. ive always thought the raya movie should have focused on a certain country instead of a whole mix of them. im good with one of my sea fams being represented correctly rather than all of us being " represented " and cluttered together

As a biologist from Southeast Asia, my disappointment is immeasurable....

I hate that Disney moved on from European and Arabic inspired fairytales (to take as theirs) to foreign cultures that aren't American. Guess Disney ran out of folklore stories to copyright.

Sadly, Disney has hijacked our European stories and folklores too, making it difficult for us to tell our own stories. Our British stories such as Pooh Bear, Mary Poppins and Alice in Wonderland have been Americanised by Disney to the point, no remembers they originated in the UK.

@@Fusilier7 Pretty sure everyone is aware those stories are British considering all of the characters speak in a British accent in those Disney movies and some of them are explicitly set in London.

@@idek7438 Winnie the Pooh is British, however, Disney owns the copywrite, seizing it from Pooh's own author, A. A. Milne, and Stephen Slesinger, their families are not entitled to royalties from Disney, so Winnie the Pooh is in a legal limbo in the UK, we have the original story, but most people will be more familiar with the Disney version. Disney's Mary Poppins was also changed from its source material, such as leaving out class struggle and labour rights, very British topics during Victorian times. Disney may depict British aesthetics, but they do not always represent Britain, the Americans may speak our language, yet they still fail to understand Britain. BTW: there is no "British" accent, there are English, Scottish, Welsh and Irish accents, so take your pick.

Didn't they also trademark hakuna matata and the norse gods?

龙的后裔？呵呵~、越南人也配自称为 “龙” 的后裔？你们配吗？你知道“龙”是多么地尊贵吗？

@@user-bq9gr9pw9e 比率

@@user-bq9gr9pw9e tf

They could have just copy-pasted a Lý dynasty dragon with elephant trunk and tusks and all the scaly glory smh

@@chaook Apparently the original design for Sisu was based on Nagas, (an Indian creature brought to Myanmar and eventually Laos and Cambodia) although they ended up going with the furry elsa dragon in the end. :/

It's almost as if the more specific the characters and setting, the more the story is able to explore relatable human themes and bring the audience into the story world rather than just throwing a bunch of references together and calling it "representation."

@@specialtramp exactly

I feel seen.. As a southeast asian that loved encanto lol

I've noticed the same thing about Coco. And both Coco and Encanto are similar examples of cultural appropriation done, if not right, then at least much better than in Raya.

@@fluidthought42 By definition, accurately representing a culture is not cultural appropriation.

Don't you mean, 4 hours?

Four!! Four hours!!! We are being fed!!! I've been waiting for someone well-versed or researched in Raya to complain about it eloquently for. Months.

imagine if she released a p3 😭

& friends*

@@Mizu-AM according to their Twitter they may release a part three diving into the queer aspects of Raya and how they relate to SE Asian queer culture 👀👀👀

Felt exactly the same. I could only point out Arnis, the rest are just "familiar but it's not my culture".

it tried to represent all of sea by lumping us all together it ended up... not representing any of us lol. im indonesian too and encanto is much better than raya imo.

It’s like they always say: when you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one

My guess is that they wanted to have an original story rather than basing it off of a classic that might be in the public domain. You’ll notice that nearly all of their films for the past decade have been original IPs - even “Frozen” took a lot of liberties with the material it was loosely based on.

Same I’m Vietnamese and they really missed out. All of SEA cultures are vastly different, idk who’s idea it was to combine everything 😭 Encanto also resonated more with me than Raya.

Ya the hate she got was completely uncalled for

Lindsay's tweet was about the world being in harmony, but everything changed when the Devastating Event happened. Now they must travel to each devastated faction pursued by the Cause Of The Devastation to reinstate the Harmony Of The World. Her follow-up tweet was literally explaining this. I think it's a huge disservice to Lindsay - who got run off the internet for 2 months because of people refusing to engage with her actual words and fighting over this misinterpretation - to say "I feel like her tweet is [literally the thing she explained she was not saying and has nothing to do with her point]".

Yeah

You know what's the worst part that it is really sad that no one questions their authority, there's no challenge to their colonial power. American corporations OWN the international cultural production. So the rest of us CAN'T make ourselves visible unless we are liked by them. We have no power. So we HAVE to be marketable to Disney or have no international recognition at all if they don't think you are pretty you are condemned to be invisible even at you own local cultural market that often rathers to make money of the big foreign corporation instead of investing in local artists. Why aren't we all buzzing about a SEA film, make by SEA artists about themselves and in the native language of some of this SEA nations? Trust me it's not because people hate subtitles. It's the USA cultural domination of the world and they happen to be corporocracy.

This reminds me of people wanting to support/pretend it's good when it comes to stuff like Nekopara Carboy paradise because otherwise they'll just be like see there's no market for this! Even though they just didn't do it nearly as good as the catgirl nekoparas... And with a lot of features lacking, like not even really having romance when that's supposedly the whole point of it. Or, yk, female main characters in situations/franchises/genres etc where there's usually be male characters. If it's bad that means someone didn't write a woman good, doesn't mean something with women can't be good.

In short, a hybrid economy of capitalism and socialism is best, Teddy Roosevelt was right, and Ayn Rand was dead wrong!

When Catwoman and Elektra flopped, the message big studios took away from that was "Female superheroes don't sell." instead of "Maybe we should hire more competent writers and directors to make female superhero movies."

Oh ye gods! My roast is ruined!

Yeeeus!

Yeah and then you launch the urn into the sun

Wild accented cinema spotted!

@@imveryangryitsnotbutter But what if... I were to take a shallow interpretation of a foreign legend and turn it into a blockbuster disney movie? oh ho ho. Delightfully devilish, Bob.

Probably you need to become harsh more XD

I enjoy your channel so much! It's cool to know you also watch Xiran. Can't wait for your video!

Just release a separate Encanto video and then roast Raya by giving it the worst rating in your next tierlist and just link this video lol

lmao good to see you here roasting this dude

Hey! One of my favorite youtubers!

Huhu MLP inspired is the word 🤣

Honestly the concept art that was more Thai inspired dragons would have been do cool, and I was honestly disappointed they picked this one. I almost threw them a bone saying maybe it's easier to animate and looks better in motion, but it still fell flat compared to other shows and movies. Give the girl dragon tusks cowards.

Also a dragon geek, dragons have continued to evolve throughout culture and media as long as they've been represented, they're rarely strictly mythologically accurate in animation or film (even the winged, fire breathing flying DnD western dragon is a relatively new media creation, historical western dragons are more snake-like). And though not a traditional Naga, adding fluff to dragons in media is something that's been going on in pop culture since "Spirited Away", and fur/feathers in general often show up as an accent feature in historical dragon art. Sisu still reads as a dragon, (by this I mean a serpent-based mythical creature) though it's not the design I would have preferred them to use either. I'm a fan of the earlier concepts that were closer to a traditional Naga.

This dragon is fucking ugly

Its a cute cartoon design lol

They prolly learnt from Raya. Imagine Encanto was originally meant to be in a vague central/south american country then they pick a specific country after people’s reaction to Raya.

This is what people chased Lindsay off the internet over holy sht

@@RadenWA That's exactly what I was about to comment. Encanto is a really good movie, but if it randomly included chilean cultural aspects that didn't fit, as a chilean I would have been so weirded out by it.

@@ItsJustValHere heck, I’d be fine of Raya kept the culture borrowing within SEA, but then they put in a snowy Viking settlement, a desert with African animals and some futuristic dress from Star Trek and I’m like 🤦‍♂️ do we not even have enough culture for you?

@@RadenWA No, Encanto was described from the very beginning as a story about a family of Colombian witches. I remember reading that before even the trailer for Raya came out, back when both films were still in early production.

exactly, i’m SEA not colombian but it’s clear encanto was like a love letter to colombia

Colombia* not Columbia, Columbia is the historical Name used To describe the female personnification of the United States. While it May Sound similar to Colombia, the two words dont even Share the Same ethymology and have nothing To do with each other.

@@LMedici Apologies, it was a genuine spelling mistake (・_・;)

What matters more is story and character though, Moana was also an amalgamation of Pacific Island cultures (like Raya is for SEA), and I think it did well with what they did as a Pacific Islander myself.

