This is my updated princess shabiki list. The biggest change is a swap-out/trade-placements of two princesses. These are my opinions. I will explain as I go.


1. Mulan
    I’ll probably be a shabiki of her my whole life. She’s the most sacrificial character in the whole Disney Princess lineup, and I can’t help admiring her for overcoming her numerous flaws. Mulan is a convincing heroine, and her humaneness is something that I find missing in some of the Revival Era girls.

2. Ariel
    She was my childhood favorite, but she doesn’t seem to diminish in my eyes even as I grow older. Ariel symbolizes rebirth. Ariel represents “the need to change yourself.” If wewe don’t change yourself, life will just thrust changes upon you, anyway. My own personal life experiences onyesha this to be factual. Ariel shows me that wewe can still resolve to be kind to your closest family members, even if they have been unkind to wewe in the past (she shares this trait with Cinderella). Ariel shows me that wewe can still remain hopeful of the outcome, even if all wewe see in front of wewe right now is unbelievable trauma and obstacles. Ariel shows me that miracles are not always something external, but can be internal as well. It is not awful to become someone different from what wewe once were. Change is a private miracle. Ariel embraces “change” so completely, and does not hold herself back. Ariel symbolizes the courage it takes to leave familiarity behind and fully embrace the unknown. This trait is not as well-developed in a whole lot of the lineup girls, actually.

3. Rapunzel Rapunzel is a fairly new addition, and the only Revival Princess I happen to feel comfortable sticking up in my juu five. Why? She’s sunny, compassionate, and kind. Kindness matters to me a lot. Some people find her boring and a Mary Sue. But what they find boring in her, I find morally centered. The only reason Rapunzel is not higher, is because she is so hesitant. Unlike Mulan and Ariel who fully embrace “change” and go after it immediately-- Rapunzel holds herself back out of her fear of Mother Gothel’s reprisal.


4. Pocahontas Pocahontas isn’t well-liked around Fanpop. She’s pretty much ignored. Some see her as a boring character, who is just a mouthpiece for environmental conservationism. I beg to differ. Poca has a nice sense of humor, is compassionate to strangers, and is a thinker. The only reason she isn’t higher, is—yet again--- Poca gets in her own way, and holds herself back. Poca likes “the constant changing” of the riverbend, but she isn’t fully committed to going the whole way. She still ties herself back with familiarity, and that’s why she ends up at number four on this list.

5. cinderella Oh, happy day! cinderella was my other childhood favorite, along with Ariel. I always loved Cindy for being so compassionate to others, and so noble in the face of hardship. cinderella never resorted to throwing tantrums au calling people names. She’s patient and hardworking, and I have always rooted for her to win the prince and leave Miss sour, wamekula step-family behind. Change will do wewe good.

6. jimmy, hunitumia She’s still at number six. jimmy, hunitumia wants to get out. I relate to that part of her, still. I can’t help thinking royal life is just booooorrrrring. A succession of parades, fetes, show-up interviews, and photo-ops. I don’t want Duchess Kate Middleton’s life, for example. (That’s why I’m definitely not upset at Ariel that she missed the tamasha at the beginning of TLM. That tamasha sounded like the same laborious repetition of everything having to do with life under the sea. Royal life seems deadening and stilted, even and especially if you’re a female). I don’t blame jimmy, hunitumia for being fed up with palace life, either, and I can see why she loved Aladdin’s brand of mischief. The only reason Jas isn’t higher, is because the movie focuses on Aladin a lot, and she doesn’t get as much screen time.


7. Aurora She’s dreamy and kind. She’s pretty, and another thoughtful princess ( like Poca). I was neutral to her once (just as I was with Poca), but Aurora has slowly grown on me. The thing that makes me respect Aurora, is this. Aurora could have easily decided to refuse the betrothal from her birth, and what it entailed--- but she went through with it, anyway. Aurora sacrificed her happiness with Philip in the forest, to save a kingdom she didn’t even know about for sixteen whole years. That takes a tremendous amount of will power.



8. Snow White A Queen wants this bubbly little sweet motherly creature dead. I have always liked Snow White. What I like most about her is her kindness and her optimism. Snow White does not resort to inaonyesha anger and hatred for her mean stepparent. Instead, she prays for her evil stepmother. It takes guts to pray for your mean family members, instead of lashing out at them.



