Me and Disney: An Introduction

Hi everybody!  Ahem, since this is a Disney blog, I shouldn't be starting with a catchphrase from The Simpsons. Though that show was probably my most-watched animated show from my childhood and it's STILL airing on Fox in its -checks Wikipedia- 26th season 28th season?! Geez, I, like many others, stopped watching long ago.

Bye, Dr. Nick

Moving on, hi, I'm Christina and I love Disney. Now, did I always love Disney with the burning passion of Hellfire?

My first Disney reference on this blog and it's this song... Great start right there!

I promise you I was never a creeper like Frollo there, but the answer is no... the truth is, I didn't always LOVE Disney.

Hi Everybody?

                                       Ok, put out those torches. I didn't hate Disney, I still liked their stuff (well not all of it, still don't love all of it now, but that's a topic for another day). I didn't have the upbringing to be brainwashed by my parents to love the Disney classics since birth. It wasn't until high school that I delved deep into that magical Disney rabbit hole.

      Me = Mabel, and if you haven't watched Gravity Falls yet, what are you waiting for?!

I was born in Guangzhou, China and by the time I arrived at LAX as a toddler, the Disney Renaissance was about to wind down with the -meh- response from the release of Pocahontas. I would be designated as an ESL (English Second Language) kid until the 5th grade (this is going to explain my random collection of VHS movies I had at home). I wouldn't have cable TV until the 8th grade so no Disney Channel for me, but at least the late 90's/early 2000's was the hey-day of Kids WB, the One Saturday Morning cartoon block on ABC, and there was stuff on Fox for kids but I never remember the names.

I had my Animaniacs, my Pokemon, my Digimon, Yu-gi-Oh, and other stuff. I always liked animation from a young age and that was never going to stop. I always say I have the drawing skills of a first-grader, but that's honestly giving me too much credit.

So where did Disney fit into my childhood? I had a cousin who owned a VHS copy of The Little Mermaid (yes it's the one with the phallic symbol towers in the background, and no, that was never noticed by me until I learned what a phallic symbol was).

For your viewing pleasure or curiosity, you pervs/non pervs

I also owned bootleg copies of  Bambi and The Fox and the Hound in Cantonese (thanks Chinatown!), but I didn't watch those a lot. Something about hunters shooting cute animals didn't appeal to my younger self, more on that when I review those movies individually. My elementary school was next door to the library so I borrowed a shit ton of VHS movies and when a Blockbuster was built near my house (look how 90's I am! to justify my title), I had my dad rent more movies. Looking back, I could've watched a ton of more Rated R stuff instead of cartoons because when your English skills in elementary school already surpassed your parents', the MPAA couldn't affect me.

I didn't watch a lot of the Disney movies in theaters. I remember my parents taking me to the movies because they're not paying for a babysitter. So I watched kid-appropriate stuff like Titanic, Mission Impossible 2, Face/Off, etc.

                                              



                                                 

Why Nic Cage didn't haunt my nightmares all this time is a mystery to behold... Anyways, I saw Mulan in theaters though. That was definitely one of the first Disney movies I bought on DVD and it wasn't a random bargain bin pick because I liked the picture on the cover. Never went through a princess phase though, I didn't like wearing dresses or dressing up in general. However, I wasn't a tomboy, my favorite color is pink and I have the athletic skill/hand-eye coordination of a wacky waving inflatable arm flaling tube man.

                                             

Watched a lot of Family Guy as a kid, not so anymore, but you can't help but appreciate classic jokes like this one

I remember I watched most of  A Bug's Life (I think my cousin and I were movie-hopping at the time and that's Pixar, not Disney, I know). I dragged my dad to watch Pokemon the Movie 2000 and it was awesome! When Ash Ketchum saved the world in the end, my dad was snoring in his seat, head tilted back, mouth open. I dragged my mom to watch Atlantis: The Lost Empire and Lilo and Stitch. Sadly, the Disney Renaissance was long gone at that point so it was more of a chore for her. My parents are "those people" that think animation = kiddy cartoons. I remember I was watching something on Netflix and she made a comment about that so I showed her a scene from the anime Attack on Titan... where the main character's mother gets eaten by a Titan in the very beginning. You probably have seen or should see for yourself what a terrible daughter I am as I smiled while my mother cringed when she watched that and I asked her again if cartoons were for kids only. She did answer something along the lines of, oh my god, ew no, ok fine you win, just don't show me that kind of stuff again. I think I got my point across though.

