Frozen II - Nov 22

Obligatory disclaimer: real life sucks. That said, ‘Frozen 2’ has arrived in the movie theaters. Yippee! Huzzah! And yay?!

…Let’s from the start talk about the big difference between ‘Frozen 2’ and ‘Frozen 1’: if the latter was loosely based on Hans Andersen’s ‘The Snow Queen’ fairy tale of a novella, the former is a completely original movie; though the plot starts in Arendelle, it quickly dismisses the elements of ‘Frozen 1’ and quickly careen into a completely new land with completely new elements. (Obligatory warning: spoilers are ahead, read at your own risk).

…MCU’s AoS TV series constantly recycled, rebooted and redesigned its’ old elements and never really tried to do something truly new. The Disney movie ‘Frozen 2’ went in a completely new direction, following Elsa’s motto of ‘Let it Go’ and let the old film go. There is some sort of symbolism of Elsa and her team leaving Arendelle behind and going into a completely new land, populated by completely new people, with a completely new set of rules… and no traces of civilization per se. This is the reason as to why the critics are divided already in regards to ‘Frozen 2’ – everyone did expect a straightforward sequel to ‘Frozen 1’ and instead got anything but. Disney’s own logic is understandable here, they did not want to spoil the surprise, but the confusion that results from their surprise might be just as bad, proportionally. We will have to wait and see as to what develops from ‘Frozen 2’ as time goes by.

Back in the movie itself… wait. What is ‘Frozen 2’ about, firstly? ‘Frozen 1’ was about the question of man vs. monster, of humanity vs. coldness (inhumanity), of lust for power, of succession of throne, of confidence, femininity and other traditional values, and by ‘traditional’ I mean ‘well-established and well-accepted in the contemporary Western society’. ‘Frozen 2’ touches upon those issues considerably less so than its’ prequel did, it seems to be concerned with the question of civilization/conquest vs. native ethnic groups, but it is a thornier issue than the ones talked about in ‘Frozen 1’, and so that topic is both downplayed and moved past very quickly in the movie into the next act – and what is the next act? In addition, people may be pointing to the destruction of a certain dam in the last part of the movie, and they are right: the message is of a restored balance, (somehow, supposedly), but in real life, this sort of action has very different consequences; they are touched upon in ‘Frozen 2’, but again, this is dismissed very quickly. Disney is all about making money, and that is the complete opposite of controversial issues, so while Disney may tolerate some controversies in SW and Marvel, at least they did in the past -now they are doing their best to kill them – in its immediate domain, especially the Princess movies, just no.

However, if we move past the more controversial and socio-aware issues of ‘Frozen 2’, (and there aren’t many – Disney is saving them for Marvel, apparently, just look at the upcoming Sam & Bucky show on Disney+), what is there left?

Various mythos and mythologies, that is what. First, in order of appearance, the Northuldra. 

Regardless of what they are in ‘Frozen 2’, their racial designation is a portmanteau of ‘North’ and ‘Huldra’, with the latter being counterparts of elves and fairies in Scandinavia. According to one legend, when the Lord came over to Adam and Eve for a visit, they were able to clean-up and otherwise prepare only some of their children, which they propped for an introduction; the rest they hid. The Lord was not fooled, however, and he made a proclamation, stating that ‘what is concealed shall not be revealed’ or something to this extent; the result were the first Huldra or Uldra. They look mostly human; however, they have hollow backs and animal tails, usually fox, dog or cow. Unlike their troll and Jotunn cousins, they were not as hostile to humans or as physically imposing; however, they were still strong enough to manually bend horseshoes and were often magic-users as well. Most of stories including the Huldra, (or the Hulder) involved their women marrying human men; usually it ended badly, (especially for humans), but sometimes the pair made it work and even had children, who were usually human, (no tails or any other animal features), but who, again, were often magic-users of one sort or another.

