We all love fairy tales and their amazing happy endings, especially the Disney ones! The songs are so joyful and they don’t seem to have a care in the world. Or so we think! The endings of fairytales have been twisted by Disney, so that the movies would be a huge hit with the viewers (obviously!). However, we may or may not have heard about the real, deep, and dark endings that these stories really have!
1. The Little Mermaid
Let’s begin with everyone’s favourite, the young and beautiful Ariel! Aah, the delightful and adventurous young lady that she is, Ariel wants to discover the human world. As she swims around with her colourful friends, showing off her sparkly mermaid tail, little does she know about the deep and dark future that awaits her. We all know what happens next, she falls in love with handsome Prince Eric and trades her voice for human legs with the nasty sea witch Ursula! Ariel, however, finally finds her happy ending, where she is turned to human, marries Eric, and lives happily ever after.
WRONG!
The real story goes as follows: The Little Mermaid exchanges her voice for her legs, but however, she would feel like she is walking on sharp knives, and would be in excruciating pain. She is unable to get her kiss from the prince, who marries someone else instead, and she throws herself into the sea. Instead of turning into foam like merfolk, she is turned into an angel.
2. Rapunzel (Tangled)
Rapunzel is a cute little story about a girl who was kidnapped by a witch as a baby, and locked in a tower. It soon ends with her marrying a handsome prince and reuniting with her parents. This is the usual happy ending of all fairytales, BUT it is quite the opposite!
In the real story, Rapunzel is kidnapped as a baby, because her real father was caught stealing Rapunzels for his pregnant wife from the witch’s garden. As Rapunzel grows to be a beautiful damsel, she falls in love with the prince. The witch is livid when she finds out and chops off her long hair. I’m sure you know the famous Rapunzel catchphrase “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair!” As the prince yells it out, the witch lets down the hair. The prince, thinking that it’s Rapunzel, begins to climb her hair as usual. As he nears the top, the witch lets go of the hair, and the prince falls into thorny bushes right near the foot of the tower. The bushes prick him in the eyes (ow!) and cause him to become blind.
3. Mulan
Mulan is the story of a brave young girl who disguises herself as a boy to join the army for her father. She is soon one of the best and most trusted soldiers, and soon defeats the villains. She gets her happy ending with Shang, the hero of the story, as usual.
What actually happened is, the story of Mulan derived from a poem, Ballad of Mulan, ends with Fa Mulan returning home again, after she gets engaged to the general of the army. However, she is discovered to be a female, and the king wants to hire her as his mistress. Mulan does not want to have such a fate and she commits suicide.
4. Alice in Wonderland
Now Alice in Wonderland is a lovely story about a young girl who enters an extraordinary world with all sorts of creatures. But did you know that the character of sweet little Alice, was based off of Alice Liddell, a girl that the author, Lewis Caroll, is suspected to have had pedophilic feelings for! Totally ruined your image of this story now, didn’t it?
Well here you go, I suppose I’ve ruined your childhood. The truth had to come out sometime!
