Like... did she just forget she can write stuff down?

I think it's funny how you said "Ariel should have just stolen the Trident" and I was like 'that's exactly what her daughter did'! 🙈

1. Why didn’t Ariel ever write down her name for Eric? 2. How was Eric able to understand a love song performed by fish, birds & frogs?

Maybe it's just the fact I was a brat as a kid, but honestly the way Ariel was introduced in the original movie was relatable, a teen girl avoiding responsibilities to do her own thing? J, dude, that was what most teens would do. Ignore their parents to do their own thing!? It's more realistic than it seems!

I agree with you that the REASON King Triton hates the humans and forbids Ariel from going to the surface to see them is directly connected to her Mom. If we have seen the third movie in this series, we KNOW that Ariel's mother, Queen Athena, was killed by humans (presumably sailors or pirates) while trying to save the music box that Triton had given her. That is WHY Triton hates the human world and why he forbid music in Atlantica....the humans killed his beloved wife and Queen. Of course he would want to protect Ariel from that fate. On that note though, for this movie, if ANY parent has a teenage daughter, that they are smothering with overprotectiveness, THEY KNOW that this child is going to rebel and do exactly the opposite of what their parent wants for them.

In some versions of the story (specifically the Broadway Musical) Ursula is Triton's Sister. In the musical she has a song that explains why she is mad a Triton, why she got banished and her whole plan including why she take Ariel's voice. I almost think the music from the musical is better than the movie. Ursula's song is "I Want the Good Times Back"

about your first point...she's a teenager. if it's supposed to be accurate, it is indeed. she's doing something she enjoys, loses track of time, and accidentally misses the concert. and it is just that - a concert. not in her honor, though they make a big deal out of the fact that this is Ariel's first concert.

That concert was not about Ariel. It was a concert about Triton. Triton commissioned a concert about how great of a job he did naming his daughters (everybody having a name that begins with an “A”). It’s a weird thing to have a concert about. Clearly Ariel (who rarely showed up for rehearsals) wanted nothing to do with her father’s strange need to proclaim how awesome he is at using the letter “A”. 😂

I think Úrsula going so far as to marry Eric does make some sense. She has made it clear she wants power, so if she marries Eric and he dies (mysteriously) she will have power over the kingdom on land, as well as having power over the kingdom under the sea.

There is a prequel from 2008 called "The little mermaid: Ariel's beginnings" where it is shown that Ariels mother, Queen Athena actually died during an encounter with pirates. So your Theory is confirmed.

I remember Ben said his first crush was Vanessa and I can't help noticing the physical similarities to his wife.

3:41 The image of the pipe/snarfblat shown also shows the bag that she was carrying on the floor. Implying that she just brought it with her into the cave; she did not have it in her cave before that scene.

On the subject of contract-magic, it's a fairly common thing in magic systems that have such things, that the power you can bind into a contract depends on the conditions of the contract. Being a sea-witch, Ursula would be well aware of how much leeway she has in setting the conditions of the contract in order to both create the magic that transforms Ariel, imprisons her voice, and which can potentially bind her soul. That is probably why there needs to be some way, even against the odds, for Ariel to succeed in fulfilling the contract - a contract that is impossible to fulfill would have minimal power at best. This is also probably why Ursula does not immediately imprison Ariel or ever directly take action against her - she only ever takes action against Eric, the other humans, and their property. Ursula and Ariel are bound by the contract; Eric is not party to the contract so is fair game, particularly since the contract only stipulates that she receive a kiss of true love, not specifically who has to give it to her. As such, Eric as a third party can disrupt the contract by boat-stabbing Ursula, since he isn't party to the magic. Of course, Ursula is under no compulsion to *explain* any of this, and Ariel never really asks many questions at all, so we can only speculate on how such things work. This also helps explain why the Trident is so desirable for her, despite the power she can wield through her contract magic; the Trident does not have the kind of limitations that contract magic has, and can simply *do things* as necessary, likely under its own internal rules which are likely to be a lot more relaxed. In most settings where witchery is placed in contract to other forms of magic, witchery is generally more complicated or difficult, and generally either weaker, or requiring a lot more hoops to jump through to be as powerful as more mainstream magics.

