The Reality of Fairytale Princesses

Welcome back, readers!

Today, we"ll discuss the foundation of storytelling; Princesses in Fairytales. We all grew up hearing stories about princesses and happy ever afters, but have you really thought about how those princesses grew up?

Stories such as Snow White and Cinderella have a somewhat similar childhood if you think about it. While I agree that they are two completely different stories with–let's be honest–the same ending of a happy ever after, have you ever thought about what their lives were like?

Let's analyze, shall we...

Snow White: The story is about a girl who flees her castle after the evil queen (her mother) tries to kill her.

If we look at Snow White's childhood, we learn that her dad married the evil queen, who had a magic mirror. The evil queen always asked the mirror who the prettiest girl in the land was expecting the answer to be her–which for a while it was–until one day when the mirror said Snow White's name.

Us 2000 to 2010, kids grew up watching Disney movies. Thinking that one day, some guy would come in and show us the way, but not just us. I'm sure these princesses grew up with the same ideology.

The reality of Disney princesses is that in these movies, their lives have no value until they meet someone. And while I agree that some films are different, like The Princess and the Frog (Princess Tiana) and Mulan. However, Snow White and Cinderella are older than those stories.

These princesses (specifically speaking about stories of Sleeping Beauty, snow white and Cinderella) Grew up hoping and expecting their lives to change once they met their one true love. These movies (while it wasn't their intention) show their lives as useless. The princess's lives are redeemed in these movies as useless without a prince.

Now, let's move on to Cinderella. I love both movies, but I wanted to point out how much Disney has tried to change this.

Now, onto Cinderella...

Cinderella is a story about a girl who snuck out of her house (even after her stepmother said no) and went to the ball. The original story goes something like this.

Cinderella's mom died when she was younger, and her dad remarried a woman who became her stepmother. However, the stepmother's true colours were revealed after the untimely death of Cinderella's father. The stepmother was jealous of Cinderella's charm and beauty, and she was 'grimly determined' to 'forward' the interests to her own 2 daughters, Anastasia and Drizella. (And these are the exact words used in the original movie.)

One thing I want to point out in this particular backstory is how the stepmother is portrayed. Stepmothers, in these kinds of stories, are always portrayed as villains. This is unfair, but again, I have (and hopefully never will) never had a stepmother, so I can't pick sides. But it's not fair to assume that all stepmothers are evil.

The movie said, "the family fortunes were squandered upon the vain and selfish stepsisters while Cinderella was abused, humiliated and finally forced to become a servant in her own house." Again, these lines are written word for word in the original 1950 movie Cinderella. These are the exact words used in the film to describe how Cinderella was treated in her own house after her father's death (I have done a ton of research and sat through some ancient movies for this post)

I researched (asked Gemini) and discovered that Cinderella and Snow White had almost the same dream in their original movies.

Cinderella's Dream: Her dream was to go to the ball and meet the prince (in the original 1950 movie)

Snow White's Dream: Her dream (which she sings about in the original 1937 movie) was to find a prince who would love her.

See the similarities?

These princesses grew up with only one dream. To find a prince who will love them. But if you think about it, it makes sense. Ella (Cinderella) and Snow White both grew up being tortured and unloved by their stepmothers and mothers and lost the parents who loved them at a young age.

But two things bug me: 

1) How both the stepmother/mother are jealous of Ella and Snow's beauty.

2) How not only these two (stepmother/mother) but all the female villains in the original movies are single

Let's dive into the second one first, specifically Maleficent's story

In Descendants (the third one), it is revealed that Maleficent and Hades were married, but Hades left Mal (Maleficent's daughter) And Maleficent when Mal was really young (maybe 4 or 6)

(I'm a sucker for that movie trilogy.)

But in the recent Descendants 4 (Rise of Red), We see that Maleficent and Hades were high school sweethearts (my assumption from what I saw in the movie). So what exactly happened?

Well, let me set the scene (based on what I think happened):

1)Maleficent and Hades fall in love in high school 

2) They grow older and eventually get married.

3) they have Mal.

4) Maleficent's mad obsession for more power and her feud with the fairy godmother (and not to mention her bossiness) drive Hades away while Mal is still young (maybe around 4 or 6)

(Descendants links all the great fairy tales)

5) The king (from Beauty and the Beast) casts a spell and traps the villains (Where Descendants 1 starts)

And I won't spoil the rest for anyone who has yet to watch the trilogy.

So this is what I think happened

Now, onto no.1, the obsession with beauty

Cinderella's stepmother and snow white's mother are obsessed with beauty. The question is, why? Let's dive in.

(This is longer than my other posts, but bear with me. We're almost to the end.)

Now both the evil queen from snow white's story and the wicked stepmother from Cinderella has this insane obsession with beauty, and here's why I think they have i.t

They are insecure about their appearance and have this obsession with looking younger.

Here's what happened. They were like Ella and Snow at one point. They wanted to find someone to love, and they used to be young and beautiful. Then they met someone they fell in love and got married. However,t as the women grew older, they noticed that the men were becoming more distant. This made them go out of their way to try and stay beautiful, but to no avail, as the ones they loved (they're princes) for someone younger and prettier. This made them go mad, and they closed off their hearts and became evil, thus causing their insane obsession with beauty.

Now, this theory may be wrong, but it makes sense.

With this, I say goodbye; I know this was one of the longer posts, but I'm happy you stayed till the end.

Bye, Readers! See you in the next one!