@@LMedici i’m so sorry and thank you

Christians have been very weirded out by dragon worship since forever since their dragons ar, for the most part, associated with satan or evil in general

Oh my God, Ganesh nerd sounds so blasphemous, I'm Pakistani and I can't imagine ever describing myself as an Allah nerd wtfffffff this is so BADDDD 💀💀💀💀💀

@@nihilism1652 god otaku

@@RoyalKnightVIII otaku 💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀💀

​@@RoyalKnightVIII westerners just like to apply their beliefs onto others eh. It's the "I'm the centre of the world" attitude for me

This discourse misidentified Jasmine as central Asian despite being canonically middle eastern (Arab)

One mistake does not a failure make; The discourse is still far superior to Raya and the Last Dragon.

@@jeffreygao3956 And speaking of Central Asian Rep, due you hate it when Hollywood depicts Kazakhstan in a way that suggest it's in (eastern) Europe? Infamous examples include the movies Airforce one and Borat

@@caitlyncarvalho7637 Well, Borat is a parody anyway; I wouldn't expect anyone to take it seriously. But you're right: Look to Mongolia for a better example of what Kazakh people are like.

@@jeffreygao3956 But Airforce One is not a parody and it also treats Kazakhstan like it's in Europe

They don't even know Turkish people also actually asian XD Thanks to racism and hate toward Turkish people nobody give a fuck about Turkish people anyway.

As an Indian I can't even at this take 💀😭😭

What?

Indian that are racist towards east asians: 😮

Also it's such an american way to adress a group of other cultures by a term related to COLOR OF THE SKIN, when that is an issue that's primarily a conflict in US culture. Usually when they say "POC" all they think of is someone who's not pale white, which is, in itself , racist too. I say this cause a similar issue arised a few weeks ago in twitter (ugh), where a japanese artist was blamed of "whitewashing" when making a fanart of Encanto with a more pastel pallette and bullied into erasing it, and the entire hispanic community stood up to defend this artist, and the response of these people was so poor they basically stated tha there's no white people in latin america or they don't have a right to speak up for anything cause "privilege", and that just ADDED FUEL TO FIRE. So yeah I hate that the people who make statements like these think they are doing a good thing when in reality they just make it worse.

Few things make me as frustrated as this bullshit. It’s heartbreaking to see how little cooperation people who all are fighting for the same general idea have with each other

@@XantaliX they're just stupid. "POC", bullshit. they only used the term "POC" when they were caught red-handed as justification. I just remember a while ago a person from us get deported from Indonesia because she overextended her vacation visa and even encouraged other people to come here despite the rising number of covid cases. then she played victim by saying the officials kicked her out because she's black and part of the LGBTQ+ community, which is not true. Nobody cares about your race here (there's still exists some ethnocentricism and feudalism here, but nothing about races). just don't mess with the law here. it saddens me that on the internet nowadays, people who have nothing to do with the said culture get more attention than the real people who live in that culture. I've seen north African people get into heated arguments with ignorant westerners that keep saying there are no fair skin people in Africa. or seeing people harassing others because a word from other languages vaguely resembles N-word and many more. such stupid behavior from the supposed "superpower" country.

@@XantaliX That's a thing too with this dark skinned Chinese woman in Genshin Impact named Xinyan. People kept calling her black on Twitter and whoever drew her with pastels or in a lighter skin tone were just "whitewashing" racists. Completely ignoring the fact dark skinned asians (naturally or not) EXIST and that lighting and art style exists.. I've also recently learned they're trying to "westernize" latinos by forcing the term "latinx" because "Your language should be more inclusive to more than only men and women." When in reality Spanish is already pretty inclusive enough, it just has masc and fem tones to it which is too deeply imbedded within the language to have it all get written out in favor of having inclusion that's already there. This has been happening with nearly all cultures and languages that differ from Americans in general and it almost makes me embarrassed to be American/live here.

To put the way Raya sees Asia into perspective: It is like a movie about Frida Kahlo casting Celine Dion as the main character and marketing itself as representing authentic Brasilian culture, because it was filmed in New Jersey.

This! It was just so clear that Ellis was "whipping boy of the week". Ugh, I can't stand these self-congratulating racists.

Racists and colonists tbh

This!! And it's the same shit that took away any enjoyment I had for Encanto, despite being latina myself.

Let's be clear - Ellis had a target on her back because she was a woman who was unapologetic outspoken. The people who came for her didn't care about Raya, racism, POC, or South East Asia. They'd been stalking her, attacking every single thing she did, said, or posted, generally doing whatever that could to silence her. Now her voice has been silenced, another spot had opened up for their fellow racists to step into, and women in the public eye have been warned, once again, to stay in their place. It's enraging, but what can you do?

@@LucasSantos-ss6ou Yep! They were a flock of vultures, pecking away, waiting to swoop in for the kill. It's honestly sickening.

Hi. I have something I want to share about it as well. Most likely no one would read it but thanks if you do Before anyone is going to say anything about it, i am south East Asian (Im Thai ) and I actually have a pretty different opinion on the video. Now it’s ok to disagree I just want to share my opinion as well. - I actually like the idea of trust because it’s uncommon in south east Asia.The fact that it’s a real problem that happens in the region today is a good way to make a compelling story as well as sharing your message. I would say I like to see that more often of the movie based on that culture to represent the problem of that culture as their main theme to get the message to the people of the culture and let them reflect on it. But i don’t think the way trust and unity is portrayed here is a good way to do it. I agree with the video that we unity as a monolith isn’t really a good way since we and kumantra itself doesn’t share anything in common between different regions. Though I still see trust and unity being possible in south east Asia. Not as one thing but as multiple. It’s not about becoming the same.it’s about accepting differences. About showing that it’s ok to have different culture, different lifestyle and different philosophy but we can try to understand each other’s perspective. We don’t have to be the same to be together. Being different but accepting each other is the way to go. Modern south east Asia do have an attempt at unity as well as seen in asean , a union of south East Asian countries. I do agree that they should not use the ellite class as a representation of trust. Using the ellite makes the story a bit cheaper and trying to make her a “princess” isn’t good enough for me. It would be much more compelling to see someone who’s not the ellite, someone who’s the underdog to give up themselves and trust the other. I don’t really agree with the part where they say raya lack of family and community trust is a bad representation. She has always been portrayed as an untrusting outcast of her tribe and no one in her tribe or the other tribe does it that way and it’s why she should learn to trust each other . I think the ending of the movie is a bit too easy. With people immediately regaining trust even though they are the exact same untrusting person a long time ago is a bit odd. I would say it shouldn’t be seen as an immediate thing and I would say having then either slowly assemble together after the crisis is solve is better. They don’t need to all immediately recover they just have to show the hope and the start of a new age. Not the end process. Ik it’s a Disney movie and it has keep it simple but I could see this being made with only a few tweaks. I think the idea of self discovery and trying to yourself out of the family expectations but still support the family is a good idea for a plot since it’s also a thing in south East Asia and it’s a massive problem I do struggle with. But i don’t think the way Disney do it is flawed or bad in anyway . It’s just kind of a creative liberty. I agree the dragon and drune are really cheap and are only there to be a force for the character. I think it would be better with human as both the good and bad guys or treating the dragons and drunes as human like character or make the dragon behave like actual south East Asian spirits. For sis design, it sucks. I’m not sure why they make her pink and purple and give her almost amphibious skin down the back since in south east Asia these dragons usually have scales . The calmer tone down appearance is probably a marketable choice but i don’t have as much problem with it however I think a more animalistic dragon who are still capable of being kind an emotional would work better. The lack of jewelry and pattern bothers me a bit as afaik thai nagas have a lot of jewelry and a very distinctive pattern on the horn which Disney try to do with the horn colo but it’s a bit too mild to be recognizable. The pattern should be carvings and the horn should have a rougher surface with flowing patterns and traditional shape with tone down edges more like a crest instead of just being a smooth rhino horn with marbeling blue color. The pattern they put on the horn are also the wrong type of pattern as well being generic Traditional pattern. She looks less like a dragon and more like Awkwafinas fursona than anything else.and since these dragons aren’t always aggressive and intimidating but are also capable of kindness and joyfulness when they want to I feel like a more traditional looking Naha won’t hurt her characters personality.her original design seems to have slight kirin reference which is odd but is removed from the new design anyway. I personally like the idea of mix matching south East Asian culture but then Disney put an additional layer of whitewashing over it which makes it a bit weird. As well as mixing some of the geography which makes some moment real awkward like the non snow proof house of spine or the fact that there are shrimp paste from tail despite tail being a mostly desert biome and even in the earlier version with s still a grassland when irl Indonesia as an island make these from small shrimp and krill . I also don’t get why they stuff in snow and desert into it which do exist in south east Asia but aren’t the main point. I would like to see more grassland and rainforest representation as well. Though I do like how they use the dragon shaped river like the ma Khong river of mainland southeast asia. Where Nagas are believed to live. The geography of tail though being critiqued a lot by the video is actually representative of how the capital of many south East Asian capitals. All kingdoms of Thailand have their capital built on artificial islands dug by massive canals and ankor wat is surrounded by a lot of water. The water act as good waterway communication and trade route for mainland countries and to protect them from foreign attacks in term of war. Though the isolation of tail is likely from the Drune as without them it would likely look more like talons . I feel like talons without trade have to turn inward to get resources . They can grow plants on floating rafts like how people did in tonle sap Cambodia. I would like to see that being represent as well. It might be contraversial to say this,but though the movie itself as an underrepresentation of south East Asian culture, this video itself has an underrepresentation of mainland south East Asian culture where most of the films took inspiration from so the video say something from the mainland come out of nowhere when they actually do have south East Asian roots. I would like to see more people from Myanmar,Thailand,Laos,Vietnam,and Cambodia working on this since from the video the team seems overwhelmingly Indonesian and Filipino . Though I think this movie needs more maritime south East Asian influences as well. Now I have to say I can’t speak for all south East Asian or south East Asian countries. As I said it’s ok to have different opinions but it’s ok to share them as well. (Pls don’t cancel me ) This is my opinion. Feel free to agree or disagree.