Personally, I believe that the spell was anchored not to Ursula, but to Ariel's voice, amplifying Eric's desire for it and directing said desire to the person that had it at the time and was capable of magic aka Ursula. If that is true, then Ursula would need Ariel's voice as it was the voice that Eric fell in love with. Again, this is just a theory I have.

Can we just talk about how Eric understanding Sebastian means that human animal communication is possible and humans not knowing this means we just keep eating sentient species? This seems like an overlooked fact.

I love these videos where you question the logic of Disney movies. It’s funny and thought provoking. Doesn’t ruin the movies for me but it is rather interesting to point out

1. Ariel losing her voice might be a nod to sirens killing sailors with their singing. 2. The Merpeople must be super old, so they might have picked up on some of the modern languages, at least from all the sunken ships.

I always figured that they used the typical magical contract rules, Where a person who makes a magical contract with another person is honor bound to tell the truth about what the contract says. There are a lot of works of fantasy where Making deals with someone is actually enforced by the magic itself. Another example of this is the sinbad movie from the early 2000's. Where the Goddess Eris is bound by magic to keep the terms of the deal she made with Sinbad.

Ima defend my favorite childhood movie for a moment: They do endeer you to arial. In the ship fight, they show you that she is: brave, kind, and curious. Then they show you that at the same time she: doesnt always think things through, gets overwhelmed with emotions (like excitement), and is unintentionally very selfish. This sets up the entire movie. A perfectly logical character would not act the way she did, but thats fine because she isnt a perfectly logical character. So for example. She did try to tell Eric that she could write. He didnt get it a single time. And then she immediately gets distracted by her actual true love, nerding out about surface world stuff.

I disagree. I've always been bothered by people calling Ariel a spoiled brat who gives up her voice for a guy she barely knows. I don't think she is spoiled at all (other than the fact that she is a princess), she collects human things because she is fascinated by humans and her father forbids anything related to humans. She is a teenager who loves something that she is forbidden to know anything about. She falls in love with Eric when she first sees him but she loved humans before that Of course, she is going to take crazy reckless action. I relate to Ariel so much in this way as I grew up very religious and there were always things I loved that I wasn't allowed to and I too did some crazy things as a 19-year-old rebelling against my parents. Ursula saying "It's she who holds her tongue who gets a man" really foreshadows how wrong Ursila is about life on land (or in general) especially how wrong she is about Eric. Eric is always interested in how Ariel feels and what she thinks and he does his best to communicate with her despite her not having a voice. He cares about what she has to say and that is a top-notch man in my book.

I like to think Ariel writing her name down was in another language but just written in English for us. Edit: Therefore, Ariel didn't think to write.

I took the contract shenanigans to be that Triton and his Trident are bound to "sea-law", and that it wasn't a magical piece of paper, per se, but that because it was a legal contract, as per "sea law", that Triton had no power to break it whatsoever. Kind of like what's theorized to be happening with the Goblet of Fire. It's magical contract law, like the Devil and his fiddle contest. Doesn't matter how powerful you are, it's an immutable power in that world. Which is why Ursula can't also just... enslave people on a whim.

Ariel is a teen whos rebelling against a over bearing parent. The prequel does explain that trident's wife was killed by pirates. Its treated like a classic demon/witches/fay deal, The pen seems to move on its own as you can see Ariel is not even looking at the paper as she's signing. In most myths about demons you have to give the signer a fair shot. (in other words you're not allowed to be flat out lie you can omit information but saying I wont kill you then turning around and stabbing them would break the deal and even at the end of the movie you see Ursula is a stickler for the rules.) I'll give you the sea life one though time wise he also might have ended up in a nuthouse. I'll also give you the voice part but the marriage part was to break Ariel's heart/will. You try swimming in a dress. Ursula doesn't add a clause to pass it down to her next of kin which is why all the others get freed when she dies the rights revert back to the original owner. When Ursula trades the soul its a trade up she's getting more value which as the contract holder she has the right to do a king is much better then a last in line princess.

