Genius Disney Theory Reveals Broken Villains Share A Tragic Origin
A genius Disney theory reveals that the studio's many broken villains may share a tragic origin. Throughout Disney's history, its greatest villains have become almost as iconic as its numerous heroes, if not more so. Yet, as fun as many of them are to watch on screen, some shared similarities between them highlight a common theme in their fall to villainy.
The Walt Disney Company's first feature-length animated film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, became the highest-grossing movie of all time when it was released in 1937, and the many successful films that followed helped cement the company as a leader in the American animation industry. Among their numerous positive contributions to entertainment, Disney also had the unfortunate tendency of painting many of their heroes with the same brush and punishing anyone who fell through the cracks. March of 2022 highlighted these criticisms in and out of its media when Disney employees organized a walk-out protesting the company's support of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation. Although this pressure did convince Disney to make some changes, it could not undo its history of problematic queer representation — or even outright erasure — in its works.
Related: Why LGBTQ+ Representation Is So Important In Media
For the longest time, the only LGBTQ+ characters allowed in movies were buried in subtext. Classic Disney villains were especially subjected to this queer coding as a way to help explain their delinquency. These Disney films infamously excluded the villains both for being the «bad guy» and for not adhering to heteronormative ideals, inspiring a theory that perhaps these villains had more than just their evil-doing in common.
Disney has a long-standing past of queer coding its villains
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