@@thefolder3086 woah this is well written and interesting. You should upload this as a comment instead of a reply to a comment, that way it’ll get more attention

@@goldenbunnies4143 I did It gets two likes ;-; Thx for reading tho

@@thefolder3086 ofc! You clearly took a lot of time to write it all out, and your thoughts are very well put together. It’s so detailed, and a really good read after watching the video. I’m not sea so I don’t have an opinion on this, but thank you for sharing yours!

@@goldenbunnies4143 thx! Idk how to get people to notice this but I’m glad at least someone did. I’m actually a part of a mostly south East Asian game developer team who makes a south East Asian inspired sci fi game so I’m pretty much familiar with blending culture but we try yo make sure it still keeps some authenticity but ofc we won’t brand it as super authentic. I also wanna hear your opinion as well even if you aren’t a native just to see how people think about the movie.

Are you Dealing with a gaston ?

yeah, and i've had many people blue screen as I say I'm latina and brazilian lol

yeah, we're all small colonial towns in which live people who doesn't know how a to speak a bit of english... its funny 'cos google earth exist and you can google EVERY city in the world and if they do this, they'll discover 1. we have buildings, 2. every city and culture is quite different from each other, 4. we know better english than they know spanish...

Example: salsa music _always_ being associated with Mexico when it's WAY more popular in other SA countries 💀

@@error-try-again-later example: tango = salsa

Yep, exactly. The biggest problem with claiming this movie as a faithful rep of SEA is that it can, and does, influence how those who don't know abt SEA view the region. For example, I've seen lots and lots of comments circulating translations of words in the movie (including words like binturi, which, as the vid shows, is completely made up) as if they are accurately representing (the very diverse!) SEA languages. Worse, more often than not there is no clarification on the possible word origin or something, just plain "dep la means 'strangely beautiful'" without mentioning that it's Vietnamese. The very fact that the whole Kumandra seems to share the same language itself is not helping. If anything, it perpetuates the "Asians are monolith" stereotype even more :(

I had no idea it was based on Sami culture. And I live in Finland! I know it's out of season, but thanks to this comment, I'm going to watch that movie for the first time. You're right, the marketing really didn't make it stand out.

@@Rebochan I'm American so I can't tell which country or culture the majority of the film is based on, but there is a group that joins in partway through they explicitly name as Sami, and I heard positive reviews of the portrayal. Would love to hear your thoughts after you see the movie 😊

I love Klaus! (=

1. How did Klaus do this better if “this” isn’t even what it was doing? 2. Disney hadn’t claimed so much representation in Raya, therefore, we don’t need this video. 3. Regardless of if they had claimed that, they delivered representation, so…

Asian american is usually so disconnected from their Asian root but always view themself as a true, one and only POC voice that matter. Just because they're from 1st world country and more fluent in english

Those with the least skin in the game are usually the ones who take the most offense, in my experience. It's like they know the conversation doesn't really involve them, so they have to shout louder and be angrier to make up for it.

they really put the AMERICAN in Asian american, new day new entitled assh*le in Twitter

Asian American voices still matter because they’re still asian I don’t like seeing how non immigrants constantly look down on american asians but i do agree the harassment was a little uncalled for because all Lindsey really did was say raya in a way was like Atla :’)

@@reigenxal As a SEA, I’ll be completely honest; the answer to that is resentment lol. We’re *way* too aware that Asian-Americans will always have more of a voice than us when presenting our cultures to the global market purely by virtue of the “American” in their identity and where they live. Personally though, my concerns about this come from wariness and worry, not condescension. I can’t help but be nervous for these diaspora because it’s pretty obvious that they’re so disconnected from their roots, they are most likely the ones who will misrepresent or speak over us in a bid to cling to whatever representation they can get from the American side of who they are. When they could just, I dunno, ask us? We’re not that hard to find online-

Amphibia has better SEA representation and portrayal.

@@mariaconner8650 it did. And even his mother was brought on to voice Anne’s mom.

@@KaeMcSpadden You know what else has better SEA representation? Khan Kluay.

Seriously!! Amphibia was so good!

@@mariaconner8650Molly McGee too

tbf I don't think Aladdin was supposed to give representation, all the Arabian stuff was practically stylistic, with Raya though they would not shut up about how they're trying to represent

I think atla and genshin and alladin were more about being "inspired" loosely. Trying to inspire their fantasy world meanwhile raya tried to go with "rep" and failed at meeting that expectation.

Thing is, no one was supposed to feel ethnically or culturally connected to Aladdin, it was just a fantasy movie, but I understand there was a specific statement on this movie that claimed specific cultural connections?

Exactly. till this day i see tiktoks of south asians and arabs fighting over whether Aladdin is southasian or not. like... it's none and both at the same time.

Clearly India was much more successful at appropriating Aladdin with Padmaavat 😁

So, Encanto is bad?

Also attempted to sue Mattel for Ever After High when EAH came first and Descendants is a rip off.

@@progunjack5556 Disney is. Encanto was the bomb.

Me, a "you photograph pale so you must be white" person who lives in a barrio filled with Latin individuals from *everywhere* : Uhh, if someone tried to commodify dia de los muertos and gatekeep or tell individuals they had to pay royalties/ect to have their services, make/buy pan muerte or dress accordingly - this otherwise quiet neighborhood would most likely riot. I'm not exaggerating. *Even I* have an ofrenda - That is one of the most dangerous and stupid things I've ever heard them try to pull (and I'm rather well educated in problematic Disney history). I can't think of an "American" or similar cultural equivalent to the amount of disrespect and outrage it would cause for them to do to another holiday.

@@RC.- I remember that being addressed in the live action Mulan response video. If it wasn't here, I think it was dreamsounds or someone else prominent talking about (on the outset) the issue of Mulan being an automatic outright GirlBoss prodigy from the beginning.

Hell, I'm super white and even I had issues with Sisu. I hated that they made the female dragon look...stereotypically female instead of like actual SEA dragon art.

@@theflickchick9850 r/PointlesslyGendered, I guess?

Apparently the original design for Sisu was based on Nagas, (an Indian creature brought to Myanmar and eventually Laos and Cambodia) although they ended up going with the furry Elsa dragon in the end. They basically placed marketability over authenticity and respect

Thai here. Agree

@@theflickchick9850 just like Disney same-facing female humans too. Elsa, Anna, Rapunzel, and beyond. same giant eyes and button nose while males are super varied in Disney's media. Dragons are such interesting subjects, especially visually, Sisu could have looked so much better.

Omg yes... Id like to hear SEA myths and legends being adapted (correctly) by big corporations...

Because the animation industry is full of people that are inspired by anime and avatar and its a negative feedback loop at this point. A lot of them are Asian diaspora actually so get used to this type of show/movie

And Disney Channel Asia actually had a series of animated shorts highlighting stories from South East Asian countries. I think it was called Tales from The Ring of Fire. They could have looked at that.

@@yuki97kira do you think only conglomerates can make animation now

Read Raya and the Last Dragon the art book. It goes into detail about what the team was thinking.