I think Ariel Is supposed to be relatable to people who don't feel like they fit in with their peers or their family dynamic. if you come from a loving supportive home with only a couple siblings you will not understand Ariel's position.

Ariel is the one coming on to Prince Eric constantly and yet the directors for the live action movie say Eric needs consent from Ariel but in all honestly it was Ariel that was the one constantly coming onto Eric. Multiply times he turns away when she tries to kiss him.

There is an entire novel called “Poor Unfortunate Soul” that explains everything about Ursula and she does those things. I think you guys would love it 😊!!!

Wow, it's almost as if the Little Mermaid was based on a classic book or something, and had an entirely different moral and ending. But what would I know.

My parents are scuba divers. I noticed Ariel getting the bends or something upon being turned into a mermaid. My work-around explanation for that is that she was still transitioning upon her ascent. Her outer body transformed but the inner fishy was still transforming upon her going to surface.

I thought this was more about the dad has changed. Since at the end he doesn't hate humans and let's her marry one.

I'm kinda hoping in the movie they'll make Ursula involved in killing Ariel's mom in some way but King Triton misunderstood it as being entirely humans fault and that's where his hatred for them comes from.

Ursula being stabbed by a boat was probably inspired by how one of Cthulhu's avatars was "defeated" (more like deterred) in one of his stories. So it can totally work.

About the concert - She didn't willfully neglect it, she just wasn't interested, roped into doing it and just forgot about it when something more interesting came along. Still she might have been expected to stay, but I'd say don't be too harsh on her for that. About the ban on the surface - I think in the third movie it's confirmed her mom was killed by humans, but I haven't watched it myself, so don't take my word for it. All the same, I see no problem with it, the very first scene of the movie is a ship pulling up nets full of fish to kill and consume, and one gets away and is visibly relieved, so we understand they have some sentience and that humans are non to kind to them. We also later see the chef cooking fish and crab, so I think we have plenty of visuals telling us why fish (and fish people) should be weary of humans and potential human contact. About Ursula collecting souls - Sure you can argue about the terms of the contract and why even bother with a contract at all. For the sake of a kids movie we don't really need anything deeper than what we get, but if we're gonna make up potential scenarios in our heads there might be some clause to her magic that she can only collect their souls and/or demand payment if a contract is written and that some aspects of that contract need to be met, like the one signing the contract has to be given a proper chance at completing the task. As for the souls themselves, she probably don't get a whole lot from just keeping the seaweed creatures, but she probably made deals with all of them that she'd get something of them if they failed in whatever, and becoming one of those things are just also a side effect. Also means fewer people to oppose her when she's trying to take over. About Ariel writing to Eric - The fact that she can write her name does not necessarily mean she is litterate. It's not uncommon that illiterate people is taught how to sign their own name for legal purposes. Also, just her name won't do any good as it pertains to getting Eric to realize she's the one he's looking for, as he don't know her name. And even if she can read and write, how would she go about explaining everything that happened. Sure, mentioning rescuing Eric at sea is a giveaway that she is telling the truth, cause how else would she know, but imagine if you found a girl at the beach and she wrote you a novel about how she used to be a mythological sea creature that only superstitious sailors believe in and how she sold her voice to an octopus witch who transformed her into human so she could get a true loves kiss. If I was the guy I'd probably think the girl had hit her head badly drifting ashore and probably swallowed too much salt water to boot. About Eric still falling in love with Ariel - He's young and seemingly haven't been with a lot of (or maybe any) girls, and here is a beautiful young girl who is funny and all over you. Need I say more? About Ursula putting a spell of Eric - The spell was probably an extra measure of safety, since he's already shown some interest in Ariel. Also, I've always assumed she couldn't have cast the spell without the voice since that already had some power over him (and the legends of siren song and how it influences men from real life), but that's just me. I'll give you that the wedding seem a bit drastic unless Ursula has some motive to gain power on land as well, in which case marrying a prince would be a logical step on the way. About transferring the contract - Ursula surely made a clause or a footnote somewhere to make it possible, since it was always her end goal, but also, I'm not sure "for all eternity" needs to be read like you do. If I buy a car and pay for it in full, I get a piece of paper saying that this in now my car, in all legal terms I own this car, and I can technically go on owning it until I die, and if I will it to someone they can technically own it until they die and so on, but being my property, not something leased or borrowed or stolen, I am free to legally sell it, trade it away, gift to someone else or get rid off as I see fit, that is my right as the owner, so I think Ursula is in her full legal right to do what she does. The "for all eternity" bit just means it's not like a timed jail sentence where after X amount of time Ariel will be automatically released. About making stuff stronger than the trident - I don't think that Ursula can just make powerful magical things that will work the same way as the trident, what she can do is write up contracts that follow the rules to be legally binding when signed, and the trident don't have the power to break those contracts. It's magic beyond what they can do themselves, like how Harry is magically contracted to be a champion in the tri wizard tournament in Harry Potter. And disregarding the condition of the ship and how currents work, I think you could totally stab someone with a ship. The prow would be made of wood, and we see it's broken to create sharp points. Historically hunters traps have been set with sharpened sticks that release to kill on impact and both arrows and spears can be just sharpened sticks if you don't have any metal or stone heads to put on them. A ship would probably crush rather than stab, accounting for it's size and the speed at which it's going, but also, octopi are squishy and might just flex until they where pierced.

