Not Quite A Movie Review
Jan. 31st, 2022 10:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chaosvizierSo, the other day I saw Disney's "Encanto" and it was great. There, that's my review. Great movie, and one of the few times where I actually enjoyed the songs in the movie.
But then I got to thinking (which is usually the part where I get in trouble), and I said to myself, "Self, this is a good wholesome family friendly Disney movie, but why can't it be a superhero movie?"
The Family Madrigal is your typical family: three generations, lots of love and care and anxiety and challenges and what not. But... they have superpowers. So let's look at this from a comic book perspective.
Abuela - the head of the family. She has no superpowers, but she does command the family. She's like Nick Fury: director of the Avengers, full of authority, but not actually empowered. She also wants her hero team to use their powers for the good of the community, helping it grow and thrive.
Pepa - weather manipulation. A powerful skill that can have many benefits, but unlike Storm of the X-Men, Pepa's power is directly tied to her emotional state. The song states "Her mood affects the weather; when she's unhappy, well, the temperature gets weird." So, much like Hulk, her emotions generate power. The sun shines when she's happy, and we see storms overhead when she is angry. Can she turn her emotions on and off at will? This would require a significant amount of self control, but the outcome could be tremendous.
Bruno - precognition. He is not Charles Xavier, telepath, or Jean Grey, telekinetic. He is like the precogs in "Minority Report". The few examples we have indicate that Bruno's predictions have all come true. This does raise the paradox of "if we know the future, can we try to avoid it? And if we try, is it that attempt that causes the future to happen as predicted?" Poor Bruno. We do later see, however, that he can be asked about changing a potential future outcome to generate a new prediction, like Sarah Connor trying to stop Judgement Day.
Julieta - healing. There appears to be no limit to the injuries she can heal - broken limbs, anaphylactic shock, cuts and bruises are all taken care of. However, her limitation is that the victim must eat something that she has cooked. Therefore, if the victim is unconscious, can they eat successfully? Can she just sit at home and bake and cook ad infinitum, and make sure her goods are in every household? How much do you have to eat to get the healing? She could open the world's first combination hospital and bakery.
Felix - Felix is not part of the family; he marries Pepa. We see him as a calming influence on Pepa, keeping her emotions under control so that her weather patterns don't get out of hand. Woe to the villains who threaten him, for they will reap the hurricane.
Agustin - Agustin is not part of the family; he marries Julieta. He is the Jar-Jar Binks of the team: clumsy, accident prone, but still good-hearted and kind. His wife is literally the only reason he's still alive.
Dolores - super-hearing. While not a physically powerful skill, Dolores would be an extraordinary spy and a gifted detective. She could hear pests skittering in the walls, the thumping of a heart, all but the most silent of footsteps, and whispers from miles away. Can you hide from her in a soundproof room? What is her true range, and how quiet a sound can she hear? Is her hearing also accuracy-based; can she pinpoint the location of a sound? We assume that her range is human standard, but what if she could also sense supersonic and subsonic vibrations? Also, her least favorite Christmas song is "Do you hear what I hear?"
Camilo - shape-shifting. He appears to be the embodiment of Mystique of the X-Men. We see him take on many different forms, male and female, young and old, and his transformation is instantaneous. He seems to use his gifts to make people laugh, and helps a mother get rest by mimicking her and holding her baby. Assuming that he must have met a person once to mimic them, it looks like he can continue to mimic anyone he has ever met. We don't see him mimic an animal, but hey, why not?
Antonio - communicating with animals. We see him gain this skill in the film, and it appears that he can hear and understand the animals, and when he speaks, they understand him. This is not animal command; they are not his minions, but they seem to regard him as a friend. How extensive is this gift? Can he speak to any creature in the animal kingdom? We see mammals and birds, but what about insects? Fish? Cephalopods? Reptiles? Antonio could have an intelligence network of unimaginable scope. "What's that, Lassie? Timmy fell down a well?"
