#tangled discourse

[eggmuffinwaffles]

shana tovah 💖

[neokonewman]

I feel that Rapunzel and her Dad's issues relied too heavily on demonizing Varian as their problem. True he kidnapped the Queen, but their was more going on with them before Varian lost it on them. I dislike how defeating Varian is treated as solving the issues between them.

Honestly, all of Frederic’s shortcomings are too easily explained away because the show uses Varian as a scapegoat. Frederic hiding the knowledge of the black rocks until they are literally starting to destroy the captial? Somehow he convinces the angry townspeople to turn against the one person actually working on stopping the rocks. Frederic sending disguised guards to harass Varian in his already destroyed home? Completely overlooked in favor of Rapunzel just being angry about being lied to. Even Rapunzel uses Varian as an excuse to lesson Frederic’s actions when Frederic even dared to try to take responsibility for his mistakes.

Varian didn’t cause the rift between Frederic and Rapunzel. It was Frederic’s lies that caused that rift. It’s Rapunzel’s inaction until she literally couldn’t not ignore the black rocks that’s part of the problem. The townspeoples’ rage about the black rocks destroying their homes and livelihoods shouldn’t have been “solved” by directing that anger on a single teen. Frederic was WAY more responsible for the conflict in S1 than Varian was. All Varian did was allow his sorrow turn into rage, borned from the desperation that was forged by Frederic and Rapunzel actions and inaction.

Also, Frederic and Rapunzel has had their issues with each other before Varian was even induced to the series. Frederic was already understandably overprotective of Rapunzel, while Rapunzel felt like the kingdom of Corona just became a larger tower for hun to hide her away. Rapunzel comparing Frederic to Gothel for that brief moment was the true conflict between the two of them. Varian was just a boy who wanted to help when it was clear to him that no one else was trying to stop the rocks. Whatever weird obsession the show has in portraying Frederic as this “poor and misunderstood, soft-hearted” father just makes his character suffer due to not letting him develop.

[jupiter235]

*sigh* 

While I would by no means call myself an expert in the field, I have gained some experience at writing thanks to writing fan fiction as a hobby. Given that, I can tell you that when you’re putting together a story, it isn’t a good idea to bog your story down with useless information. Which means, unless you’re writing for a series that you intend to go on for a while, don’t take up your readers’ time by including information that isn’t relevant to the plot. 

Case in point: you’re writing for a movie/TV mini-series. You only have so much time allotted to you in which to get your story told. Therefore, you have to decide what your characters and story should spend time focusing on. Unless this show or movie is entirely a romance--where the overarching plot is to get two specific characters into a relationship together--spending time on which character is going to wind up romantically involved with which can become a pointless waste of time. Especially if you have a larger overarching plot, and other things you have to focus on in order to get to the climax of that plot. 

Given all of that, do y’all really think Disney is going to spend any time confirming all of their characters’ romantic or sexual orientations? Especially if whether or not that character is going to wind up romantically involved with anyone has no bearing on the plot whatsoever? 

The answer is they will not. Like them or not, you do have to admit that Disney recognizes that they won’t have very many fans if they make movies that do nothing but drag on because of information that is not relevant to the plot at all, so they aren’t going to spend time on confirming or denying a fictional character’s sexual orientation unless it becomes relevant to the plot. 

Y’all, that’s what fandom is for. That’s what headcanons and fan fiction and fan art is for. Let the creators of a story give us the canon version so we can play around with it in our fandom spaces. 

And maybe stop spending all of your time and energy being angry about it and going after the creators because they won’t confirm your personal headcanons for a character, and maybe stop attacking other fandom members just because they disagree with you.  

[swan2swan]

runningracingdancingchasing

See, I completely disagree with you. I see her complete lack of interest or understanding in romance and love as proof of her being ace/aro, not gay. She's disgusted by love from EVERYONE, not just Rapunzel and Eugene

Well...the ending of “Under Raps” may beg to differ, when she’s contemplating the rose.

She’s clearly not completely disgusted by romance, it’s just...not something that she shows in the same way as everyone else. Honestly, I don’t think she’s even aware of it herself, because she’s so rigidly disciplined and focused on her work that she doesn’t give it a second thought. Furthermore, she’s so constantly burdened by the need to impress her father and keep her reputation solid that even if she did know how she felt about women, she’d bury those feelings deep, deep down because they would get her in trouble.

The metaphors are also everywhere.

