BeautifulTomorrow
Member
What about Mulan and Pocahontas?? Will they get a makeover too?? Because I'm not sure how that would work out...
-
Welcome to the WDWMAGIC.COM Forums!
Please take a look around, and feel free to sign up and join the community.
Princesses getting new look
- Thread starter drew81
- Start date
Animaniac93-98
Well-Known Member
You thought that looked like a "pervy" fan drawing? You haven't been on the internet very long, have you?
GiveMeTheMusic
Well-Known Member
New dresses and hairstyles have been designed for Snow White, Cinderella (already in place in the parks), Aurora, Belle and Ariel. The other princesses (Mulan, Pocahontas, Tiana, Rapunzel, Jasmine) won't receive updated looks at the parks at this time.
GiveMeTheMusic
Well-Known Member
All of them. These are worldwide changes.
tinkerblonde11
Well-Known Member
Well, I guess they have to keep up with the Victoria's Secret models now a days...
Dragonrider1227
Well-Known Member
So far the only one I'm iffy about is Cinderella. I always thought Belle looked nice with her hair down. Clearly I wasn't alone on this 
MotherOfBirds
Well-Known Member
I'm glad they're updating them. They start to look dated after a couple of decades. Every time I look at Snow White, I think "Eh" because she was so clearly made in the thirties. Cinderella and Aurora scream I-was-made-in-the-fifties and Ariel was very clearly influenced by the aesthetics of the eighties, which isn't a bad thing. I support the change primarily for the sake of the face characters because more natural/updated hair and such will be more flattering and more realistic.
scoobygirl39541
Well-Known Member
Not that I'm against change, but to play devil's advocate... isn't everything you mentioned the point though? The characters are from those time periods.
MotherOfBirds
Well-Known Member
Technically, they're from whichever periods in history Disney was going for at the time, several centuries back. The animation and design, however, are generally pretty stylized. The backgrounds for Sleeping Beauty are the best example in my mind:
It's pretty late-fifties/early-sixties and a little groovy. Beautiful, but definitely a different artistic direction than your standard fairytale fare. Snow White does something similar in the styling of the character herself, who looks rather like Betty Boop (which is due in part to her popularity at the time and the fact that her animator was also a lead animator for Snow White) to the point that it's immediately apparent which period her film was made in. To me, the new look is just giving them a similar contemporary update for merch/promotional purposes
mm52200
Well-Known Member
Technically, they're from whichever periods in history Disney was going for at the time, several centuries back. The animation and design, however, are generally pretty stylized. The backgrounds for Sleeping Beauty are the best example in my mind:
It's pretty late-fifties/early-sixties and a little groovy. Beautiful, but definitely a different artistic direction than your standard fairytale fare. Snow White does something similar in the styling of the character herself, who looks rather like Betty Boop (which is due in part to her popularity at the time and the fact that her animator was also a lead animator for Snow White) to the point that it's immediately apparent which period her film was made in. To me, the new look is just giving them a similar contemporary update for merch/promotional purposes
But why is there a need to modernize them now? Snow White has stayed very relevant and popular for 70 some years, along with Cinderella and Aurora being pretty popular still after 50ish years. I don't think Princess sales all of a sudden decreased because the princesses don't look modern or contemporary and I seriously doubt this will help sales any either. If the formula and looks have worked for so long....why change it? I mean if it's not broken, don't fix it.
MarkTwain
Well-Known Member
Actually, this is one of the things that has bothered me most about the whole princess franchise, and especially the newest princess redesign. Each of "the princesses" is in fact one character in a much larger, individual animated feature, all of which are uniquely stylized and animated. In some cases, the look of those princesses were designed by animation legends, like Marc Davis for Sleeping Beauty/Aurora, Eric Larson for Cinderella, and Glen Keane for Ariel, all of whom have very distinctive styles and signatures. And yet all of these different styles and eras are completely homogenized so that they all look like Barbie dolls. The princesses need to be looked as characters from animated masterpieces first, and as merchandising products second.
Before:
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/...
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RKxF88gHyPY/
After:
http://www.posterstoreuk.com/media/
MotherOfBirds
Well-Known Member
Good point. I think for the purposes of merchandising and the park, it's mostly about making them look like they could all exist in the same universe (at least in instances where they're presented together)
J03Y
Well-Known Member
i'd just prefer that the princesses physical features look at least a bit more realistic, the wigs look completely fake on Belle, Snow White, Mulan, Pocahontas and even other characters in the park. and their dresses or too poofy, why not just make dresses (obviously not expensive elegant satin dresses, but not something that looks so blatantly like a costume it's actually laughable), so that while they do have a cartoony look to them, they still look like princesses from both their respected time periods and their respected films.
bigAWL
Member
Obviously, other meet & greet characters looks have changed through the years. But it's interesting because I think changes in other M&G characters have generally been in an effort to make them look closer to the animated versions. Because you're not going to bring out a natural-looking bear and call him Pooh.
That said, for me personally, I'm fine with an effort to make face characters look more natural rather than strictly adhering to the source movies. For many of them, you can't really make a face character's face look like the movie version with exagerated features. So why stick cartoon hair on a natural face? Why not make it all look more natural?
That said, for me personally, I'm fine with an effort to make face characters look more natural rather than strictly adhering to the source movies. For many of them, you can't really make a face character's face look like the movie version with exagerated features. So why stick cartoon hair on a natural face? Why not make it all look more natural?
phi2134
Well-Known Member
I like how the older versions looked a lot more, mainly because they don't have that "bratz" splash of style and body shape to them. They used to be much more regal and elegant ( from the original movies ) and now it's just a bunch of marketing techniques to draw little kids in to liking them more
Yzma
Active Member
Lavender?!? There's a picture backstage at Epcot of all the new Princesses and Aurora is pink.
GiveMeTheMusic
Well-Known Member
The photo I was shown had Aurora in a very purplish-pink gown, unlike her stark pink outfit now. This was awhile ago, so it may have changed.
hollywoodj
Active Member
I saw something that said Belle's new look would debut Feb. 2nd...