I didn't get it, so looked to see if the answer was on other sites. Full credit to Tisha Bell on Facebook.
"if you notice, around a certain time, there stopped being villains and became more about breaking generational traumas, and believing in yourself"
Ah yes, the very specific type of therapist who works with things like "self-esteem" and "trauma".
There literally are villains as well. So idk wtf this is a hot.
There's no villain in Frozen (there's a twist where the sister's love interest is revealed to have ulterior motives, but he wasn't actually driving the core conflict at the center of the movie, that Elsa's secrecy around her powers have endangered the whole kingdom and her sister's life). At most, the bad people in the movie are merely taking advantage and scheming through chaos they didn't cause.
There's no villain in Encanto, either. They suggest it might be Uncle Bruno a few times early on, but his reclusivity and secrecy is driven by the family dynamics, that pushing down/hiding the truth is strongly discouraged in that family so that they don't talk about their problems, until they simmer a bit too long and cause cracks in the family (and literal cracks in their magical house).
The "villain" in Moana turns out to be more of the natural consequences of past actions, and the way to "defeat" the villain is to apologize, make things right, and return what belongs to her. The antagonists along the way on that hero's journey are what I'd cynically refer to as opportunities to sell branded merchandise.
The Zootopia villain is revealed at the very end, as well. But the "antagonists" along the way are social, cultural, and political forces that make it hard to solve the mystery and pinpoint the problem.
Wreck It Ralph reveals a villain at the end, as well, but the problems they're trying to overcome are a combination of social expectations (Ralph is sick of being seen as a villain, Vanelope just wants to be accepted) and kinda the Eldritch horror of being trapped in a simplified world controlled by the higher world's much more complex rules where nobody will think twice about simply pulling the plug (both literally and figuratively) on societies full of sentient beings after their whole universes no longer serve the trivial purposes for which they were created.
Strange Planet I only saw once, but I don't remember a villain at all. Just that the planet was dying and it turned out to be because of big oil or whatever industry was a stand in for big oil.
Raya and the Last Dragon? As I remember, the main antagonist was shadowy forces threatening everything, and the human antagonists with actual agency mainly were motivated out of selfishness when teamwork/cooperation could've saved them all.
These are clearly different styles and plot devices than what was a traditional Disney villain (wicked witches and stepmothers, the gay-coded 90's villains like Ursula, Jafar, Scar) who were introduced early as bad people doing the bad things that caused the central conflict in the story.
There are different kinds of villains.
Frozen might be a bit of a fuzzy one, but there's no villain in Encanto or Moana, by any reasonable metric. Antagonist != villain.
I personally like the theory that the rock trolls are the true villains in Frozen, and manipulated all the key events that actually set the main conflicts on motion (including the earlier things that set up the conflicts in Frozen 2).
Yeah. The statement is so vague that people can assign thier own meaning. Either by accident or design, this shares common design principles of a mentalist doing a cold read.
There're no real villains in Moana or Encanto, and the villain in Frozen doesn't play a role anywhere near as big as in classic or Renaissance era Princess movies. I've not seen Raya and don't really remember the plot of Brave, but I do see some people making similar comments about each of them.
Stepping a little outside the classic "Princess" genre, Inside Out, Elemental, Soul, and Turning Red don't really have villains either (according to what I'm reading—Inside Out is the only one I've actually seen).
For movies within this era that actually have proper villains, that leaves Luca, Wish, and Coco. As far as I can tell, that's it.
Some people just post vague bullshit because they know that a large group of morons will just go "Hmm, yes I don't understand but I agree!" and upvote it.
There is a comment a bit higher up explaining it
Yeah I agree.
Like a horoscope!
I had a look at the list of movies and dates, not sure that I get it.
I am lazy and did none of that. Someone please just comment the answer for us.
Maybe the mid-90s when the princesses started having more agency?
the mid-90s is also when disney was on the brink of bankruptcy so there may have been something else going on
This comment elsewhere in the thread addresses it. https://lemmy.world/comment/20680178
I think that's probably it, thanks!
Frozen (2013) doesn't have a traditional villain. The main barriers to the main character's happiness is a lifetime of being told to keep her superpower secret and the wedge it forms between her and her sister (whose stunted emotional development causes her to jump in the arms of the first man who pays attention to her).
Big Hero 6 (2014) does have a villain, but his motivations are complicated, and the main character's journey is as much about overcoming the trauma of losing his brother as it is defeating the villain's plans.
Zootopia (2016) reveals the villain at the very end, and most of the plot is driven by the characters grappling with societal injustice and prejudice.
Moana (2016) is a hero's journey but the big bad villain is revealed at the end to be, like, environmental destruction personified, and the way to defeat the villain is to apologize and make things right.
Frozen 2 (2019) similarly has a plot where it's revealed that all the problems are caused by the characters' grandfather's sins, and the way to fix it is to undo the betrayal and land theft of the indigenous people (which their entire kingdom is basically built on).
Raya and the Last Dragon (2021) is one I've only seen once but I remember it being about climate change and generational trauma.
Encanto (2021) is for sure about generational trauma. The antagonists are mostly conceptual: crushing expectations/responsibilities that come with great power, the imbalance and negative family dynamics that come from parents or grandparents showing favoritism, insecurity that comes from going from poor to rich but believing that it can all fall apart in an instant, the toxic effects of keeping secrets. Oh and it all stems from the grandma seeing her husband murdered by soldiers in front of their baby triplets.
Strange World (2022) is about climate change caused by overexploitation of natural resources.
Yeah, the OP meme is funny, but these aren't just about therapy, and instead require the writers paying attention and putting their findings properly into a story. So I'm guessing Disney got better writers in the 2010s.
92-98 when they stopped all being white Europeans. Although I have girls and can confirm that 2009's Princess and the Frog is the best Disney princess film.
Aladdin was my favourite Disney film as a kid. None of the characters are white Europeans! The villain is a real villain: someone who is evil that the heroes must defeat.
'92, first of the batch
I think it makes more sense when you graph the movie-going population against demographics. They're following the money. Any concepts of inclusiveness or social reform are purely coincidental.
Human therapists? Is that the specific type? Idk
Well, "Humanistic Therapist" is a thing
Or Disney just learned to pander to Tumblr users
Nothing to do with tastes changing or anything
Moana is considered a disney princess movie?
I mean...she's the daughter of the chief of her village, but does that really count as a princess?
Is she even the daughter of the chief? I don't know, I've only seen that movie once
There's princess, and "Disney Princess", and a Disney Princess doesn't have to actually be a princess (and been like that for a while)
I don't really follow stuff like that
It's not really something to follow, just Disney marketing doesn't mean literally a "princess" a lot of the time
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