In one sense, Barbie is already dead, cheerfully doomed to repeat the same pink day, devoid of food, conflict and sex.
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People might go to the movies to escape reality. Yet Barbie and Ariel choose to live in the world their audiences inhabit − and, in doing so, decide to die.
Halle Bailey as Ariel in Disney’s The Little Mermaid.
Courtesy of Disney
In The Little Mermaid, audiences finally get to see Ariel in all her powerful, adventurous glory.
13th century painting of mermaids from a house in Barcelona.
Museu Nacional d'Art de Catalunya, Barcelona
From Ancient Mesopotamia to Shakespeare to Arnhem Land, humans have been telling tails of mermaids for millennia.
A coffin made to resemble a mermaid at a Ga funeral. The Ga people live along the southeast coast of Ghana.
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These literary works ask readers to rethink the histories of these half-human sea creatures and their role in society today.
Edmund Dulac/IMDB.
Disney’s new Black mermaid has been called ‘inauthentic’ – but fairy tales have always been repurposed across cultures. And Hans Christian Andersen’s Little Mermaid was different from Disney’s.
Glen Keane at work.
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The condition challenges the centuries-old idea that all great artists are able to envision what they’re drawing.
Superstition or wishful thinking could trick you into thinking you saw one of these mythical creatures.
AP Photo/Eduardo Munoz Alvarez
Mermaids are not real, but are meaningful to people around the world.
Photo by Laurie Sparham © 2017 Disney Enterprises, Inc.
The latest fairy tale movie from Disney has a dark twist, so it’s right on trend.