Now, you may argue that the Northuldra that appear in ‘Frozen 2’ are not anything like that; rather, they are a more derived version of the ‘noble savage’ cliché that plagued Disney during the 1990s and the earlier periods. Fair enough. Unlike the people of Arendelle, the Northuldra live in a forest with no sign of human civilization or its’ trademarks, (especially by the Western standards) and they seem to be using no steel or other metals and they live in apparent harmony with nature; the old clichés die hard if at all. That said, the same could be said of elves, especially those that are more like Tolkien’s than Disney’s, Marvel’s or DC’s, for example, so there is that.

Beyond the Northuldra, there are the various elementals, one of whom, the fire elemental, is the salamander; Disney’s ‘Frozen 2’ went with a classical depiction – that of a fiery/fire-breathing lizard rather than something D&D. Again, in European history, the salamanders were some of elemental nature spirits – they did embody fire; when it came to the other elementals, then the earth was represented by the gnomes, (think D&D dwarves rather than D&D gnomes), water – by undines, (variant mermaids), and air – by sylphs, which are often depicted as graceful winged humanoids. Here ‘Frozen 2’ shifted from this concept; the air elemental in particular seems to be shapeless and invisible instead; a variant D&D invisible stalker?

The earth/stone giants, however, bring us back to the Norse myths – they were the Jotunns or the trolls, they are the frost and stone giants of Marvel’s Thor. They are embodiments of a primal, untamed nature, and they did not like humans or their civilization; just watch them demolish the dam at the end of ‘Frozen 2’. They also live in the same forest, past the magic veil, where no civilization exists at all – and they are hostile to Anna and co. for no given reason, straight from the start. True, having stone brains probably doesn’t help, and Anna and co. were able to maneuver them into bringing down the evil dam… that was raised by the grandfather of Anna and Elsa, by the way… but hey, the balance between civilization and nature was restored! Go, Greta Thunberg! Wait, what?

…Since the 1970s, USA tried to make itself into a utopia, and after winning the Cold War, they accelerated their movements, and on some fronts, such as the social integration, they have achieved some success. On the other – such as the environmental issues – not so much. True, without the U.S. interference things aren’t rosy either; just look at Canada and its’ continual mishandling of the oil pipeline; but the problem? During their last peak – the early 1990s – US tried to do and solve everything through sheer physical force. Before long many people, countries and governments were sick of it; president Putin’s anti-US stance is not very healthy or sane…but again, he is an American creation, just as the Taliban had been, that broke free to US’ detriment. These days, many countries are still pro- than anti-US, but they do not appreciate American meddling in their affairs either. Just look at what happened when the ex-president Obama endorsed the Canadian PM Trudeau. The Canadian media were very professional, they freely admitted that this was nothing like the (fictional) Russian meddling in the previous US elections, but they were just as firm at pointing out that the ex-president Obama (and the rest of the US) should stay out of the Canadian elections as it is right and proper. The end. These days, Trudeau is still the Canadian PM, but whatever is going on down in the States, he wants no part of it.

And what is going on down in the States? Why, yes, the impeachment of the Donald, but also the upcoming presidential election. The former is going on more or less; the latter even worse than that. The Donald was never the best president of the United States, but who are the alternatives in the 2020? Fine, he is impeached and out of the way; who is left? Don’t forget, the US is a true democracy, its’ president is elected by all the people, and not a smattering of oligarchs, top army brass and various other strongmen as it is in the RF; in America, the presidential candidates have to win-over their electorate and its’ votes, and right now? The American government is involved in a soap opera called ‘The Donald, his life, family and impeachment’. Once 2020 comes around, both of America’s main parties may find themselves flat-footed and unsupported by America’s proletariat…and that is a problem that will not be fixed quickly or with the blame game on the Russians…

Back to ‘Frozen 2’… yes, at the movie’s end it did become some sort of a utopia, where civilization and nature can coexist. It also features a sea horse called a Nokk. It is better known as Nix or Nixie; it is a water spirit, similar to the Kelpie, as well as to the Grindylow and the Merfolk. Rowling’s Grindylow was some sort of a goblin-like creature, inferior to the merfolk of her universe; in real-life folklore, both the Grindylow and Nokk/Nix/Nixie were water spirits that were man-eaters; just look up Theodor Kittelsen’s depiction of the latter: it is more humanoid than equine, but judging by its eerily glowing eyes, it is clearly unfriendly towards humans.