I thought the voice casting a spell on Eric was just visual storytelling and he thought she was Ariel

About Ariel using writing to communicate: the closest that she comes to writing anything in the movie is when she signed the contract with Ursala. This doesn't mean that she could read or write. People who can't write still sign things.

Hmm… not sure where people get the sexism from. Eric was just the final push into going on land. And if anything, her father’s terrible reaction to her stuff and Eric statue was an even bigger push Also, I usually love your videos, but you have a few really bad takes in this one. First about the consent thing, Ariel was basically throwing herself on him! I’m pretty sure he’s smart enough to gather that he has consent. And secondly about the not being able to swim, she hasn’t even swum with legs before. When she went up to the surface, Flounder and Sebastian helped her

The "conscent" takes that have been addressed lately for these Disney movies have baffled me. Is like, wasn't Ariel in love with Erick before she got legs? Yes she was. She was stalking him in his boat and that's why she was able to save him from the wreckage. And in the boat you could see, if she was able to speak, she would have ask him to kiss her. 😂 Meaning, she likes him and she didn't reject his advances. So.... Same for Aurora. She was in love with the prince and she was in her way to meet him and scape with him to live together. So, she needed conscent for his kiss, specially when the said kiss only took place while she was sleeping because it was to save her life? The answer is, it's obvious people who want to be together want to kiss each other. Same case with Snow White. These stories were written in a time where if a girl took the first step to kiss a man, it would have been seen badly. Doesn't mean men kissed them without conscent.

Ariel being a minor may have been the loophole to break the contract. Sure, back then, maybe she wasn't considered a minor, but the rule her father imposes over here would indicate that she might have been too young at that time, in that society, to make that kind of contact.

The prequel Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Beginning does answer your question and fills in the plot hole a of why he hates humans and you guessed it.

I am only 1:30 and the fact that you called Little Mermaid sexist means that you do not understand Ariel’s motivation. Eric is simply Ariel’s way permanently into the human world. Does she love him? Clearly. Does that mean that he is not simply a means to an end? No, he most definitely is a means to an end. Her “I Want Song” explains her motivations and the reprise is where they add her feelings for Eric.

Stop it with betterhelp, that's not a good company

As for the casting people complained about. The film is set in the Caribbean. Hailie’s casting fits as Javier’s. Listen to Sebastian’s voice.

4:48 - Why is Ursula collecting souls? It's obvious- she sells sea souls by the sea shore.