Even barbie had better dragon designs (rapunzel)

Barbie... She's from my little pony...😂

IT'S BIBBLE!!!!

she looks like a rainbow Falkor

gigantamax bibble

True! I don't even know anyone who has disney plus and we were in the middle of the pandemic so ordinary people can't go to a cinema or rent (unlike rich people who can rent a special cinema or pay for Disney plus) If it was readily available the Pinoys can carry this movie however COVID said NOPE 😂

It’s kind of a “privilege” that other countries can go to movie theaters and have Disney+ in their countries yet we Filipinos don’t even have it yet at all. Of course, yelling privilege isn’t the right word for this discourse but it just seems unfair that everyone can freely post NWH spoilers in memes or theories yet we still have to wait for a long time for it to come to streaming services, and even then, those services are region-locked probably and we have to resort to pirating, I only watched Encanto because it was available for pirating!

@@naethavenir9422 did you try using a VPN? I once tried to access a website that wasn't available in the country I'm in, so I used a VPN and it worked

See, that costs money. It doesn't cost anything extra to animate people from a certain region, but actually releasing the film there is hard work!

ya true

WAIT ...USTEDES NO SON LOS DE LOS MITOS OMG Q HACEN ACA

HI RED OMG

Hi Red! As a Vietnamese myself, this video is a real breath of fresh air.

This kind of review definitely allows for people to speak out on the specific aspects that bother them or which they feel confident in discussing, and it's absolutely fascinating. As a viewer I feel much more immersed hearing one person discuss one specific aspect of the film, because it feels richer and more accurate, rather than having one person discuss every questionable aspect of the film half-deep. I am not Southeast Asian, so I can't necessarily comment on the content itself, but this type of formatting makes it much easier to focus on each aspect the speakers are criticizing and actually internalize what is being said. I'm a sucker for film criticisms and reviews and this is the most I feel I've learned from any of the videos I've seen before, simply because the formatting and in-depth discussions are so neatly presented.

Well hi Red, great seeing you here!

To Be Honest, The Director Was A Mexican-American And I Am Mexican American.

As a Vietnamese person, that one clip from a Craig of the Creek where a Vietnamese kid made bánh xèo made me feel more represented than the entirety of Raya and the Last Dragon

Avatar the last airbender raya and the last dragon the titles are almost the same

Exactly my thoughts. Concept from Encanto and Setting of Moana.

i definitely get this!

Yeah no sht. It’s never used in good faith. Anyone who talk in this mechanistic new speechy way is just regurgitating talking points.

Romani here and thank you!

@@Chordata7 Ayyy Opre Roma 🖤

If I had to guess they somehow missed the memo you are speaking for your culture. It’s a good overall mentality but there will be weird folks anywhere.

Twitter is a hellhole and everyone should stay away.

@@MammaApa Exactly, I quit Twitter and came back to Tumblr last year, best decision of my life tho..

It honestly made me have gamergate flashbacks. It is one of the reasons I think the online left does more harm than it can ever help.

I’m really glad to have heard another breakdown of it, this time with more of the context. I didn’t think Ellis deserved the harassment she got

@@extrules Online anything is bound to do more harm because of all the problems being on the internet causes.

What the heck is "isekai"? Just say "fantasy stories inspired by real cultures in history" 😂 That's what Lord of the Rings is. LOTR is directly inspired by Finnish mythology and ancient Scandinavian culture.

@@Kingdom_Of_Dreams isekai just literally means another world, as in, you get sent into another world. some examples are alice in wonderland and the wizard of oz

@@Kingdom_Of_Dreams Isekai isn't just "fantasy", it's a kinda specific genre where a person from a normal world is transported to another fantastical one, think Chronicles of Narnia

@@Kingdom_Of_Dreams usually in isekai stories the mc brings something from their world that amazes the fantasy world so much that the mc becomes the ruler or soemthing similar

@@Kingdom_Of_Dreams Isekai is a subgenre of fantasy anime and manga, once called "Portal Fantasy", where a human from our modern world is sent off into a high fantasy otherworld and has to adapt. Bringing along modern knowledge or a token piece of modern technology like a cell phone is common in the genre, but not required. Spirited Away, Chronicles of Narnia, A Kid in King Arthur's Court all can fit into the genre.

**Look nervously at Iwájú** Tbf they did specify Lagos, Nigeria as the setting for that but given its a sci-fi who even knows if they'll bother to make it distinctly Nigerian or end up with amorphous afrofuturism

I can see this as the starting idea for a movie on Australia. I've been waiting for one on our Indigenous/Torres Strait Islander Peoples for decades, but I know that it's going to be so messed up and actually become offensive if it ever happens. 'Moana' is currently our only representation from down here, and Polynesian culture is completely different. Even more so when our peoples are much more land-centric in comparison (some saltwater and desert Nations never actually seeing open water), and water in our collective culture is relative to inland river systems and lakes. However, some Nations are also across our multiple island groupings, so that may be how Disney thought they could represent us in 'Moana', too. If this ever does occur, particular representations like "language on Nation" is going to be very difficult, as you're not allowed to speak in language on other peoples' Nation i.e. it's disrespectful to speak your family clans' language, when you're in another clan's area grouping. Like I mentioned earlier, we also have freshwater, saltwater, and desert communities, which creates these cultural distinctions that Disney likes, but then they need a villain for their stories... You can see where this goes.

I've been disillusioned with Disney ever since I learned the truth about Pocahontas. Now, I watch Disney princess movies for the colors and animation...while trying not to think about how a bunch of white people mess with traditional stories & cultures.

Nah they just turn all the black characters into animals for the duration of the movie.

@@jazzycat8917 i think it will be distinctly nigerian since it’s specifically set in lagos so i have hope

That’s because “diversity” in Hollywood is shallow and skin-deep. They don’t see people from the lens of unique ethnic groups, but from racial groupings based on physical features. It’s an extremely asinine and degrading viewpoint for them to see all Asians as a monolith where “representation” is just plucking a few random East Asians and calling it Southeast Asian appeal.

@@TrueMentorGuidingMoonlight I mean what did you expect, they stole the whole human races concept from the Nazis to play different immigrants against each other so they wouldn't complain about the Government back then, but only complain about each other. And they still use it for some reason. Because they just don't learn from history.

They dont really care about diversity and that each asian country is different , they just assume all asian countries are the same , same thing happens with hispanic culture

@@danielasarmiento3101 Ironically the same treatment is given to white people too. Netflix Witcher barely had any Polish actors despite the franchise being extremely Polish, rooted in Polish fairytales. But nah, they just hired a bunch of English actors for the white folk and a bunch of tokenized POCs to fill the screen every frame. Funny how being Caucasian isn’t considered diverse despite the massive variety of ethnic groups in Europe, like Anglo-Saxons, Scots, Franks, Slavs, Nords, etc.

I think this is indicative of race overall in the United states. We don't see culture. We see color. It's weird and ignorant. It's not that way with just asians.

This is actually so interesting, the information you've given that is. The fact that most representations are shallow or downright villainous (in most actions movies smhhh) is so crappy, honestly. Proper representation is so important because for example, I live in Pakistan and because of the nature of mainstream American media I didn't really understand any Latin American culture let alone Mexican until watching Coco, which I absolutely loved. Finding out how Disney treated the woman who inspired coco and their trying to trademark such an important day made me not want to watch the movie afterwards, but I'm so glad that it's an actually GOOD representation of Mexican culture and experience! I've watched Mr. Iglesias since and I personally really liked it, however I don't know how accurate that is. I also started one day at a time so now I know a little about Cubans as well, and I'm so glad that I do! Please let me know if you have any recs with good Latin American representation! They don't have to be American, as long as I can find subs I'm good!

Because Pixar made it and they actually put effort in their movies, unlike Disney Animation Studios.

Fun fact: evidently, the original script for Coco revolved around a boy who lost his mother and learned to come to terms and let go on Día de los Muertos. They then DIDN'T go with this script after realizing it missed the point of the holiday, and rewrote it into what it is now.