Isabela - create plants. Isabela's power is similar to that of Poison Ivy, but with a key difference: Isabela can create a plant from thin air. It starts with only flowers, but later she creates an entire cactus out of nothing. Can she create a tree? A bush? Seaweed? This power could be awesome in scope. However, even just limiting it to flowers, she can make an unending paradise for bees. She could make a living hell for those allergic to pollen. Or she could make poppies and become an opium dealer. Tough call. Important biological note: Mushrooms are not plants.
Luisa - super-strength/invulnerability. Luisa is like She-Hulk, or the Juggernaut: she's not a raging out of control monster like Bruce Banner's Hulk; she's always on, fully aware, and in control. She throws a boulder up in the air and it lands on her head and shatters without even fazing her. Her hips knock two hefty rocks off-screen in milliseconds. And we see her carrying an entire house, a dozen massive stones, and she says she can move churches and flatten diamonds. We don't establish an upper limit of her carrying capacity or invulnerability, but it's pretty high up there. LUISA SMASH
Mirabel - Here we have the crux of the story. Mirabel seems to have no powers at all; every family member seems to gain their powers at a young age by touching a door, and the door then transforms to reveal their room and their gift. I would say that Abuela has no powers because she was already an adult when the house came to be. Mirabel, when she was of age, touched a door and nothing happened, implying a lack of a gift. But at the end, after the house is repaired, she touches the front door of the house, and it transforms for her. To me, this implies that her gift is an integration with the house itself. She 'repairs' the family and 'repairs' the house over the course of the film, and in the end, after the house has been utterly destroyed and the magic lost, it is Mirabel's touch that brings it back. The house recognizes her as its master. And this is no small thing; the house is a magical construct. "Bigger on the inside", as the Doctor would say. The house is sentient and can move parts of itself at will. It contains multiple interdimensional portals, one for each of the family members. Perhaps not unlike Dr. Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum, or Superman's Fortress of Solitude, it responds to the will of its master.
Honestly, I would love a superhero movie with this team.
TL;DR version: MADRIGALS, ASSEMBLE!
But then I got to thinking (which is usually the part where I get in trouble), and I said to myself, "Self, this is a good wholesome family friendly Disney movie, but why can't it be a superhero movie?"
The Family Madrigal is your typical family: three generations, lots of love and care and anxiety and challenges and what not. But... they have superpowers. So let's look at this from a comic book perspective.
Abuela - the head of the family. She has no superpowers, but she does command the family. She's like Nick Fury: director of the Avengers, full of authority, but not actually empowered. She also wants her hero team to use their powers for the good of the community, helping it grow and thrive.
Pepa - weather manipulation. A powerful skill that can have many benefits, but unlike Storm of the X-Men, Pepa's power is directly tied to her emotional state. The song states "Her mood affects the weather; when she's unhappy, well, the temperature gets weird." So, much like Hulk, her emotions generate power. The sun shines when she's happy, and we see storms overhead when she is angry. Can she turn her emotions on and off at will? This would require a significant amount of self control, but the outcome could be tremendous.
Bruno - precognition. He is not Charles Xavier, telepath, or Jean Grey, telekinetic. He is like the precogs in "Minority Report". The few examples we have indicate that Bruno's predictions have all come true. This does raise the paradox of "if we know the future, can we try to avoid it? And if we try, is it that attempt that causes the future to happen as predicted?" Poor Bruno. We do later see, however, that he can be asked about changing a potential future outcome to generate a new prediction, like Sarah Connor trying to stop Judgement Day.
Julieta - healing. There appears to be no limit to the injuries she can heal - broken limbs, anaphylactic shock, cuts and bruises are all taken care of. However, her limitation is that the victim must eat something that she has cooked. Therefore, if the victim is unconscious, can they eat successfully? Can she just sit at home and bake and cook ad infinitum, and make sure her goods are in every household? How much do you have to eat to get the healing? She could open the world's first combination hospital and bakery.