Mythology-wise, if we go with the mermaids/siren theory, Ariel’s voice would attract mortal men by default

I'm sure there's someone else who might have wrote this or may have thought of this Ariel's contract was for legs. She's come to the surface numerous times without any the bends issues. So unless Ursula turned her completely into human I don't think Ariel in general would have trouble with going from water to land.

So Jay at what point do/should parents move from “because I said so” to discussion with your children?

"The contract is legal, binding and completely unbreakable" Ooookay, but it's a private contract, it doesn't worth anything for people not part of it. If the contract is so powerful that even people not on it cannot break it, then you have a tool more powerful than a Death Note. You can declare anything and it will not only become law, it will become a self-executing Magical Law.

I always understood the boat scene to mean Eric doesn't consciously hear/understand Sebastian; the crab manages to plant the correct name in his mind but as far as Eric is concerned, he thought of Ariel himself. Still makes no sense that she doesn't write! I think it would have been cool if they dropped the 3 days limit entirely, at that point it makes sense for Ursula to try and steal Eric's love, like a "Swan Lake" evil twin situation... only for Eric to realise that even if Vanessa has "the voice", she's kinda mean and he likes Ariel better.

Watched this film recently and had the exact same questions! Also "Why didn't Ariel just steal the trident and avoid legal contracts alltogether?" Is basically the plot of the Atlantica segment of Kingdom Hearts

I feel like it may be closer to the musical/Play version, where King triton does think that the humans killed his wife. And it turn out it was Ursula (who also has more back story)

I always thought that while writing isn’t speaking, writing a message would be sharing hear voice, just not literally. Ariel can’t write to Eric because the contract gives up her voice. I also always assumed that the contract is in English for the viewers sake, and Ariel and Eric may still speak and write different languages from each other

This feels like one of those "How do i monatize my suffering?" videos since his kid wont stop watching it.

When Ursula/Vanessa puts a spell on Eric, we see that she's using the seashell in her necklace, in other words, she uses Ariel's voice to put a spell on him; this leads me to believe that Ariel is, in fact, a siren, wich also gives new context to Ursula taking her voice, she wants to ensure Ariel doesen't cheat. Also, this explains why Eric was so obsessed with finding her, he was under her spell from the beggining. On another note, even if Ariel had gotten Eric to kiss her within the three days, I still don't think it would have worked, since they haven't had the chance to genuinly get to know eachother and are, at best, infatuated, no true love here.

1. OK, so as you said, Triton didn't give any examples in original animated movie proper, but your theory is actually the explanation used in the direct-to-video prequel: Ariel's mother was killed by human pirates. 2. Since Ariel was fully human at the time, it would just be the bends, not the reverse-bends (whatever that is). 3. I know they don't explain, but it seems pretty obvious to me that if Ursula cheats (more than she did), then the magic just wouldn't work. Like, she has to give Ariel SOME sort of chance for the terms of the contract to give Ursula her soul. 4. Eric was infatuated with Ariel's voice, fell in love with Ariel as a person. 5. Again, Eric doesn't love Ariel's voice more than Ariel herself, so Ursula SHOULD need that extra push to get him to choose Vanessa over Ariel, and I think it makes sense that using the voice that Eric is infatuated with helps facilitate the spell, but yeah, they could have explained that better. 6. I think it makes sense that Ariel would have more trouble swimming with legs, when she's used to swimming with a tail, so the earlier moments where she's swimming just fine make less sense; but at the same time, if she gets used to walking so quickly, she should probably get used to swimming with her legs just as quickly. 7. I'm sure there's at least one fine print on that contract. The real question...HOW is it legal? I feel like a broader understanding of the world's magic system would be necessary to explain this.