@@nihilism1652 If you like zombie movies, Juan of the Dead is a very funny Cuban movie

Como que los tamales son comida de celebración? Como así? El tamalero no pasa por tu casa o que pedo?? Los tamales son comida de los estudihambres así como los tacos de canasta, mucha gente come eso como parte de su dieta diaria porque es una comida conveniente y llenadora, no vengas con mentiras, los tamales no solo se comen en la Candelaria

To be fair, the creators sort of set Moana in a Disneyfied version of the time the Polynesian expansion stopped before resuming, around a millennia ago or something, so the blending of cultures was intentional, as current cultural differences developed over time. For the navigator song (I think the English name is We Know The Way????), the singer Opetai'a Foa (apologies for potential misspellings) blended words from various Polynesian languages. That is not to say your criticism is invalid. We all deserve culturally specific representation! But at least there was a specific artistic intention with how the cultural elements were handled. Was this justified? Could the filmmakers have done differently? That's not for me to say, that's for the Pasifika community to determine. But, at least, they weren't trying to be culturally indifferent.

@@nusquamnemo4780 It would be cool if they had him sing straight-up proto-Polynesian, I looked it up and that is a linguistic reconstruction that has been made. It would make perfect sense with what you’re describing. But I know that reconstructed ancestor languages can be… a little bit tricky to work with, to say the least. Especially one with comparatively little research put into it as opposed to one like PIE, or at least I imagine so.

@ ミツ -- It sounds like they did a way lazier and more offensive version of what AtLA did, which was taking inspiration from a lot of sources, except unlike AtLA (which tried to be very respectful of its source cultures, and to not copy anything exactly as it was irl into the show), they put on their Expert Authority voice and claimed it all as one culture. . And maybe really thought it was all the same because they didn't do actual research as scrolled past google search results and grabbed this and snagged that, here and there, without even visiting the source site to verify what they were actually looking at.

*"didn't do actual research so much as scrolled" . (typo)

but that's not really disney's fault, they can't make a movie that everyone will relate to

Ayyy same- Idk this supposed to represent SEA till now-

i'm from asia and i didnt know until after i saw the promo after watching the movie lol

atla is East Asian + Inuit inspired cultures

@@lexezlao I think somebody's forgetting the Sun worshipers's who's culture is based on the Aztecs.

@@drafezard7315 I forgot about that too

Filipino here and I honestly wouldn't have minded a Malaysian-focused Disney movie in place of the failed cultural representation Raya is and those stories you mentioned seem really cool too! SEA has a lot of cultures and stories and I'm seriously disappointed that Disney came up with this I mean, past Disney movies were inspired after actual stories, why couldn't they have done the same thing with Raya, right?

Non SEA here but i want a story about the mythical crocodiles so bad. Im sorry with the shit show you guys got, you deserve a lot better

@@saiko2062 right? And I'm sure Philippines also had their own badass women in the past whether in history or folklores... My biggest problem to relate with Raya is that they didn't really insert Southeast Asian struggles and problems into the movies... How can us SEA people say "hey! I could relate with that! I'm facing the same problems too!" if nothing be relate to except for sprinkle of SEA aesthetic here and there? And I also agree with you that Disney should take a whole lots of steps back and maybe focusing on just one culture from one country at a time...

@@dustyrose192 yeah, it's kinda suck to see that people are still thinking that East Asia and Southeast Asia shares same exact cultures... Disney is all about magic and fantasy... It's kinda disappointing to watch Raya because SEA's folklore is everything about magic and fantasy... And about the mythical giant crocodiles, it is very popular lores in Malaysia, especially in Sarawak... There is a few version of it but the most told version is that there is a warrior from Dayak descendants. He is so strong and invincible that he is feared by his enemies. One of his enemies kidnapped the warrior's wife and found out that the warrior's weakness is he lost his invincibility if he got into the water. His wife got murdered, thrown into the river and he went berserk, but unfortunately killed by his enemy. His body along with his wife sunk into the river. Their body was cursed by a "god" to be a giant crocodile that inhibited a river named Batang Lupar since then. Many believed that the same crocodile had resurfaced in 1940's and had killed 14 people. The crocodile died when people shot him in 1980's with 40 shots of long nails, not bullets, because bullets didn't do anything to it. But many believe that the crocodile is not Bujang Senang, instead just a normal saltwater crocodile. The real Bujang Senang is still living till this day. Just googled "bujang senang" and you'll see how big the crocodile is.

Time for us Southeast Asians to make more of our own movies and films! I'm no filmmaker myself but will happily support any efforts. I heard about a video game being created featuring Southeast Asian creatures so let's have our own movies too! (because I understand a lot of Asian characters in games feature East Asian characters). No need for other people to create it for us then get all frustrated when it isn't done right.

Plus, Deadliest Fiction represents Southeast Asia better.

@@jeffreygao3956 how come it is considered "racist" when Southeast Asians are depicted in a fantasy context but not when Chronicles of Prydain and the infamous Disney film The Black Cauldron depicts Welshmen in a fantasy context? I know a person who only knows Welshmen from Prydain and the romcom Notting Hill and does not see them as fantasy creatures or crass vulgar drunkards but as people simply living their lives. He strongly accepts that the actor in the movie isn't pigeonholed into either role despite also being a Welshman.

@@caitlyncarvalho7637 Probably because Disney said Raya was accurate and didn't follow through.

@@jeffreygao3956 does that individual I know personally who only knows Welshmen from Black Cauldron and Notting hill (movie not real-world location) but sees them as normal people and not commodities and that included Nottinghill co-star Rhys Ifans. do you think this is a sign that representation isn't needed and if not, what does this mean?

@@caitlyncarvalho7637 Depth first, representation afterward is what I would say if I was honest...but is this a prank?

The thing is: in academia, a dragon is just a vaguely serpentine mythical creature. That's it. A basilisk is also a dragon. There's dragons with human heads. The ancient egyptian mythical serpent Apep is also called a dragon; the mesopotamian mushkhushshu are also called dragons. 'Dragon' isn't clearly defined; they can have no legs, up to six legs, wings, no wings, horns, no horns, the face can vary (from reptilian to mammalian to human), and so forth.

I just say dinosaurs and pterosaurs are dragons.

@Clawsfuchsia In the furry fandom (I know, I know) I've also seen 'noodle dragon' used to refer to creatures that resemble these serpentine beasts but aren't meant to be any specific creature from Eastern folklore. ("Noodle" being a reference to how they're shaped, of course, and also a term of endearment similar to how snakes are called "danger noodles".)

Noodle cat then?

“Dragon” isn’t really a class of creatures as it is shorthand to describe a specific set of features in mythological animals. A hydra could be a “dragon” the same way a long could be a “dragon”, but a hydra is not a long, and vice versa. Calling something a “dragon” is akin to calling something a “mammal” or a “fish”. It covers a lot of ground but you get a specific idea of what type of creature is being referred to.

They will do anything to help….unless it requires actual effort past a like or a hashtag.

Some people just find it cathartic to insult people online I guess

People are doing this with Encanto right now, crying about whitewashing and bullying artists such to the point that _actual LatAms (Latin Americans)_ and especially those from Colombia have created an entire hashtag (#ShutUpGringo2022) to tell them that they're wrong, what they're claiming is whitewashing is not, and to shut up and stop "defending/fighting for" them. The Americans, as predicted, have tried to fight back with the claim that gringo is a slur (the most hilarious one being a slur against black people specifically) and have turned to attacking the people they claim to defend. LatAm has been dealing with this this hilariously by taking the piss out of them; even created a whole professionally sung and mixed cover of We Don't Talk About Bruno (We Don't Talk About Gringos/No se habla de Gringos) to mock them. American keyboard warriors are something else, man.

@@KoiladaScrewYTHandles ikr! A lot of the things they do are legit harassment, but because they are on the right side of their black and white political isle, they get a free pass. Honestly, American political system is the dumbest system I have ever seen.

@@RKNancy Thank you! Somebody finally agrees with me!

See, and that is the problem. If they just had done the movie (bit more dilligent maybe) without all the touting about representation, you maybe would have just watched it and thought, "Hey, i know that!". But with all that build up, you NEED to deliver. And that failed (again) at that.

@@2nd_Directorate I've not really seen any corporate media (except documentary I guess) that brags about their "cultural representation" and then ended up actually do anything meaningful (if any) with it. It's 99% of the time straight up pandering because they know white critics will praise them for it no matter what and generally people desperate enough for representation would accept it no matter what

For what it was, the movie was entertaining to say the least. However, it wasn't something I truly sought for after watching. It was just surface level representation here and there. Characters kinda looked like me and some food and clothes that are native to SEA i got to see; But that's all really.

Ikr.Since I saw the movie I've always thought about how it is so similar to Avatar.I'm burmese as well yet I couldn't tell which countries culture are represented when I watch only clips of it.While in other disney movies related to representation you could really tell which is which.

