Snow White and Cinderella are just two of the many main characters who are also the victims in their story. They’re either chocking on a poison apple or talking to birds to make sure their evil stepsisters take their prince charming. The infamous Grimm Brothers, whose stories have been adapted by Disney and other entertainment companies, are the authors. I myself until a few years ago believed the way Disney told the tales were the same as the original versions. Yes, the villain always bit the dust in a Disney movie, but violence was minimal. For the Grimm Brothers, violence and pain is served on a silver platter to the villains as our protagonists come out the victors. The villain is usually blinded by several things from jealousy to fear. In Little Snow White, the Grimm Brothers write, “Now Snow-White grew up, and when she was seven years old, she was so beautiful, that she surpassed even the queen herself. Now when the queen asked her mirror: Mirror, mirror, on the wall,/Who in this land is fairest of all? The mirror said: You, my queen, are fair; it is true. But Little Snow-White is still/A thousand times fairer than you. When the queen heard the mirror say this, she became pale with envy, and from that hour on, she hated Snow-White.” (Grimm). The mother is presented as a heartless and narcissistic woman who is incapable of loving her own flesh and blood. The relationship between Snow and her mother would lead to four attempts to take Snow’s life, the fourth being sort of successful; that is, until the servant of Snow’s creepy prince charming accidently gets her to cough up the piece of poison apple lodged in her throat. In the end, the evil mother would die by dancing to death, literally, in hot iron shoes. You could say that the realities of the Disney fairy tales would scar the childhoods of many people. The Grimm Brothers had many ways to give the bad guys a gruesome death, or great pain. In Cinderella, the evil stepsisters suffer not from death but from a variety of torture; a few no so lovely song birds left them blind. If no more sight isn’t the punishment bestowed upon the villains of the Grimm tales, than death it is. It happens very often that we want the villain to get a violent end because we are always cheering on for the protagonist to win. Honestly, the heroes can be a bit naïve, and sadly, stupid. Look at Snow White. The dwarves tell her again and again not to open the door to anyone after having nearly died because of the evil queen’s attempts. And does she listen? No. The beauty of the red apple tempts her to take just a small nibble, and then she’s out. It’s funny, isn’t it, that the naïve, and oblivious character comes out triumphant and the villain who is actually intelligent and cunning come out the loser? |