Modern Disney movies like to slip in jokes and references that are for the adults in the audience, since they know that there will be plenty of parents watching with their kids, as well as some older viewers who just enjoy the magic of a Disney film.
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00:00Watching a Disney princess movie is a vastly different experience for kids than it is for
00:05adults.
00:06When you're young and innocent, you don't have to worry nearly so much about logic and
00:09consistency.
00:10But for adults, these things kind of matter, which is why fans have been a little bit bugged
00:14by some of these things only adults notice in Tangled.
00:18What about the baby?
00:19You would think that the heir to an entire kingdom would be afforded some protection,
00:23especially because she's only an infant.
00:25So how was Mother Gothel able to saunter into the palace and kidnap Rapunzel?
00:28Did she cast some sort of spell to put everyone to sleep, or is the palace really that lax
00:32on security?
00:33Hey, Mom and Dad, wake up, there's a witch singing to your baby four feet away!
00:38All in the accent
00:40The difference between Rapunzel's accent and Mother Gothel's accent makes absolutely no
00:44sense.
00:45Mother Gothel sounds like she's speaking with a Mid-Atlantic accent, the favorite accent
00:48of old-school Hollywood stars, which The Atlantic described as a phony British announcer voice.
00:52The inflection works for Mother Gothel's character, but it does raise the question of how Rapunzel,
00:57who's lived in a tower for her entire life and has never spoken to another person, has
01:00a completely different accent.
01:02Since Mother Gothel taught her how to talk, Rapunzel should have the same accent, right?
01:06Speak up, Rapunzel, you know how I hate the mumbling.
01:09I am the lost princess, aren't I?
01:12Did I mumble, Mother?
01:16Where are her shoes?
01:17One of the most bizarre things about the movie is that Rapunzel doesn't have shoes.
01:21It might make sense that she'd be barefoot in her tower, although you'd still think she'd
01:24have socks or something to keep her feet warm.
01:27But how does she not acquire shoes at any point in the film?
01:29Even at the end of the movie, when she meets her parents in the palace, she is shown to
01:33be barefoot.
01:34Couldn't Flynn, the professional thief, have stolen her a pair?
01:36Say all you want about Flynn reforming his ways, his failure to acquire a pair of shoes
01:40for the woman he loves proves that chivalry is dead.
01:44Unhappy birthday
01:45Considering it's a massive clue to her true identity, why did Mother Gothel tell Rapunzel
01:49her real birthday?
01:51Is Mother Gothel just overly confident, not believing that there's the slightest chance
01:54Rapunzel will ever meet another human being and learn that she and the missing princess
01:58are the exact same age with the same birthday?
02:00This seems like a huge slip-up on Mother Gothel's part.
02:04The adaptation
02:06Disney is notorious for taking liberties with their source material, but Tangled isn't even
02:09close to the brothers' grim fairy tale.
02:11In the original story, Rapunzel isn't a princess.
02:14She's born to a woman whose husband steals food from a neighboring garden to appease
02:17his wife's pregnancy cravings.
02:19When he is caught by the Enchantress who owns the garden, she lets him go but demands that
02:22she be given the child to raise as her own.
02:25It's not quite so clear who the bad guy really is in the original, now, is it?
02:28Everything I did was to protect you.
02:33Where's Mother Gothel?
02:34Does Rapunzel live by herself?
02:36If so, how long has that been going on?
02:38She wouldn't have been able to live by herself as a defenseless baby, but she's clearly on
02:42her own by the time the movie takes place.
02:44In the original fairy tale, Rapunzel isn't locked into the tower until she's 12, which
02:48makes sense since even magical hair would take time to grow long enough to pull someone
02:51into the tower.
02:52Even if Mother Gothel did actually live with Rapunzel throughout her childhood, Rapunzel
02:56has been alone for a while.
02:58It's clear from Rapunzel's opening song that she spends most of her time in solitary confinement,
03:02which is pretty depressing.
03:04The missing tower
03:06People have been searching for the missing princess for the better part of two decades,
03:09but never find her.
03:10It seems pretty odd, then, that Flynn stumbles upon her tower so easily.
03:14Given that he found it while fleeing from the castle, it can't be that far away from
03:17the city.
03:18But why has no one else in the kingdom ever found this tower before and reported it?
03:23Stockholm Syndrome
03:24It's one thing for Rapunzel to obey Mother Gothel when she thinks the woman is actually
03:28her mother, but even after the truth about her history is revealed, she still seems to
03:32be under Mother Gothel's spell.
03:34This seems to indicate that she's suffering from Stockholm Syndrome, which, according
03:37to the dictionary definition, is,
03:39"...a psychological response wherein a captive begins to identify closely with his or her
03:42captors, as well as with their agenda and demands."
03:45In the film, Rapunzel happily reunites with her parents and presumably lives happily ever
03:49after, but in real life, Rapunzel's time in captivity would have had long-term psychological
03:53effects.
03:54Here's hoping Maximus doubles as a great psychiatrist.