I always assumed Ursula got banished for making deals for people’s souls. My theory is she’s syphoning power from them to power her own spells. This is also why they revert back upon her death, the only reason they stayed small was that their magic was being continuously syphoned off and when that stopped they inflated back to normal size like a squished down sponge that’s dropped into water. Alteori has a theory that Ariel’s siren song put Eric under her spell when she sang to him on the beach and Ursula isn’t so much enchanting her song as enhancing the power and control it already possessed. Some of this goes back to the original short story: the merfolk turned into corals are there because the mermaid swims past strange corals that try to grab her as she swims past and frighten her on the way to visit the sea witch. Ursula asks for her voice as payment because the most valuable thing a mermaid possesses is her voice. Ursula tries to marry Eric because the book’s version of the contract was if the mermaid could make the prince marry her she would become truly human, while if he married another she would turn into sea foam and die, there wasn’t a time limit. In the book she fails with the prince marrying another woman who he mistakes for his rescuer.

Can't wait to see how much less sense the live-action remake makes.

I have been conditioned by Arrested Development to expect to hear “You’re a crook, Captain Hook” every time J talked about “sea law”

On the Disney Wish, they had a live action Little Mermaid play, and I absolutely loved the changes they made. Ariel becomes the victor over Ursula, Triton is still traded for the Trident, but apparently the Trident only responds to the most powerful creature in the sea, which becomes Ariel, which was such a good twist and way for her to overthrow Ursula. I hope it took inspiration from their plans for the new live action remake!

12:00 I love to imagine that Ursula would’ve won just by the voice, but JUST IN CASE, she pulls a spell so Eric will NOT change his mind, because she’s starting to doubt herself instead of Ariel

When I was little my family rented this movie and I was just old enough to realize that it wasn’t real. Instead of paying attention to what was actually happening, I just kept wondering how they did it. My parents said it was movie magic and I was like “there’s no such thing as magic.” Fast forward to today and I’m a film major.

As a kid, we read the original book version by H.C.Andresen where Ariel dies at the end a somewhat 'heroic' death, after she betrayed everyone, behaved selfishly, and didn't even think about the consequences of her actions. The Disney version obviously filtered some of the less PG-friendly things, but still basically the same character and ZERO consequences. The entire point of the story is to teach kids that bad behavior = bad things might happen to you or the people you love. I can't wait for the new version I hope they fix this to at least some extent.

There is actually an animated prequel-sequel where we literally see Ariel's mother die to a ship because she tried to get a music box Triton made for her back, and Triton banned music forever because hearing music reminded him of Ariel's Mother's death. So yeah, the prequel-sequel already confirmed that's probably why Triton hates humans.

There was a lot of unknowns going on during the story. Like nobody knew that the Trident could turn Ariel into a human. Or that by killing Ursula she could have made the curses stay permanent or something like that. Also Ariel was just trying to get away we don't know if it was just her legs just flailing from ascending to the surface.

Here are a few of my explanations for some of the questions. Why not write? Ariel can't read or write English instead of what we see on the contract is actually a translation for our benefits. Like localizing an anime. Why marry the guy even though he is under a spell? The spell could need some feedback. Basically if Ursala wants to maintain it long enough she would need to display some affection herself to keep him hooked or at least oblivious to the fact. Also rule land and sea. Why does she want the trident despite having something just as good? Short version the trident is more convenient. Her contracts require consent to take effect, she can't impose her contracts on others like how the trident can just destroy everything by it's user's will. The king didn't need Ariel's permission to destroy her treasures.

That listening part is something I feel a lot of parents forget to do especially ones who are more outdated in their parenting methology. Especially if they are authoritative parents rather than ones that are able to keep a civil discourse with a child and understand them learning why they are doing x thing that seems like they are just disobeying to disobey. There’s also the fact that a punishment and rewards system as a form of teaching and parenting is very flawed and doesn’t work.

She has to make him fall in love with her, without her voice. So telling him that she needs to be kissed isn’t the solution. Also, the consent thing…. Her entire reason for being there is to make him kiss her, so if anyone needs to ask for consent, it’s her, not him

I think we like Ursula as the best villain ever in part because she plays a good game. She stayed true to her word about the deal. Ariel gets a kiss, Ariel is free, Ursula is "curses! Foiled again!" Ursula was surprised at how good Ariel was that she sent Flotsom and Jetsom to play dirty. I think that's even more of a real why we love her so much. She will play dirty. Dirty but fair.

do we really need an example for why fish people dont like humans? I mean we hunt like crazy almost killing off many types of whales multiple times and we pollute the oceans. You definitely dont need a personal incident.