On the other hand, the same man painted another two paintings, depicting the brook-horse – a subtly different water spirit, one that did usually appear as a white horse on land; it would entice people to mount and ride it, where upon it would jump back underwater, drowning its rider. The Nokk from ‘Frozen 2’ combines the elements of both of those real-life folklore beings: it is shaped like a horse rather than as a merfolk or something anthropomorphic, but it has the glowing eyes of Theodor Kittelsen’s Nokk as well.

Finally, there is Idun, Idunn or Iduna. Yes, this is the name of one of the characters from the ‘Frozen’ franchise, cough, but it is also the name of one of pagan Norse goddesses – she was the divine distributer of Asgardian apples of youth that kept the Norse deities eternally young, and she was the wife of Bragi, the Norse god of bards, skalds, and poets. Neat, hah?

…Trivia aside, what can be said of ‘Frozen 2’ as a whole? It shows a clean break from the events of ‘Frozen 1’, which brings us to Hans. He is not in the script at all. Overall, that is not really a problem; just look at MCU’s AoS (and also AC, especially at S2), where not only the actors had their roles remade and repositioned, but their characters (especially Grant Ward and Kara Palamas, but honestly – all of them) disrespected, abused and discarded. Compared to them, Hans’ fate is mild and perfectly acceptable, except for – Elsa.

Let us recap the first ‘Frozen’ – Hans, regardless his moral compass, was very much a part of the main cast and was a rather more complex character than, say, Gaston from the B&B franchise, (regardless of the version). You would expect him to be back in the second film, simply because he had not died unlike most of Disney’s villains, but instead there is no mention of him at all – and that changed the team’s dynamic; there’s only Anna and Kristoff now, (Kristoff’s relationship with Sven is something else), and Elsa is happily single and unattached – Emma Watson must be so proud! On a more serious note, you can find a video online, where Disney chief Jennifer Lee says that Elsa ‘will ‘tell us’ when she’s ready to explore her sexuality’. Except that Elsa is a fictional character, drawn in CGI, and she will do what the owners of her franchise, (i.e. ‘Frozen’) will want her to do.

In Hollywood, which includes Disney, sexual minorities are treated even worse than racial ones, (unless they are The Rock. As ‘Hobbs and Shaw’ shown us, you do not mess with The Rock) – both OUAT and TBBT rather flirted with having same-sex characters on their shows, but in the end, it had amounted to nothing concrete – and Disney wasn’t even a part of either of those franchises. And here we have Elsa, whose sexuality was hotly debated ever since her first movie was aired six years ago. These days, the initial passions died down some, but Disney is quite sure that by making Elsa officially heterosexual will annoy a large fraction of ‘Frozen’ fan base, and by making her officially homosexual – ditto. So instead they’re keeping her asexual…and now that she’s no longer the queen of Arendelle, but rather the protector of the forest, (what, did the previous one die, or get turned into a tree, or something?), Elsa is no longer a part of the more civilized, humane part of her world, (well, the world of her franchise), but of the primal and less humane one instead. If this is her happy ending, (and we have no reasons to believe otherwise), then it is certainly an atypical one, especially by Disney’s standards. As both the first ‘Frozen’ film and ‘Moana’ showed, Disney is trying to break the mold that it made during the ‘Disney Renaissance’ of the 1990s, but it does so on its own pace and settings. Yes, there is probably wokeness in ‘Frozen 2’, but as Tom Holland’s ‘Spider-Man’ movies showed, if done correctly, that is a good thing, and secondly? If the elections of 2016 showed that mass media’s influence over the American populace is great, but still has limits, then ever since ‘Frozen 1’ and ‘Moana’ showed that while the public opinion over the decisions of media companies such as Disney, (and Sony, etc.), is also both great and finite. What will come out of this is anyone’s guess.

…This is it for now, see you all soon!