Disney's Dishonor

​By Jade

Note: This article contains a few minor spoilers for the live-action Mulan movie. 

When my family heard that Mulan came out on Disney Plus for everyone to watch the new live-action film, we were all excited. Although I had been skeptical about the idea of having some witch as a villain, I was nonetheless excited after seeing the trailer for the movie.

After the movie, we were severely disappointed. The movie felt disappointing, a lack of substance. As we were watching, my father pointed out frequent inconsistencies in the movie, from the featuring of buildings from the wrong time period and such. 

For me, I was disappointed by the portrayal of the Chinese people. As a Chinese-American, I expected Mulan to be an accurate portrayal of Chinese values, right? However, Disney failed us. The movie, directed by a white woman, was nothing like the Chinese culture I knew.

Instead, it relied on stereotypes. Stereotypes about the Chinese people surrounding luck. A weird emphasis on Qi. Even my parents, my mom who grew up in Hong Kong, and my dad who grew up in Taiwan, were confused by Qi. In fact, my mom even asked what this Qi was! The concept of the witch got even worse than I had ever imagined.

There was a weird emphasis on fate and luck in the film. Although I don’t remember the precise term they frequently used in the film, I really despised how Mulan’s greatness relied on her luck and Qi (life force). Suddenly, it made it seem that Mulan was this great hero who was already powerful because she had some sort of superpower and an incredible amount of luck? It made no sense to me, leaving me feeling frustrated and confused.

The emphasis on honor in the film also disgusted me. Chinese culture doesn’t have the same emphasis on honor as the film. I didn’t understand the purpose of the emphasis of honor in the film and shortly realized that it was just a portrayal of a stereotype, the stereotype of the honorific Chinese person. It was a complete miss portrayal of Chinese culture, leaving me feeling disgusted with the film.

Frankly, I’m surprised that I was even able to sit through the entire film. It felt so miserable, cliche and fake to me. As an Asian-American person, I couldn’t resonate with a film that supposedly represented my background, my culture. Did Disney even consider how the film would affect people’s view on Chinese people?

If they did consider the film’s effect on everyone’s view of the Chinese people, they clearly didn’t think it through. I can’t find a single Asian person who enjoyed watching the film. Through the emphasis of stereotypes and the inability to appeal to the people the film poorly portrays, Mulan is a total flop.

Disney’s Mulan isn’t the only blunder of Disney’s when it comes to representation for the Asian-American community. The reliance on Asian stereotypes in the world of Disney films is disappointing. In A Wrinkle in Time, Charles Wallace (an intelligent white boy in the book series) is portrayed as Asian. Charles Wallace is a character mostly defined by intelligence in the film. Marvel’s first movie, starring an Asian-American superhero, is suspiciously about a master martial artist, fueled Asian stereotypes even further. Sadly, before the release of Shang Chi, the only Asian Marvel superhero I could think of, was Wong…

Artemis Fowl, instead of accurately portraying the Japanese-Russian Butler, chose an African actor instead to portray the loyal servant of Artemis Fowl, reinforcing the stereotype of the obedient African-American, while relegating the character’s time in Japan to be a time of martial arts training instead, making Japan seem like some magical place where people get master martial art skills from.

Disney isn’t the only entity with disappointing Asian representation. J. K. Rowling’ s beloved Harry Potter series featured Cho Chang and the Patil twins, all of whom were portrayed as meek and boring. Cho Chang is perhaps one of the most hated characters in the franchise, with many fans mocking her for being weak. While Rowling introduced Cho as a strong Quidditch player, she suddenly turned her into an absolute wimp and weak person after the events of The Goblet of Fire. The Patil twins were seen as undesirable, being the only options left to bring to the Yule Ball. In Rowling’s most recent work, The Cursed Child features an Asian character who finds the protagonists of the play, only to be killed off a few seconds later. 

Overall, society has a problem with Asian stereotypes, and unfortunately, it's not going away. This is disappointing to the Asian community. Not all Asians are master martial artists. Not all Asians care about honor. Not all Asians believe in feng shui, Qi or a combination of both. Not all Asians are the same. Stop putting us in a box.