Cassandra enjoys affection and appreciation, but she’s never gotten it from her stern and rigid father, and has thus never pursued it. Rapunzel is the first one to actually show her something resembling open love and attention, and this makes Cassandra super-awkward and confused throughout the book and the show--especially because Rapunzel is head-over-bare-heels for Eugene. Cass is never going to let herself believe that Rapunzel is actually into her, because she knows that Eugene will always be Number One (remember that part in the novel where Cass finds out that Rapunzel told Eugene about the Big Secret, and Cass’s immediate response is to run away from everything because she’s so devastated? Yeah...). 

There’s certainly validity to an asexual/aromantic reading of Cassandra, but given all of the emotional baggage she’s constantly lugging around, I think it would be a mistake to look at her reluctance to get attached and conclude “she’s just not into any romance at all”. There’s just too much happening.

Of course, we’re only halfway through one of three seasons, so I think it’s a little early for any full conclusions to be drawn. We haven’t really had “proof” of anything--all we know is that Cassandra rolls her eyes at the Day of Hearts and catfished a guy by pretending to seduce him. Also she and Rapunzel put a broken tablet together that said “Let there be love here” and then sacrificed their friendship bracelets in a pool to mimic the wedding ritual of two lovers from the past. But there’s still a lot of time to go--we’ll see where things end up. 

[neokonewman]

What's the hottest hot take you have about Tangled the series?

I don’t exactly know what truly constitutes a “hot take” but my most steadfast belief that I don’t think I’ve gotten a chance to express on tumblr is that Eugene had a lot more going for him then just being Rapunzel’s supportive boyfriend, and the show really dropped the ball when it came to his potential as well as New Dream’s development as a couple and as individuals.

Like most things in the series, TTS had all the potential story elements to do Eugene’s character justice, but stops short for one reason or another in my opinion the most frustrating way possible. Lance being his old partner in crime that he screwed over, but later reconciled with and joined him on his way to redemption. A bitter lover that Flynn Rider betrayed. A crime lord that he worked under for most of his life that has it out for. An identity crisis that involves his long lost birth family. All of these elements have the potential to make a story arc that would have gracefully continued Eugene’s arc from the movie about him making up for his past, and moving forward as the bat version of himself.

Unfortunately, almost all of these plot points weren’t even resolved by Eugene himself. They were most often “solved” by Rapunzel either telling him what was “best” for him, or taking over the plot point entirely, robbing Eugene a chance to have agency in his own story beats. Sometimes, the story just drops a plot point for Eugene almost entirely (ex: his identity crisis at the end of S2 completely overshadowed by the Cassandra betrayal twist that no other character ever touches on)

As for the lost potential of New Dream, even if we ignore the near universally hated ending of “No Time Like the Past” making Rapunzel on the same level as Stalyan (arguably worst than her), the couple is so one-sided that the show just forgets that Eugene is supposed to the future co-ruler of Corona or at least heavily support Rapunzel with her doing so by marriage, and instead makes him take a job directly under Rapunzel’s employment. Instead of using his previously establish position as a criminal consultant to the royal guard be a stepping stone of him applying his knowledge to help heal Corona from the reckless war on crime, he instead is put in a position that he in canon of the show was established to be awful at, and ended up “running the tightest ship the kingdom’s ever had, which again Corona did not need.

As a fan of the original movie, Eugene was tied as my favorite character in the movie along with Mother Gothel, so seeing his character so sidelined was a heavy hit to my enjoyment of the series.

[neokonewman]

I read your Challenge of the Brave ask and honestly you're 100% right. To make thing even worse the books and comics provided a couple pretty easy ways to spark the feud between Cass and Rapunzel. In the comics, Cassandra is also an artist. In the books, Cass tries tooth and nail to make sure Rapunzel is safe but Raps makes it impossible by sneaking out without her and inviting a stranger into her room. Heck even BFE implies Cass's birthday is right after Rapunzel's.

While personally I think having Cass’ birthday the day after Rapunzel’s is overkill considering how canonically important Rapunzel’s birthday is to the Tangled universe, I do agreed that conflict can be much more than jealousy.