Hey are you still under military dictatorship? I haven't read or looked up anything about your situation since the coup. Hope you can have more quiet times soon.

You know you done goofed when a Nicktoon from 15 years back has better side characters.

Dig for even a little while and you quickly learn that Southeast Asia isn't even KIND of a monolith.

In trying to include everyone, they excluded everyone.

That's why it sounds like The last Airbender. The creators did mash culture together and made it work because its a fantasy world. I thought Disney was already getting away with designing young Raya as Korra. I'm not mad at it just feel "Meh" because they could've done something better

I mean they did one movie about the arab/islamic world : Aladdin This is nothing new in the disney lineup

​@@bluubandette8871 Yeah, plus A:tLA/LoK never claimed that it was representation for a certain culture. Sure, it had a lot of cultural influences, (Feudal China, Imperial Japan, Tibet, Inuit peoples, Thailand, hell there's arguably references to Venice, NYC, and rednecks too) but it never claimed to be accurate to a certain culture. (Disney's made that blunder before too. A lot of Chinese people love the 1998 Mulan movie despite all its inaccuracies not only because it's good, but because it clearly wasn't trying to be a historically/culturally accurate period piece. But so many Chinese people hated the 2020 Mulan movie because not only did it suck, but because Disney made such a HUGE deal about how they were going to be super accurate to Chinese culture this time around...and then made something so fundamentally misunderstanding of Chinese culture that it made the 1998 Mulan movie look like a factual documentary.)

Yeh same, I think the reason we like it cause we relate to some degree (300+ yrs of ol spain tho i wish More Filipinos, Media and the country would be interested or search more about pre-col philippines czuse its fascinating anyway back to topic) since you just knowing about it recently isnt really ur fault i guess bec it wasnt talked as much cause: One. Its on Disney Plus which it isnt even in many areas of SEA Two. Its a disappointing movie (it would have been better if disney said its INSPIRED by the variety of culture in SEA.)

It is not a post colonial mentality Spanish and Mexican influence is part of being Filipino. Many People (Filipinos) actually don't know what is Filipino because history is not prioritize and only one Ethnic group is prioritize or Ethnic boundaries are being destroyed.

@@himasekiwari155 If you bother to look, you will pre colonial Philippine is very different. IMO Spain is worst colonial power compared to British in the preserving native culture aspect.

Not just you, I read a lot of comment from Malaysian that says Encanto feels really relatable to them because of the family oriented theme and the mixed skin colour.

The unavailability of Disney+ in the Philippines probably contributed to people not hearing about it ...but then again, ang lakas natin mang-pirate ng movies so i guess its indicative na di siya nagclick sa atin haha

This... The many times i was angry how people were like "tan skin, double eyelids is not an asian look"and im like.... Oh wow.. Everyone here doesnt exist.. Me, a tan skin, curly haired, double eyelid asian doesnt exist... Bye bye time to disintegrate i guess. Ignorance is fine if youre willing to learn.. But ignorance is never fine when you take it as facts.

Was she tatar?

@@Inspirit-gp4dp going off of what you gave her physical description I highly doubt she would be tatar as they look like a mix of Slavic and Iranian. I think it's possible that she could be either a descendant of the indigenous peoples of Siberia who speak many languages including uralic, turkic, tuvan, yenesian, ainu, and inuit languages. or possibly a descendant of one of the two mongolian populations in Russia, the kalmyks and the buryats.

@@williamblue356 there is different groups under the name Tatar and some are much more turkic than others. Crimean Tatars are the most european and Siberian Tatars are the most Siberian/Asian.

Here in the UK, most people include Middle Eastern ethnicities under the Asian umbrella (including people from those ethnicities themselves) so I grew up with kinda the reverse of this 💀

The least they could do is let the culture show in the clothings and Sisu (someone actually redesigned Sisu into more of a Balinese/Javanese naga and she looks cute there), but they couldn't even do that.

why is it always the white men 😭

I despise how the Internet decided to treat her when she definitely wasn’t the first person to even make that comparison. White men (like Honest Trailers) had already made that comparison. People wanted an excuse to just rip her to shreds. Peak moment of the left eating their own considering her right wing detractors never managed it in the past. Her explanation video (because she only had a few ill-chosen old comments to actually apologise for) was absolutely heartbreaking.

@@LadyAhro exactly on the part that people aside from ellis were already making the comparison. i remember those popular movie or tv instagram pages posting things saying young raya’s outfit looked like korra’s n comments along the lines of saying “we’re getting another legend of korra”

@@M00NL9GHT I think for the same reason it's always teen white girls for us. There's a weird fetishization going on I think...

The joining in is not the problem. Thinking you allready know everything is. Everyone needs these discussions, irrelevant of the stand of knowledge. How could we otherwise learn. And life experiences are still valid, regardless from where we all hail from. As long as the willingness to learn is present, there shouldn´t be a problem.

Counterpoint: Twitter will implode if it can't run on context-free outrage bait… wait, that actually sounds amazing 😂 For real, it's a pretty good aphorism to try to live by. The internet would be a much less toxic place if we could all restrain ourselves from jumping into other people's ponds and flailing wildly, so to speak. We also need to give room for people to learn and grow, though, so we'll have to find a middle ground. Not assuming "I'm right" is a good start, as is listening to others with an open mind.

@@2nd_Directorate that's basically what Op is saying. because essentially people say the original statement to people who act like they know everything when they know nothing. interesting to realise how words can be different but the meanings are the same with context

it's almost as if it was coordinated to go down this way, like the discourse was manipulated to devolve into Lindsay harassment

Man...that sucks.

I think the issue was that Lindsay already had two groups of ready political enemies. 1. Socially liberal people originally mad at her for being two degrees of separation from Buck Angel. 2. Socially conservative people originally mad at her abortion documentary from a decade ago. The pandemic just allowed for all of them to all gang up on her at once, whether justified or not, and the Raya thing just gave them an excuse. But none of their issues had anything to do with Raya or SE Asia. Edit: I should explain that these groups were jumping on after an intial argument that DID have to do with Raya and was as this video stated, started by an author of Asian descent, but by the time Lindsay made "Mask Off" she was addressing just about everything else anyone had ever been mad at her for, with the Raya issue almost entirely lost.

@@gentlerat And Leftists like me are: "What the fuck did she do so wrong? Twitter is full of sharks it would seem. "

@@grnmjolnir it's all pent up impotence. They can't change anything real but they can feel powerful for a moment by dragging somebody.

Thank you for your perspective! I was wondering how previous attempts like Aladdin were received, this was enlightening.

Me and my partner *just* watched Aladdin the other day and even our white af European asses with limited knowledge on all the Middle Eastern and Indian cultures noticed and were confused by the movie not being able to decide which culture(s) it was trying to represent, and movies like these 2 are such a lost and misused opportunity, and arguably might do more harm than good as they further muddy the waters of what is part of culture X and what is culture Y in the eyes of white people, and POC do not feel accurately or sufficiently represented. It's especially tragic as these are products made for kids, so the white kids see some weird generalizations of an entire region that isn't actually accurate to any part of the region and grow up thinking that's accurate, whereas POC kids have just very vague "representation" that doesn't feel like it fits but then their white peers use it to stereotype them. Like heck, in my middle school class, there was one Roma boy, and he was mockingly called "Aladdin" simply because he was slightly darker than us white kids (and well the stereotype that all Roma people are thieves certainly made this connection even easier to make as Aladdin is also a thief), even though Roma people have nothing to do with anything in Aladdin, but like also how could the kids have known that as the movie Aladdin doesn't even itself know either what culture and ethnicity it's trying to be, if only it had been more explicit in "hey, this is happening in this geographic location in this culture and ethnicity", people might not have been so insistent on misusing the movie to stereotype and mock all people who simply look "not white, but not dark enough to be black either". Sorry for the ramble, I go off on tangents easily and seeing you bring up Aladdin which I just rewatched and noticed the cultural identity crisis it has (which I understandably never noticed before as a white kid) just made my brain go brrr xD I'm sorry for the disappointment with the movie, and I really hope in future we will see movies with actually good representation for everyone's sake, I know I would genuinely want to learn more of all sorts of individual cultures and preferably directly from the source, no more of these bastardized generalized versions made by white people for white people.

@@hillomunkkiseni no no I don't mind the ramble, it was very interesting to read lol. I totally agree, these kinds of movies do end up doing more harm than good (and im really sorry about that roma boy, that must have have been horrible)

Right? Like I’m tired of the world mixing up south Asian and arab culture. We’re not even remotely the same and it’s so annoying to see people think that Indian/south Asian culture is interchangeable with arab culture when it’s not at all.