14:44 Disney sucks at making good movie contracts. It’s a fact. Every movie/TV show they make that involves a contract has the biggest plot holes and loop holes.

In the original story The Witch had a beef with the princes' father and when the Mermaid failed to win the prince, the Witch promised to change her back if she killed the man. Which of course she didn't.

To answer your inquiry about Ariel’s contract, there was probably a clause that Ursula hid in the small print saying that any benefits or burdens of the contract could be transferred. This is common in contract law. So theoretically, the only way Ariel could escape the contract is if Triton agreed to transfer the burdens of her contract onto himself, hence he loses his soul (or whatever the heck that scene is). 😂

Ursula is one of my favorite Villains. Curious as to whether in the remake she will be Ariel's Aunt.

Doesn't that whole "for all eternity" part of Ursula's contract violate the Rule Against Perpetuities? She could have just made it last as long as the life of the last living descendant of King Charles III.

If you don't think anyone would have minded renaming Aladdin to Jasmine, you haven't been on the internet for awhile, hehe.

The fork being called a mini trident, the mom dying being the reason they can’t go to the surface, him being in love with a different girl’s voice, telling him the name thing are all addressed, and them not kissing are all fixed in the live action

I really hope that the live action establishes more rules for Ursula’s magic. One simple change could be to just make it so that she technically _has_ a lot of abilities and powers but is only able to use them by way of contracts with others. Maybe this could even be part of her banishment? Like way back in the day Triton banished her and restricted her powers so that she could only use them on people who actively agreed to it and signed a contract. She wants her hands on the trident only to undo this banishment/curse and get her old self back. Then, instead of actually turning herself into Vanessa, Vanessa could just be one of the souls Ursula has collected in the past and since she legally owns her she is able to make her do whatever she wants. I just feel like something as simple as that could help make the story and the character make a lot more sense because it gives her a lot more restrictions in terms of powers which makes it so much more believable and it makes her even more terrifying in my opinion.

In the prequel it was because of a pirate ship hitting Athena when she was on the surface playing with a music box or some s*** but honestly I think the sequel was better because Ariel got to see kind of what her dad was dealing with because her daughter desperately wanted to go to the ocean which Ariel was like. It's dangerous because there was another sea which that has been trying to kill Melody since she was born so they basically outlawed the sea there's also a theory that since Melody wanted to live in her grandfather's kingdom under the ocean that they needed a new heir for Eric's kingdom an ariel died in labor of their son The Prince from Cinderella that theory being that in Cinderella 3. A twist in time we see his mother is a redhead who can't dance and in the first Little mermaid we see the Eric's father looks almost identical to the prince's father in Cinderella. So it is to say that he is that princess father and Ariel is the deceased mother there's a bunch of theories about how other Disney princesses are connected through family trees kind of makes me want to write a fanfiction based on the Dcom princess protection program

Ursela steals Ariel's voice to get revenge on King Triton and his Kingdom and she marries Eric to gain his Kingdom and get control of the sea there.

If I were Ariel, I would have haggled with Ursula. I would have offered my voice only if I became human full-time, or do the three day gamble, but keep my voice.

She's treasure hunting like it's not going to be there when the concert is over

In the navy we deal with "sea lawyers" all the time. Their advice is dubious at best.

Disney took some liberties with The Little Mermaid. In H.C. Andersen's story Ursula's contract says that she'll die and become foam on the ocean since she is a mermaid and has no soul. The spell makes Ariel not only human, but every step feels like she is walking on glass. Eric meets a princess that he thinks is Ariel, and fell in love at once with her. They wind upp getting engaged while Ariel and Eric bonds as friends. Ariel's sister's also made a deal with Ursula to get Ariel back if they lost their hair, and Ariel killed the prince before sundown (or something). Ariel refused to kill him since she loved him, and became foam on the ocean.

