Frozen

   First things first: I am a huge Disney fan. I love Disney; I love the classics and most of the new things they do. They're an incredibly talented corporation with some serious stuff behind them. I also love The Snow Queen, which was supposedly what this movie was based on. So of course, I was anticipating this year's Frozen.

What. A. Huge. Disappointment.

   There were so many things wrong with it, so many things that could have been so much better. The thing that is most unbelievable is that they had the audacity to say that this was based off The Snow Queen. Now, I know Disney takes liberties with their stories, but there was literally nothing that was actually similar to the original story. It feels like Disney wrote their own story and then stuck in random bits and pieces of The Snow Queen to try to stay true to their "inspiration". But I won't dwell on this; in fact, let's ignore this in the scope of this criticism.

    The pace of this story was also wrong. It was much too rushed, and there was no expository anything. We barely got to see their parents before they get killed. We don't learn the name of the kingdom, or the girls' royal roles, until much too late in the film. In the first ten minutes of the film, we go from tiny kids who are best friends playing, to a herd of tiny trolls, to fifteen years through a snowman song, to Elsa's coronation. Uh, what? There was no development whatsoever. I saw what it was supposed to accomplish, but I didn't feel how it was supposed to be. I also have strong issues with the parents. Who locks up their kid in a room for fifteen years? And what was the whole thing with the ship? And later on, the trolls? Oh, let's not forget the random snowman and the reindeer and the whole gang of buff males who were there...why? There was just too much stuff with no room for it in the story.

   Next, we get to the theme of this story. Except...what theme? Sisterly love? Don't marry the guy you just met? Loyalty? If you love someone, you'll do anything for them? Everything is so scattered, so diverging and running off on all tangents possible...it was very difficult to see any linking theme.

   The music is also completely in the wrong place in this film. Good music? Yes. "Let It Go" was masterful, "In Summer" a delight, "Do You Wanna Build a Snowman?" moving--but only in itself. Within the story, all of them seemed forced, with bad transitions from speech to music, or just a scene that has little to no smoothness to it, as if you ripped the movie into pieces and tried to patch it together again--without tape. Good music, but all in the wrong places. There wasn't space for it, nor proper transitions.

   ...I won't even get into the animation. Not even the magical teleporting of body extensions through other parts of bodies. No sirree. That's not my place.

   There are so many plotholes and character downfalls that I can't even begin to name them all. Firstly, Elsa is supposedly so powerful that she could freeze all of Arendelle with just one hand, right? So how the heck does a pair of gloves inhibit all that power? The trolls...I'm not even going to go there. There are so many things wrong with that. The fact that Anna fell in love with two dudes over the course of, like, three days...I don't even. And Elsa, who magically changes her entire personality in less than a day. From "Conceal, don't feel" and "I can't do it!" to "I will save everyone because sister". "Let It Go"--also in the wrong part of the film. This is supposed to be a turning point for Elsa, yes? It's supposed to be her epiphany, her point of no return. So why is it that immediately after that huge "I DON'T CARE", she goes back to her "Conceal, don't feel, conceal, don't feel" mantra? Why is it that right after that she not only goes back to not embracing her powers, but still keeps them away from everyone and everything? Sure, FEAR, but "Let It Go" literally just said that she didn't care and it was time to see what she could do. So go do it! Don't just hide there and alienate yourself!

   This lacked a cohesive story. The dialogue was poor and unrealistic, and everything was stated outright. Everything was said, not shown. "There's so much fear!" Yes, Elsa, there's fear. Now show that. Don't tell it. Don't even mention it. Just show us how you feel. The love between the sisters was said to be there, but it wasn't shown, because hey, they spent fifteen years apart with just about no communication other than Elsa telling Anna to go away! There needs to be a sort of story behind that kind of love, or closeness. Anna claims to "know Elsa", but once again...fifteen years.

   Not only that, but the characters were also incredibly lacking. I saw what the characters were supposed to be, but that isn't how they came off at all. Anna was supposed to be this sweet, caring, loyal princess who loves her sister no matter what. Instead, she came off as a naive, stupid, dramatic, and foolish girl whose innocence is so complete that it is a flaw. She stupidly chases after her sister without a plan, without food, in the dead of winter, refusing help. Uh, what?
   Elsa was actually one of my biggest problems of this film. What's she supposed to be? She's not a hero, she's not a villain, she's just...there. She's supposed to be a beautiful, misunderstood girl with powers she herself doesn't understand and so caring that she's willing to lock herself away to save her family. Except she came off as another stupid, foolish, naive psychopath (and not a good one; not like the Master or Jim Moriarty or River Song) with no emotional control, all sex appeal, and a coward. Instead of facing her powers, learning to control them, and using them for the better like all the best heroes (Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, Maximum Ride and her gang, Donna from Doctor Who, etc.), she hides it and runs away from it, literally doing nothing to offset that. She accidentally kills her sister twice (even though she feels regret both times), but she doesn't learn her lesson either. She's a very typical Mary Sue--in fact, the best canon Mary Sue I've seen in a long time. Beautiful beyond belief? Check. Superpower? Check. Perfect in every way except for one defining flaw? Check. Everyone in love with her, and all those not portrayed negatively? Check and check. Saves the day? Check. Disney even played up on her sex appeal (look through the movie; you'll find it)--Mary Sue if ever I saw one. There could have been so much done with the story had Elsa not been such an incorrigible character.

   Essentially, Disney could have done much better. I expected better. I dislike Frozen for many of its aspects. Though I will admit this: those landscapes? Fantastic.