Disenchantment Has a Trailer!
This has been a pretty good weekend for princess fans. Maleficent II officially began production, and I started a new playlist on my YouTube channel about princess TV shows. The biggest news, however, is that Matt Groening's upcoming Netflix series just dropped its first full-length trailer. I am so excited about Disenchantment, and the trailer did not disappoint. It looks like everything I was hoping it would be. Bean is incredibly easy to relate to. Even though she does turn many of the princess tropes on their head, she still inherently wants to be a good person, which is very important for princess parodies, which can easily lose their focus if they try to be too malicious. I'll let you check out the trailer below before delving into it further.
The first thing we see is Bean's wedding, but just like the opening wedding in ABC's 2015 comedy Galavant, things do not go as expected for our adventuresome heroine. When Bean is given the opportunity to say "I do" for the prince's hand in marriage, she bravely exclaims "No!" and throws her wedding ring on the floor. There have been many other princesses who were forced into unwanted marriages, such as Fiona in Shrek, but they usually wait for their prince to come to rescue them instead of outright refusing and then bravely facing the consequences of their actions. Don Bluth's Thumbelina came the closest to this scenario by refusing to marry Mr. Mole without being aware that Prince Cornelius was already on his way to stop the wedding, but he gave her encouragement indirectly through her memories of him in the visual eye candy that we see reflected in the candles and the engagement ring he gave her at the beginning of the movie.
Even though Bean is a little irreverent when it comes to her royal responsibilities, the most important thing in the trailer is that she still wants to be a good person. I don't think I would be able to tolerate a princess show in which the princess is just as lazy and clueless as Homer Simpson or Fry. When she refuses her groom's hand in marriage and he accidentally falls onto a pile of swords in an attempt to pick her ring up off the floor, she is genuinely shocked by the injuries that were caused by his stupidity and facial expression appears to be torn between wanting to help him and wanting to get away from the ceremony as quickly as possible. Even the admittedly distasteful joke about her saying she makes a good butcher after killing a bunch of animals and learning she was actually in a pet shop was redeemed by her own naivete, as she showed concern and regret when she realized what she had done.
Aside from retaining all of the traits that make princesses great, I love how easy Bean is to relate to. There was one clip from the trailer and another from the teaser in which her father tells her how disappointed he is in her for failing to maintain the grace and class that one would expect from a princess. Her toothy overbite, stubby eyelashes, freckles, and messy platinum white hair are not what you would expect to see on a princess, but like Rapunzel, they make her appearance unique and endearing. Groening has stated in interviews is a bit of drunkard, and that was highlighted in the trailer as well when she was portrayed in a tavern surrounded by an enthusiastic crowd who cheers for her to chug down a fairy, which fortunately flies away unharmed after she finishes her drink. Even though drinking is not a very ladylike activity, it is also one that many older animation fans can relate to. I also like that the show does not encourage her vice. When she asks her companion, Elfo, what this feeling is that she "doesn't want to drink away," he tells her that it's called hope, showing us that she is aware that she has a problem and wishes to improve but doesn't know how.
We also received some samples of the type of humor we can expect to see from Bean's two sidekicks. Her demon friend Luci says that he wants to "get rid of all the diseases plaguing mankind and replace them with worse ones," which is exactly the sort of joke one might find in one of Groening's other shows. Elfo's humor appears to come from his sheer stupidity when a woman falls in the water screaming "I'm drowning!" and he responds "I'm Elfo!" and again later when he fails to follow Bean's advice to avoid falling down a large waterfall. I'm looking forward to having a lot of laughs when this show premieres on Netflix on August 17th, but I'm also looking forward to having an older princess who is inherently flawed but whose heart is always in the right place.
The first thing we see is Bean's wedding, but just like the opening wedding in ABC's 2015 comedy Galavant, things do not go as expected for our adventuresome heroine. When Bean is given the opportunity to say "I do" for the prince's hand in marriage, she bravely exclaims "No!" and throws her wedding ring on the floor. There have been many other princesses who were forced into unwanted marriages, such as Fiona in Shrek, but they usually wait for their prince to come to rescue them instead of outright refusing and then bravely facing the consequences of their actions. Don Bluth's Thumbelina came the closest to this scenario by refusing to marry Mr. Mole without being aware that Prince Cornelius was already on his way to stop the wedding, but he gave her encouragement indirectly through her memories of him in the visual eye candy that we see reflected in the candles and the engagement ring he gave her at the beginning of the movie.
Even though Bean is a little irreverent when it comes to her royal responsibilities, the most important thing in the trailer is that she still wants to be a good person. I don't think I would be able to tolerate a princess show in which the princess is just as lazy and clueless as Homer Simpson or Fry. When she refuses her groom's hand in marriage and he accidentally falls onto a pile of swords in an attempt to pick her ring up off the floor, she is genuinely shocked by the injuries that were caused by his stupidity and facial expression appears to be torn between wanting to help him and wanting to get away from the ceremony as quickly as possible. Even the admittedly distasteful joke about her saying she makes a good butcher after killing a bunch of animals and learning she was actually in a pet shop was redeemed by her own naivete, as she showed concern and regret when she realized what she had done.
Aside from retaining all of the traits that make princesses great, I love how easy Bean is to relate to. There was one clip from the trailer and another from the teaser in which her father tells her how disappointed he is in her for failing to maintain the grace and class that one would expect from a princess. Her toothy overbite, stubby eyelashes, freckles, and messy platinum white hair are not what you would expect to see on a princess, but like Rapunzel, they make her appearance unique and endearing. Groening has stated in interviews is a bit of drunkard, and that was highlighted in the trailer as well when she was portrayed in a tavern surrounded by an enthusiastic crowd who cheers for her to chug down a fairy, which fortunately flies away unharmed after she finishes her drink. Even though drinking is not a very ladylike activity, it is also one that many older animation fans can relate to. I also like that the show does not encourage her vice. When she asks her companion, Elfo, what this feeling is that she "doesn't want to drink away," he tells her that it's called hope, showing us that she is aware that she has a problem and wishes to improve but doesn't know how.
We also received some samples of the type of humor we can expect to see from Bean's two sidekicks. Her demon friend Luci says that he wants to "get rid of all the diseases plaguing mankind and replace them with worse ones," which is exactly the sort of joke one might find in one of Groening's other shows. Elfo's humor appears to come from his sheer stupidity when a woman falls in the water screaming "I'm drowning!" and he responds "I'm Elfo!" and again later when he fails to follow Bean's advice to avoid falling down a large waterfall. I'm looking forward to having a lot of laughs when this show premieres on Netflix on August 17th, but I'm also looking forward to having an older princess who is inherently flawed but whose heart is always in the right place.
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