9. Merida This is her new placement. Yup. It finally happened. Merida is fiery, but is such a sourpuss, too. Merida rarely has a good day. Merida is constantly bitchy and moody. The only time I see a true light-up-the-world smile on Merida’s face is when she is alone with Angus, au alone climbing a cliff. This makes me think that Merida keeps her family at arm’s length. That is her choice. Not everyone has to upendo their family. What was the deciding factor to explain me placing Merida so low? Merida is constantly blaming Elinor, and her total venom and cruelty towards her mom over the whole marriage thing just drives me crazy. This is what sinks her to spot number 9. Merida, why is it your intention to change someone else, instead of changing yourself? Instead of being so full of spiteful negativity towards your mom, wewe could have tried to speak with her in front of the clans. Resorting to vandalism and a cryptic spell that did destructive harm to your mom did not impress me. Merida also has nothing on Mulan in the sacrificial au bravery departments. See addendum.


10. Belle She’s always been disliked kwa me. I didn’t like her when I first saw her on the big screen in 1991. Belle thinks far too highly of herself. She’s snooty. She’s too good for the provincial townspeople, she’s too good for Gaston, she’s too good for the likes of the beast, whom she calls “a monster.” I can understand some of Belle’s ostracization, because Belle brought it on herself. Belle stuck people with labels, and called them provincial—which led them to close-ranks, and view her as an “odd” person. I think Belle doesn’t help her own situation. I find Belle’s pity party rather boring, and Belle doesn’t like “change.” Belle won’t embrace the unknown. Belle talks a big line about “wanting to live in the great wide somewhere”--- but when it finally materializes, all she does is gripe, gripe, gripe. Belle only sacrifices herself one time, for her dad. After that, Belle doesn’t really sacrifice herself again at all. At the culmination of the movie, Belle chooses her father’s life over the beast’s life. I’ve been done with Belle as a role model for a long time. Sure, Belle. Go right ahead and leave the beast high and dry to deal with the mob and your stalker, Gaston--- since wewe didn’t offer yourself in exchange. I swali Belle as being the most compassionate Disney princess that she’s marketed to be. Her actions in the movie totally fail her marketing test.

11. Tiana I admire her hardworking tenacity, but her demeanor is lacking. Tiana has a mean streak ( just like Merida and Belle both do) and she doesn’t have a real problem displaying her anger in front of others. When Tiana doesn’t get her restaurant, she throws a fit, just like Merida throws a tantrum about the marriage request, and Belle has a pity party about being the beast’s prisoner. I wish Tiana would refrain from issuing mean quips at ray (who only tries to help her, for crying out loud!!!) Even if her harshest criticism is justified in Naveen’s case--- all that this shows me is that Tiana doesn’t have control over her own tongue. Tiana just says the first thing that enters her head. I don’t admire Tiana really. kwa the end of the movie, Tiana gives up NOTHING that she had going on. Tiana ultimately gets even zaidi than what she wanted at first--- she gets Naveen AND her restaurant—while Lottie who is understandably affluent, flamboyant, a little crazy, and who is a much sweeter person ujumla, jumla than Tiana is gets…to wait for Naveen’s tiny brother to grow up. charlotte was sacrificial. charlotte gave up her dream of love, so that Tiana could have a career and love. Talk about TPATF being wacky.

In my opinion, my bottom three girls should suck it up. I don’t understand why they seem to blame other people constantly for the circumstances they are in. They are holding themselves back from changing and becoming nicer people.

ADDENDUM    So. It has finally happened. My four mwaka struggle to upendo Merida is over. The cognitive dissonance I have endured has finally stopped. I am no longer at war with myself. I feel a sense of profound relief, actually. I adore Elinor. She is lovely to watch. I find Merida’s personality and her decision-making far too childish and foolish. Merida wants to remain riding Angus, shooting arrows, and has the “Peter-Pan Syndrome” written all over her. Merida, like Peter Pan, is the champion of never accepting her adult responsibilities.

Why is the movie called Brave, exactly? I have always wondered exactly how Merida is brave.… Her mashabiki say it is because she stood up for herself against coercion, and because she admits to her mistake “in-universe.” But I wonder…? Merida actually did all of these non-brave things.
1. Merida already had a complicated relationship with Elinor-- but Merida then exacerbated it.
2. To avoid getting married, Merida went the whole nine yards! Merida showed out in front her clans, threw a complete tantrum, vandalized personal property that wasn’t her own, called her mother a beast, and then resolved to manipulate her mother’s most personal thoughts.