@@rotisserie8444 except for the islamic influence on the region of India. We are not related at all

Not exactly, you're missing a moment when Namaari says "I am...inevitable!" calmly.

@@jeffreygao3956 which do you hate more appropriation of culture (which is what this video is accused of) or appropriation of likeness (which is what Crispin Glover accused Back to the future part 2)?

The ending scene was also literally just that scene from Guardians 1. Where Peter was holding the power stone and they all shared the pain with him.

Durian! Don't know it as a caribbean person but know of it cause my Malayalsian colleague during my PhD would not shut up about it lol. I hope to try it one day.

@@BeautifulEarthJa Just keep in mind there are many types, like bitter and sweet. A lot of people hate one kind but love the other.

in the same boat as Veronica hah. Heard so much of it from a malaysian friend in an mmorpg of all places, and now i'm hopelessly curious

yeah even most of reviews are basically "well at least they tried" and just brushed it off lmao.

Yes! I love durian! My dad was born in Malaysia and he absolutely loves it. Back in 2019 I had the pleasure of visiting Malaysia with him and we went to a durian farm it was awesome as I had only ever gotten to try durian that was previously frozen here in the US

Ghost? Maybe, but mostly spirits

i like how all of SEA collectively decided one of the scariest things to encounter in the night is a random ass ghost/monster lady disemboweling your organs and/or eating fetuses

@@zaqareemalcolm of course,ghost is scary,that's why i never go outside at night

There's an origin legend here in Indonesia about that and it's also tied to be really religious. So, once upon a time, when the earth is yet to be dwelled by humans; the spirits, jinns, demons, you name it, all live on earth as much as they liked, they're incorporeal beings so their presence didn't really bother the corporeal beings such as animals and the like. Until one day, it's decreed that humans will start living on earth so every spirit was banished over the seas. So, where did they go? You guessed it. The bunch islands in the middle of the sea. After getting banished to the islands, the spirits remade their civilizations on the islands, some hoped to return to the 'main land' but couldn't go that far off beyond the peninsular area which encapsulated the continental-based SEA countries, which is the reason why SEA countries had a lot of ghost stories and superstitions. Of course, a lot of intermarriages and shared cultures also boosted this. We love us our horror stories.

@@zaqareemalcolm or r@pe you. Yea... There is a myth like that in my country

This video is an almost two hour long roast. I think you can afford to get a little heated.

@@carterlove7293 Good point.

@@carterlove7293 PART 2 as well. In total it's basically 4h!

This movie was so disappointing. I know nothing about Asian culture, but the story itself was horrible. Also, f that creepy ninja baby. That thing completely broke any immersion I tried to have.

Malays getting more annoyed about a movie for cultural insensitivity than the racism of the Bumiputra policy is a whole mood tbh

Honestly, as over used as the comparisons to ATLA is, the story concept of Raya would have been MUCH better as a series with the majority of a season in one nation.

It is interesting how they chose to make every place a very bland location instead of havin not-indonesia, not-malaysia, and so on.

@@An_Actual_Rat And it's 'wrong'? I don't get the hysteria.. Watched the movie and thought it was nice. A nice fantasy movie. Seriously don't get the framing and forced outrage.

@@HAYAOLEONE When your story tries to represent a culture, in this case many cultures, yes it is.

@@madsmbrc.g8644 Hello. I asked you nothing, young human. The movie is animated fantasy for kids. Aren't you tired of whining like a needy old woman? Bye, non/barely 'Asian' young human.

Oh yeah, I found the "it is all for naught" accent scene ... Strange? Why would someone from the Highlands be taught what is essentially "Queen's English", DESPITE IT NOT EVEN EXISTING AT THAT TIME. Modern British accent is a relatively new thing. Haven't seen Wolfwalkers yet, but I recommend the other animations by the same team (they're more Irish than anything though) - The Book of Kells, and Song of the Sea. Now, Song of the Sea - that's a genuinely beautiful movie.

And Scottish and Irish people got shouted over by non-Celtic people in the United States who loved Brave, too, just like how SEA get shouted over when they talk about Raya. Disney makes a theme park rendition of a culture or multiple cultures and then sells it to other cultures without much thought given to accuracy.

Brave heart was pretty good

Luckily Disney will never do the same thing for my home region(north eastern Netherlands), because I would cringe for being compared to general dutch stereotypes.

Celtic cultures are so underrepresented. I'm English but I've lived in Wales most of my life and it's annoying how little Wales or Welsh culture is represented.

Same with Europeans. Even though there many different cultures with hundreds of years of history, we are all just white.

@@maras00jr49 the byproduct of American cultural hegemony and ignorance.

@@Mica_T I would argue that that was intentional as the US grew over the centuries

I am Vietnamese but many people ask if I am Chinese, Japanese etc. I shrug it off but it’s still a bit weird you know? I don’t hate people though!!

when they say asians, theyre talking abt east asian. Indians are not even considered asians anymore lol.

The story kinda sucked too. I got what they were going for, but it just felt so bland, and after watching the film i though "Great, almost two hours of padded runtime, only the beginning and the end have anything genuinely engaging happening."

The story is shit. xD And the message is worse xD

fellow southeast asian here, yeah it did really suck :( I was really happy thinking "aaw Disney's making something that takes inspiration off of my country and its neigbors" and was ultimately disappointed, at the most the inspiration seemed surface level at best not to mention on sissu's design. good god she looks like an elongated unicorn, that is NOT what our dragons look like from what I remember too, the story was okay, it could've worked, but the pacing was awful

@@mattybrunolucaszeneresalas9072 oh yeah! disney queer discourse is the absolute worst. thankfully i wasn't really there for any raya stuff since i avoided that movie ^^'

As a SEA myself, i was pretty skeptical… i wanted to love it so much but i just cant… 😭😭😭

How many Asian characters can you have her voice though? Is she absolutely a legend? Definitley. Were Disney's voice choices good? No, but let's get some other people in. Then again I'm not SEA so my opinion's pretty far from infallible

@@nastassjahall9358 I vaguely remember her playing a filipina mom in Glee. I have no idea about her local career.

@@rajavlitra I more meant about her voicing the only other 2 asian disney princesses, or at least doing their singing voices

If nothing else, it's not like there's a shortage of SEA people in the US. Surely at least a handful of them can voice act.

I belief thatvif they had tried to look, there will be more than a handful of SEA people who can voice act and sing

Because of that, I can never call Mulan(2020) irredeemable. It’s a bad movie but far from the worst ever or irredeemable.

I agree completely. They made the same mistake with live action Mulan.

This is the only Disney Princess movie without singing and it upsets me. Disney princess songs are a great narrative tool for Understanding the protagonist on a deeper level. Without it Raya feels a bit off.

@@Lexivor To be fair, the original Mulan was BARELY a musical. There's like, four songs in it before it decided to become a straight forward action movie, and after that, the only song we get to hear is "true to your heart" by 98 degrees. If I were directing the live action Mulan, I also would've just cut the songs.

@@whatalsaid I think I saw a video somewhere that that was the point. The first half of Mulan is lighthearted and we are going to slay the huns with our awesome training and become heros! But then they reach the massacared village and reality hits. There is nothing glorious in going to war. Also the movie was supposed to be nostalgic clickbait and the music was what separated it from the other Mulan incarnations. All the other remakes had music + 1 Emmy bait song. Why not Mulan? To make it "realistic and edgy?" Bruh we saw how that played out.

@@CrystalDragen Especially when Mulan uses those songs very effectively. "I'll Make a Man Out of You" is both a great training montage song, and reinforces all the gender themes of the movie. Then there's "A Girl Worth Fighting For" and the ending of them finding the wrecked village, which as mentioned was an incredibly effective way to shift the mood. Just saying, the animated movie used it's songs extremely well.

lars was an icon

They also could have recruited a group of Norwegians, Swedes, Danes, Icelanders, and/or Faroese to voice the characters in "How to Train Your Dragon." Almost 21 million people; they could've found enough voice actors. Yet one of the only HTTYD voice actors with any Scandinavian descent is Kristen Wiig, who is part Swedish. Most of the rest are U.S.ian, Canadian, English, or Scottish. They also could have found some Sámi voice actors to voice the Northuldra in "Frozen II," and some German ones to voice the characters in "Tangled."

@@mlpfimstories2245 "How to Train Your Dragon" is a dreamworks movie btw , not disney .