3 things, 1) in recent years Ive realized something, Ariel is the Bella Swan of Disney movies. I still love this movie, but cant love her as much as when I was little 2) in a prequel (i dont remember its name) Ariels mother was revealed to be killed by pirates. 3) in Fairy tales theres the rule of 3. 3 is an important number in fairytales. 3 little pigs, 3 wishes for aladin, 3 nights of the princes festival in the original cinderella. feel like thats why Ariel had 3 days to get eric to kiss her

Totally wasn’t expecting the life lesson at the end there. Well played J, well played. Also I agree 100% on every point. The writing thing has driven me nuts for YEARS.

The fork/trident thing will forever bug me now 😂. I never really thought about it. I am excited to see how they transform this one though. Maybe some of these questions will be clarified.

In watching this, I’m actually missing the biggest plot hole, the fact that this entire romance is total nonsense…. A girl falls in love with some guy without ever even knowing what he’s like, well okay that can happen. But what happens next is that they get to meet and have absolutely zero conversation and learn nothing about each others personalities and then after they beat Ursula they get married. Not knowing anything about each other.

Ok this video is beautiful! J just spends 16 minutes and 43 seconds ranting about The Little Mermaid. I didn’t know I needed to see that but I did. It was beautiful

"the disney remakes are often hit and miss" when was the last hit again? :/

none of the retcon material matters.. the only thing we know from the original film is that ariel is big dumb when it comes to muggles just like arthur weasley.

You really need to be using scuba-diving equipment to get the bends. You don't have enough nitrogen in your bloodstream usually to get it from free diving. So she might have suffocated definitely, but getting the bends? Eeh probably not

"There's never any parking by the courthouse." Very true 🙃

I think the reason Ursula goes out of her way to do all of this is bc that’s just how evil she is!

What super important to remember here is that the movie would make much more sense if you were looking at it through the Greek tragedy lens. In Greek mythology this all makes sense. Sirens and triton being a son of Poseidon. As for not being able to swim to the ship, but could rise from the bottom to surface, because of her legs: project herself straight up by pushing off the ground and kicking allowed propulsion and less drag in fluid state. When she was fighting against the waves, she is now at surface with more movement of water - resistance. Go to the bottom of a pool and push yourself up from the bottom. kick hard. Now go to a wave, pool and tread water while the waves are crashing on you. No, human being with newly acquired legs, would have been able to swim as a Siren can. All she could do is keep her head up. I was a 16 year old when this came out. Our Generation was expanding our horizons and young women were in need of better modelling than the ME Generation gave us. I think you’re all expecting way too much from a movie that patronizes young women, and stereotypes her to being a flaky, greedy, subservient creature. Disney has an opportunity here to depict Ariel as a strong woman with clarity of mind. If the live action remake continues with the plot device of the animation, they’ll have further shown they continue as nothing more than a capitalist nightmare. They can profit and still DO BETTER.

"Now I have consent" As though Ariel's body language could somehow appear even more willing to kiss him in the boat than she does. Like, can mute people never consent without carrying a notebook around?

12:00 Because she is a siren, not a mermaid…and so was her mom. Only ursula who studied dark magic knew that siren singing could hypnotize and lure people

09:49 I think it's not weird at all that Eric falls in love with a super-pretty girl that seems into him, whether she can speak or not.

So we gonna mention to fact that Flounder definitely ain’t a flounder.

I believe Ursula used Ariel's voice, as part of this "siren spell", considering the spell on Eric broke, when the container of the voice broke. 🤔

As someone who was just in the musical, THE STAGE VERSION OF THIS STORY MAKES SO MUCH MORE SENSE!!!

Sebastion once said "Come with me i'll take you home and get you something warm to drink." Because sponge square pants cartoon logic also apply under the sea in mermaid world.

Yeah, I'm gonna have a hard time taking this seriously after you said that the Live Action Beauty and the Beast "Fixed Plotholes", considering how many more that movie introduced...