This is bravery? All of those actions do not constitute the kind of bravery I grew up with. Merida didn’t lay down her life for someone else’s. No, Mulan did that with her father, Shang, and the emperor. Ariel did that with Flounder, Sebastian, and Eric. Saving a person whom wewe cursed with a magic spell is not bravery. Merida only corrected a mistake she made kwa turning her own mother into a bear. That’s actually far from the standard definition of bravery I read in Merriam-Webster. Bravery means courage. Merida didn’t do anything courageous. Mulan saved an entire country from pillaging and genocide, while Merida’s country just decided to go along with Merida’s dislike of tradition. Merida is not the heroine of Brave. Elinor is. Merida doesn’t fully change her mind about marriage and love. Elinor fully changes her mind about the marriage and what upendo means. Merida is a protagonist caricature. Merida is a tragic character to me, and one who is only concerned with her own self-fulfillment.

     As for Merida being “called-out for her mistake within the universe of Brave”—that simply doesn’t happen at all! Merida’s mashabiki would like to say that Merida gets called out for her mistake. But Merida simply doesn’t get punished for all of the things she does in the movie. Nope. That would take much zaidi running time than the clocked 100 minutes. The things that do happen within Brave are pitiful indeed. It is Elinor who ultimately kills the villain, Mor’du. That’s right. Merida doesn’t even injure the villain to redeem her own self-image! Instead, Merida wraps the tapestry she formerly vandalized over her mother, cries a few tears in front of the clans, and gets exactly what she has always wanted. Merida gets a new tradition that includes absolutely zero responsibilities for her. Mulan, though, accepted a new military life with all kinds of hard responsibilities. So, I fail to find Merida brave au particularly sacrificial. What other people might need for their own futures never once crosses Merida’s mind. The movie basically praises Merida for coercing her mother into viewing life the way that she herself does.
    Romance can be a valuable part of becoming an adult for some people. Even then, if wewe are aromantic, and want to stay single well into adulthood, then that’s a personal choice. Staying single has NOTHING AT ALL to do with FEMINISM. Brave is not a feminist movie. It’s a movie about a girl who wants her own way at all costs.
    I can accept that Merida is a flawed character. Heck, all of the girls in my juu five are flawed--- Mulan, Ariel, Rapunzel, Pocahontas, and cinderella all have weak points. Merida’s complete willingness to physically hurt her mother to achieve her goal is why I dislike her. Merida is not an ikoni for females everywhere. She’s an ikoni only to her dedicated fanbase. Merida’s mashabiki can upendo her for her fiery traits and her brashness. But I don’t have to upendo Merida for what I see in her. Merida is a skilled manipulator, and Merida never learns how to stop being a manipulator kwa the end of the movie’s running time. So now, Merida is finally at position 9 on my princess list. Cinderella, with her patient and kind spirit towards her evil stepmother, has taken Merida’s former position. (I have so longed to put cinderella up in my juu five! Finally, it has happened!!!!)

I have alisema so many times that while I like Merida, I don’t upendo her. This placement for Merida now fits with what I have been saying all along. I used to feel extremely bad and torn about this, because I upendo Elinor, and Merida is her child. But now I don’t. Merida has to stand on her own footing in front of me. A character who manipulates people to get her own way, is not a character I will lovingly embrace and hold close to me. I have now placed Merida bedside the princesses who most directly resemble her in the Disney lineup. With this update of my princess list, I am no longer at war with my own conscience, thankfully. I have been at war for four years with my conscience. I just could not, ultimately, keep up a charade kwa admiring a mean character. It worried me so.

Since this was a really major decision for me, that’s why I wrote this article. I have been distraught about Merida for almost four years, since 2012. No one has to agree with me. But I accept change. Change is inevitable. I’m not fond of Peter Pan’s and Merida’s movie messaging of never growing up. It's false. New life circumstances continue to find me, and I have opted to change myself, which is a concept that I see reflected in Mulan and Ariel the most, and to some degree in the other princesses of the lineup. Familiarity and staying with what wewe know is not always inherently good. Changing yourself to adapt to new circumstances is not always inherently bad.