"The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all."
Hello everyone!
And of course, The Mandalorian has just started streaming again!
If you haven't yet seen the silver bucket head and his adorable green side-kick, I suggest you do, they're basically the best thing to come out of the Star Wars universe by Disney in a long, long time.
But I digress.
BEFORE I went on my Booktober binge here, I wrote up a review about the newly released Mulan. This would be the 2020 one, mind, and, yes, it's about as good as reviews make it, which is to say, not so good.
Since I needed to cleanse my palate after watching that confusion, I went right back to the very first Disney movie I ever saw in cinemas, and I was about nine or ten years old at the time, let me tell you. Nine going on ten, and you see the big expanse of white with the Huns suddenly rushing down, is SOMETHING.
The 1998 version of Mulan is something else.
Meanwhile, let's not dance around the topic and dive right in, shall we?
We take a look at China, its Great Wall, and how there's ... not a lot of soldiers guarding it when the creepiest villain of a lot of old cartoons shows up. Shan Yu is nothing like the largely forgettable Bori Khan, and he's extremely happy that the watch fires have been lit, alerting China that there is an invasion from the north.
The beacons of Minas Tirith! The beacons are lit! Gondor calls for aid!
Ahem. Wrong fandom. Sorry.
In China proper, Mulan is up early making notes onto her skin (as if we all didn't do it every once in a while when taking tests) because she's meeting the matchmaker that day so that she can make an auspicious match and bring honour to her family. But, being late to the preparations, she just BARELY makes it into the lineup, and gets herself in trouble for speaking out without permission right off the bat.
It also doesn't help that her grandma gave her a cricket for luck ... and cricket ruins everything when Mulan tries to put him back in its cage, and sets the matchmaker on fire.
Ashamed and extremely sad, she's wondering when she'll ever be able to bring honour to her family, and how to fit in to this society. Her father has some words of wisdom to impart about that logic, along with cherry blossoms, but the moment is broken when the Imperial messenger rides up to warn everyone about the impending attack.
As each family is supposed to send one man into the army to protect their country, it falls on Mulan's invalid father to do so, which is basically a death sentence, but unlike the live-action movie, here it's handled a bit better because her father knows his place in society, and has tried teaching Mulan hers. None of this enlightened nonsense, because that was just how it WAS back then; you can't impose modern views on a time that looked upon women like commodities to be bartered and sold.
Anyway, terrified of what might happen, Mulan reaches a decision, cuts off her long hair, steals her father's armour, and heads off to fight in his place. And worse, if he reveals her, she will be killed for breaking the law!
Dang.
The ancestors hold an emergency meeting and decide to send the Great Stone Dragon spirit after the wayward girl, but Mushu, the dragon actually doing the waking, somehow manages to break the statue, and decides to go after her himself. Maybe then he won't be disgraced anymore, but a real guardian!
So he introduces himself to Mulan (guardian of lost souls and all that) and then proceeds to give her singularly weird and unhelpful advice about how to act like a man when she enters camp.
Well, you can't have it all.
She's in, anyway, and we get a delightful training montage with Shang, the general's son who is in charge of whipping the boys into shape and all that - and I DARE you not to sing to I'll Make a Man Out of You. There's nothing quite like that song, really.
Mulan eventually finds her footing after figuring out Shang's test with the arrow on top of the tall pillar and starts forging friendships, becoming better and better. At this point, Mushu's worried the war will be over before they get there, though, and he and cricket forge a letter from the general to give to the most annoying Imperial messenger ever (riding up on a panda is something else!).
So Shang & Co take off to deal with the threat, but little do Mushu and Cricket know it's ACTUALLY one until they roll up onto the burnt-out remains of a village ... and what's left of the Imperial army.
Alone and VASTLY outnumbered, Shang's group is then attacked by Shan Yu and his cohort, and that would have been a brave, valiant death for them all if Mulan didn't outthink everybody and cause a snow avalanche which buries Shan Yu's army.
In the process, she manages to rescue Shang while she's at it, but having been wounded by the Hun leader earlier it is finally revealed she's a woman. By law, she should be executed, but Shang spares her life since she saved his. He and the survivors (a handful of them, to be sure) then head into the city for the celebrations while Mulan should go home in disgrace.
Only, Shan Yu has other plans.
He and HIS few survivors head into the city too, and Mulan sees them, prompting her to ride on ahead and try to warn everybody, but because she's a woman - and because she basically betrayed Shang's trust - nobody's willing to listen.
Until Shan Yu ACTUALLY kidnaps the emperor right off the Imperial balcony.
At that point, even Shang has to admit he was wrong, and he joins Mulan and the others where they climb into the palace, disguise themselves as concubines, and kick some serious Hun butt.
Still, while the emperor casually walks away after being freed (dude's got class), it might have gone badly for Shang if Mulan didn't reveal herself as the soldier from the mountain who destroyed Shan Yu's forces, having him go after her. Hatching a plan with Mushu, she leads the Hun to the roof and there, Mushu shoots him off by using fireworks.
Afterwards, Mulan is honoured by the emperor, which forces all of China to bow to her, her ingenuity and skill, and is offered a position on the imperial council. She politely declines, saying she must return to her family, and takes along the emperor's family medallion and Shan Yu's sword.
Presenting these to her father, she explains the Fa family is finally honoured, but he breaks down and says the biggest honour is having Mulan for a daughter.
Grandma would have been happier if Mulan had brought a guy not a sword home, which is Shang's cue as he walks in, incredibly adorable and very sweet, at which point Mulan asks him to stay for dinner, and everyone's happy. Including, yep, you guessed it, the guardians, who restore Mushu to his position, and then we can ALL party!
Unlike the live-action movie, this version of Mulan doesn't try to be something it isn't - it's a fundamentally easy story. A girl takes her father's place in the army to spare his life when invaders threaten China, and she overcomes all obstacles placed in front of her to rise through the ranks and eventually save them all, being granted the highest honours by her emperor after performing daring feats.
And while there's obviously a talking dragon, a lucky cricket, and a sassy horse, that doesn't take away from the reality of the story, far from it! It's magic in its purest form.
Plus, who doesn't like a good song every now and then?
The reason why this Mulan works while the other didn't is because the cartoon doesn't make the main character special - she is, essentially, just a girl, doing things out of love for her family, not because she's seeking honour specifically. That happens by accident along the way while she's doing other things. She's just like you or me, struggling to find her place in the world, and eventually learning that if you think outside the box, you might just get farther than you initially thought you would.
Mulan's strengths are her perseverance (or stubbornness, take your pick), her intelligence, and her ability to think fast under duress. She doesn't balk at danger, but she does have a healthy respect for it, and she proves herself in essentially a man's world because she doesn't back down.
But she doesn't need any special magic to do it. Just her own brain and some help from her friends. And, like Mushu explains, she has unselfish reasons, which is another point in her favour. If you need further proof, look at the position the emperor offers her: a place on his council, meaning he, too, values her intelligence and insight.
It's sad that a cartoon over twenty years old is by far more liberal and empowering than a movie made in a time when that should have been the norm, but this is why it still works today. If you need a strong heroine, look no further than the girl who was willing to die for her family and her country just so her father could be spared. She didn't know jack about military skill or tactics, but she went on to learn, and did it all anyway.
And brought honour to us all in the process.
xx
*images and video not mine
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