As I mentioned before, Cass could have been on screen teaching Rapunzel self defense lessons by her request because Rapunzel feels like she has to prove herself to her father to get freedom (which is pretty dang sad). Then the Challenge of the Brave comes up and Rapunzel recklessly joins in order to make a statement, but is overwhelmed due to the difference between someone who recently started learning to defend herself vs people who has been training specifically for the event and Cass has to sacrifice time showing off her skills to protect Rapunzel from getting hurt. Like, Rapunzel be good for a beginner and may even be a natural, but even that doesn’t put her on par with actual fighters. It doesn’t have to be a glorified measuring contest on “who is better than who.” Just an old fashion conflict between friends who have their motives at odds with each other.

Of course, I can still see jealousy play some part in the conflict between Cassandra and Rapunzel, but TTS really overplayed that card.

[neokonewman]

I don't care for how some fans make Varian's father out to be abusive (especially in fan fics). I can't tell you how much I dislike this take on Quirin as a father. At most he was a bit emotionally distant, which is not the same as being abusive. Varian adored his father for a reason. Do you is like this take on him too?

This is a bit iffy in a sense that I believe neglect is certainly a form of abuse, but at the end of the day I don’t think Quirin is purposely neglecting Varian. It’s the unfortunate result of him being very busy, being emotional distant, and him honestly being a bit ashamed of Varian’s recklessness. His role of being the leader of Old Corona and his duty as a father puts him in a pretty tough situation when Varian’s inventions cause problems to the community, but at the same time, it’s his own personal failings as a father that prompts Varian to think he has to do’s something drastic to earn his love. S1 portrays this dynamic between the two of them pretty well in my opinion, both being fueled on concern for their home and each other, but being completely on the wrong page due to their own personal reasons.

Of course, you probably are more referrring to the common fandom trope of making a parent purposely physically and/or emotionally absuvie, which I do disagree with when regarding Quirin. Being both a deeply concerned, but ultimately distant parent are the majority of Quirin’s character flaws, but he never seems malice in his intentions. I think Quirin unfortunately falls into the purposely abusive trope in fanon works because it’s common in general for fandom’s to write flawed parents as such. There is also some projection at play in how people read certain scenes in the show, and the moment when giant Quirin intimidatingly looms over small Varian and orders him into silence can have lots of interpretations to the audience.

As for Varian’s adoration for his father. I do believe it is warranted because again, Quirin does show that he cares for him, albeit in subtle ways. Plus based on my interpretations of Varian, he seems to be a kid who, while is out of control due to a lack of supervision and direct guidance, he was raised to at least show respect to his social betters which I’m sure his father being the leader of the village plays a role in enforcing. Varian’s main goal at the beginning of his arc is to do something amazing and useful for his community, which must be inspired by Quirin’s role as the reliable and solemn leader of Old Corona. That coupled with the shame of his inventions causing problems could easily lead to Varian idolizing his seemingly much better put together father.

In short, I personally don’t see as Quirin as purposely and/or overtly abusive, but I do think his failings lead him to unintentionally neglect his son which leads to some sort of abuse in that extent. Also while I don’t agree with the take on Quirin being a more intentionally abusive parent, I can at least understand why some members of the fandom read him as so.

[neokonewman]

Some fans think it was unreasonable for Varian to expect Rapunzel to drop things to help him with the amber situation. I kinda agree but only for the day of the storm and the days after it. I have seen Rapunzel defenders say that Varian and Rapunzel were close enough friends to each other for her to drop things for him even after the storm and that Varian's expectations of Rapunzel were unreasonable. Thoughts?

Whether or not they were “close enough friends” is irrelevant to the situation. Varian is a civilian in danger and while it was understandable that she couldn’t drop everything during the storm, there is no reason for her to do nothing until Varian had to actively reach out to her a third time.

And yes, I said third because Varian told her things with the black rocks at Old Corona was getting bad, then he rushed out into the storm to beg her for help because his dad was in danger, then finally he has to send a secret letter to her just to get her butt moving. This isn’t a matter of them being close enough friends or not. Rapunzel and the other members of the royal family have a responsibility to look after the well being of their people, and actively ignoring the serious plights of their people, especially in a matter they actively caused (Frederic for taking the sundrop and Rapunzel, albeit accidentally, activating the black rocks). This is a human decency issue because while Rapunzel is doing whatever in the castle for a prolong period of time, Old Corona is in shambles, their leader is incapacitated, and their people are without homes. This goes beyond Varian, although just leaving teenager alone after two disasters situations (the blizzard and the rocks) is very irresponsible.

Personally, I don’t have to be particularly close to a person to offer them aid during times of disaster.