@@reib.2853 Irrelevant. It's still a valid argument. If you're going to criticize Raya for not having SEA actors, then you would also criticize How To Train Your Dragon for not having Scandinavian actors. Unless you like double standards.

@@hoominbeeing this recks of “All Lives Matter” if you want to point out how HTTYD failed do a video about it, don’t use it as a reason to minimize the subject of THIS video. Also the marketing from Dreamworks is totally different: they keep it as a fantasy with viking folklore elements, or Kung Fu Panda that was marketed as a “love letter to kung fu movies” they never used other cultures as a marketing tool, they made explicit what and why they’re using element of other cultures - no the case with Disney and Rays.

@@biazacha I didn't bring it up. This is a reply to the reply of someone who brought it up lol. Secondly, yes, you do have a point. If a show specifically states it's trying to accurately present a culture, then it should try to be more accurate. Thirdly, what's wrong with all lives matter?

I was so glad that Zhao pretty much immediately dug into why the way Lindsay was treated was 99.99% utter bullshit. Unfortunately, the people that need to hear this (those that were *salivating* at the chance to dogpile a big creator) aren't going to listen, or worse yet, could come after Zhao and the team that helped put all this together for daring to be thoughtful adults about it. I especially appreciated the part where they put into words what I had felt about the situation the whole time: What do these people going to bat for big corporate product and viciously attacking a KZfaqr *think* they're accomplishing? It's pretty obvious at this point that it was never about lifting up a SEA piece of work.

you ask these people which countries are south east asian and they'd show you china at best

Here's the thing, we just celebrated CHINESE New Year and a lot of WHITE PEOPLE took the opportunity to try and cancel me for not calling it "LUNAR New Year" and accused me of not being inclusive. I'm Chinese. Chinese New Year is a different date from Lunar New Year in other countries. I believe in social justice too but it's ridiculous when people who don't understand my culture decided they needed to teach it to me??? To be fair, I use a pseudonym online and not my birth name but the term Chinese New Year isn't offensive in any way. They also call it Tahun Baru Cina here, which exactly translates to Chinese New Year.

@@liriodendronlasianthus yeah, people outside of a culture trying to educate native people in it is literally a colonizer mentality, it’s so frustrating

@@liriodendronlasianthus its just fucking stupid HAHAHAH i swear white people take more offense than the actual peiple themselves

why only milk 1 country's culture when you can mesh 11 and get more money and brownie points? meanwhile those 11 countries has hundreds of cultures so yeah!!

I think it comes down to the reason for Disney making each movie. Encanto is meant to be a nice animated flick for the holidays. The movie honestly doesn’t have a lot of expectations in the company other than to make money and be received positively, so they let the creative team who started it have more freedom. On the other hand, Raya is supposed to be the next addition to the Disney princess brand. It had a ton riding on it such as marketing tie-ins, toys, merchandise, maybe a future addition to a Disney park. It was the big production that executives took control of, which suffocated most of the actual meaningful cultural representation in order to make it more marketable to as many audiences as possible. This is all only what I think though

From what I’ve read, all the cast for Encanto were either first- or second-generation Colombian. So yeah...as far as representative casting goes, Encanto blows Raya out of the water. Lol

With Encanto, it seems like there was a lot of love and appreciation for the culture. With Raya, it felt more like a cashgrab, Disney wanting to check off "Southeast Asia" on their animation representation list.

@@blubbydragon5381 Encanto has no shortage of merchandise. That said, I wonder if you're right about Raya being ruined by executive meddling. One of the most immediate and noticeable inaccuracies was the design of the dragon. Sisu looks more like an Eastern dragon, something that westerners are very familiar with. But concept art shows designs more accurate to SEA dragons. They KNEW what SEA dragons looked like but went with an Eastern design, and the only explanation I can think of for that is that they thought the Eastern design would be more palatable to western audiences.

Many people attacked her about talking about lgbt issues years ago saying she doesn't have the place yo discuss them....when she is in fact apart of the community.

And on her video "Mask Off" she showed evidence of just how much and how deep haters were willing to search for every single minor thing that's she's ever said that could be in the slightest "controversial", which only goes to show how hateful these people are Gosh like Lindsay is not perfect but no one is, and she has always been much more sensitive, empathetic and well-researched than most of the KZfaqrs out there She brought a sense of sophistication and commitment to her work we hadn't seen before on this platform

I feel like it's noteworthy how a man's voice throwing out a lukewarm take, even in jest, got zero reaction, but a woman throwing out basically the same take immediately started a huge internet riot involving heaps of harassment and aggression.

Honestly I always got the impression that people were desperate for something--anything, because they were waiting to have an excuse to hate her. There's a few youtubers that are like that; they pretty much do 99.999% of things right but earn a hate crew regardless that are neurotically obsessed with taking them down.

For someone who built a career on criticism, she sure couldn’t take it or differentiate between valid criticism and trolling. I used to enjoy her videos but she showed an embarrassing lack of humility and accountability. Screaming about her experiences with sexual violence in order to silence hurt viewers with valid questions about her past content soured her to me forever. She’s not some poor bullied helpless girl, she has no sense of accountability, and abruptly left KZfaq and tried to guilt trip her audience into continuing to pay her staff who she essentially fired with no notice months after the controversy died down and she had returned to releasing content.

Yeah, a lot of people just went after her for personal reasons (she had ended up on the wrong end in a lot of drama long before this had happened, but she still didn't deserve it).

she's been problematic for ages and alwys has the worst takes. good riddance

Now it’s X and run by a corrupt egotist with his head in the stardust.

Even though I hate to say it but I think Encanto is what it is because of Lin Manuel, not Disney themselves. I think Disney wouldve been perfectly happy to just land Miranda (since hes puerto rican that would prob be enough for disney execs) and their cultural advisors to make a movie, but they ended up traveling and spending time in Colombia, Lin Manuel with crew, in order to get a better feel for the culture and music. Miranda being the current golden hen of hollywood, probably had enough pull to make Encanto properly.

Nope they rather chase whatever Clout internet kids like to watch the most. "Coco" was published after Hispanics were getting dragged out of America without their children. "Reboot Mulan" & "Raya" appeared after the beating and harassment of Asian- American during Covid-19

@@bluubandette8871 You really think it takes like a few months to do these films? Or do you think Disney is in on the grand conspiracy train? The Mulan actress was cast in 2017, years before anyone even knew covid existed, in a line of crappy 90s disney live action reboots with Lion King, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin. production on Coco started in 2011. Maybe the final release date had something to do with it, but overall, these movies didnt happen over night, they were in the works for years.

If they really plan on continuing to represent Latin American countries, I just hope they stay away from Argentina. We already have our own media industry, which is strong and partially internationally recognized, we don't need multi-million dollar American company putting their hands on us, especially after how many times they directly screwed up our economy and democracy. Although tbh like 9/10 of our population are direct descendants of WW2 European immigrants (translation: we're white) so they'll probably just pretend we don't exist as they can't use us for diversity.

@@bluubandette8871 Bro you think they made an entire feature 3d animated film in a span of 5 months????

This is the first I'm learning that she resigned. It's a great loss. And what was gained by harassing her? Only more pain and grief in the world.

Twitter seems to have an extremely unfair hate boner towards her, these people want her to be held accountable for every little "transgression". Which is complete madness, these Twittards are conducting a modern-day witch hunt, but they'll claim she "had it coming" for whatever perceived wrongs she has done. And will look at you dead in the eye and say with a straight face and conviction in their voicez that they "did the right thing." -_- I'm not going to pretend Ellis is a saint, but she certainly didn't and doesn't deserve this constant barrage of hate and vitriol she's been getting over the years.

I think she was the target of a lot of hate (I don't know why) before that point and folk just used it as amumition. I think the actual discussion was just a backdrop for these people. I don't adore the lady and I'm not a fan, but I don't care for sending death threats on Twitter.

I hate twitter. Literally these 14 year olds who never go outside would much rather ruin every celebrities career over the tiniest things regardless of context instead of do something productive. I've literally seen them cancel a Mexican content creator for speaking Spanish because he knows dream or something and he therefore has to be a bad person in every way. Likd. Shut up.

All of these white kids on Twitter are running around ruining the good representation that is Encanto and then saying that everyone who makes LGBT headcanons are ignoring the message o the movie. Me, a Colombian person has been harassed by kids too young to be on Twitter telling me I can't relate to characters in my own way because a couple assholes decided to overlook representation for their own headcanons, cmon.