Felix - Felix is not part of the family; he marries Pepa. We see him as a calming influence on Pepa, keeping her emotions under control so that her weather patterns don't get out of hand. Woe to the villains who threaten him, for they will reap the hurricane.
Agustin - Agustin is not part of the family; he marries Julieta. He is the Jar-Jar Binks of the team: clumsy, accident prone, but still good-hearted and kind. His wife is literally the only reason he's still alive.
Dolores - super-hearing. While not a physically powerful skill, Dolores would be an extraordinary spy and a gifted detective. She could hear pests skittering in the walls, the thumping of a heart, all but the most silent of footsteps, and whispers from miles away. Can you hide from her in a soundproof room? What is her true range, and how quiet a sound can she hear? Is her hearing also accuracy-based; can she pinpoint the location of a sound? We assume that her range is human standard, but what if she could also sense supersonic and subsonic vibrations? Also, her least favorite Christmas song is "Do you hear what I hear?"
Camilo - shape-shifting. He appears to be the embodiment of Mystique of the X-Men. We see him take on many different forms, male and female, young and old, and his transformation is instantaneous. He seems to use his gifts to make people laugh, and helps a mother get rest by mimicking her and holding her baby. Assuming that he must have met a person once to mimic them, it looks like he can continue to mimic anyone he has ever met. We don't see him mimic an animal, but hey, why not?
Antonio - communicating with animals. We see him gain this skill in the film, and it appears that he can hear and understand the animals, and when he speaks, they understand him. This is not animal command; they are not his minions, but they seem to regard him as a friend. How extensive is this gift? Can he speak to any creature in the animal kingdom? We see mammals and birds, but what about insects? Fish? Cephalopods? Reptiles? Antonio could have an intelligence network of unimaginable scope. "What's that, Lassie? Timmy fell down a well?"
Isabela - create plants. Isabela's power is similar to that of Poison Ivy, but with a key difference: Isabela can create a plant from thin air. It starts with only flowers, but later she creates an entire cactus out of nothing. Can she create a tree? A bush? Seaweed? This power could be awesome in scope. However, even just limiting it to flowers, she can make an unending paradise for bees. She could make a living hell for those allergic to pollen. Or she could make poppies and become an opium dealer. Tough call. Important biological note: Mushrooms are not plants.
Luisa - super-strength/invulnerability. Luisa is like She-Hulk, or the Juggernaut: she's not a raging out of control monster like Bruce Banner's Hulk; she's always on, fully aware, and in control. She throws a boulder up in the air and it lands on her head and shatters without even fazing her. Her hips knock two hefty rocks off-screen in milliseconds. And we see her carrying an entire house, a dozen massive stones, and she says she can move churches and flatten diamonds. We don't establish an upper limit of her carrying capacity or invulnerability, but it's pretty high up there. LUISA SMASH
Mirabel - Here we have the crux of the story. Mirabel seems to have no powers at all; every family member seems to gain their powers at a young age by touching a door, and the door then transforms to reveal their room and their gift. I would say that Abuela has no powers because she was already an adult when the house came to be. Mirabel, when she was of age, touched a door and nothing happened, implying a lack of a gift. But at the end, after the house is repaired, she touches the front door of the house, and it transforms for her. To me, this implies that her gift is an integration with the house itself. She 'repairs' the family and 'repairs' the house over the course of the film, and in the end, after the house has been utterly destroyed and the magic lost, it is Mirabel's touch that brings it back. The house recognizes her as its master. And this is no small thing; the house is a magical construct. "Bigger on the inside", as the Doctor would say. The house is sentient and can move parts of itself at will. It contains multiple interdimensional portals, one for each of the family members. Perhaps not unlike Dr. Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum, or Superman's Fortress of Solitude, it responds to the will of its master.
Honestly, I would love a superhero movie with this team.
TL;DR version: MADRIGALS, ASSEMBLE!
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Date: 2022-02-01 05:44 am (UTC)