My parents aren't that bad because when I was six, they took me to Disneyland for the first time and it was splendid. I wore my overalls and pink plaid shirt and was all smiles. I've gone back plenty of times with my friends in my adulthood without them (they think they're too old for it, but whatever, more happiness and awesomeness for me). We even went to California Adventure around the time it first opened and it was... ok, I was still in elementary school with low expectations and the mentality that would've loved the Minions had they existed back then, but even then I thought it was BORING. The highlight was Soaring for my parents and I. We went on it twice and there was quite the line for it because the rest of the park was once again BORIIINNNGGGG. Behold the wondrous what were they thinking? short-lived Superstar Limo:

I watched a lot of TV so I knew most of those celebrities and it was still lame to the extreme. Imagine how my parents felt. Hey, Jackie Chan was there though and they knew him. Yay for... diversity? Pft, who am I kidding, as if the 87th Oscars that aired the week before I (originally) began this blog wasn't proof enough. (But congrats to Disney for their double wins though) Just want to say, this blog isn't going to be political, my DNA is comprised of sarcasm, apathy, and sugar from Disneyland's churros. I just try not to be a jerk to people as much as possible. All bets are off though when I'm driving because I live in L.A.

Honest opinion of the Big Hero 6's Oscar win? I was seriously caught by surprised, but pleased (I love that movie and um Baymax, enough said), but I, like most people thought HTTYD 2 was going to win, though if the Blue Fairy gave me a wish, I would've given it to The Tale of Princess Kaguya. Studio Ghibli deserves more than just Spirited Away's Oscar (love, love that movie as well). Hayao Miyazaki only flew over to L.A. for his Honorary Academy Award because of John Lasseter, but he and the rest of the studio don't care about Hollywood politics. Japan, among other places, are far, far ahead of the U.S. in their appreciation of animation as a medium, not a genre as designated by the oh so lofty Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. I watch the Oscars only out of habit (done so as a kid because I had dial-up and no cable TV) and just to see the occasional train wrecks and surprises. Like John Travolta's weird face-touching (if only Adele Dazeem Idina Menzel had Elsa's ice powers)

Though my strong bias is Disney, I'm a fan of the other studios. How ignorant was I about the animation industry before? Basically fell under that group where everything 2D was Disney?, everything by computer animation was... that name I don't remember, starts with a P, but they have that funny lamp jumping on a letter, but they have a white castle like Disney in the beginning?

Not that White Castle!

Yes, that castle, it's not really white, it's more blue though...

Yup, definitely remember that, my VHS copy of Toy Story had that castle

And now it's this castle, and honestly I've always liked it since it was first shown on Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest in 2006

Now I'm a big kid and I know my Disney and my Pixar from my Dreamworks, Laika, Illumination, Blue Sky, Sony, and now Paramount's getting into the animation game... you can't really blame the general public for getting confused. The respect for the industry might not have increased much, but the box office and the number of studios vying for that sweet, sweet moneypot definitely have. If someone gets them mixed-up, correct them nicely and politely and keep your smug sense of superiority deep inside.

Me on the inside when I corrected my coworker on this subject once

How often will I update this blog? Uh, I don't know, I'm not what you call a stick to a schedule kind of person. Sometimes I'm Dipper, sometimes I'm Mabel (seriously watch Gravity Falls). But I love Disney and I'm looking forward to watching the entire canon (I've put off watching some of the ones I've never seen before for the purpose of this blog).

So what am I watching, Mickey?*

It all started with a Mouse, but one movie was the first animated full length feature: Snow White and Seven Dwarves* 

*Yup, I got to go to the Disney Burbank Studios for a fan event once and managed to take these sweet shots myself. Especially happy about the Snow White one before it got replaced with these two sisters from that movie called Frosty or something, I don't know, it wasn't that big a deal for Disney, don't know why they changed it.

           So like, they're sisters and there's snow, yeah I don't remember this movie at all

All heavy sarcasm aside (get used to it in this blog), I liked Frozen, I don't love, love it, but that doesn't stop me from buying the artbook and the Blu-ray and the deluxe edition soundtrack.... Big fan of physical media right here and obviously brainwashed by the Disney marketing machine haha, but nowadays kids aren't going to get their start on the Disney movies and songs like I did with the death of Blockbuster and library rentals, maybe bootleg copies from Chinatown. It's all about the Internet and frankly, I don't care how, but as long as quality animated movies, Disney or not, are being made, let the folks out there watch them and give the studios their billions.