Subject: Villainy is subjective.
Author:
Posted on: 2014-03-07 15:26:00 UTC
In fact, one could argue that Elsa is a villain who is redeemed, because she freezes Arendelle and runs away, and is so against fixing it that she freezes her sister's heart. Like I said, she is redeemed in the end, but one could argue she was villainous.
But nobody will, because all her actions make sense. She told to hide her power, so she runs away where she can hide. She's afraid of her powers to the point of believing she can't control them, and her fear of herself is misdirected at the world. It's important to note that it wasn't a specific targeted blast that froze Anna's heart, more of an icy wave directed outwards that happened to hit Anna.
So if, say, Elsa ran further when she realized what she'd done, would it have been villainous to leave the kingdom to freeze, or could it be justified the same way as her other actions? What is the event horizon? Is it actions or is it feelings? Because I don't know if her bitterness wouldn't have consumed her - when Anna tells her that Arendelle's in snow, the villainous thing to do would be to act indifferent. That would've been the point where her change became clear. But it didn't - cue amazing musical number. When actually faced with her actions, she couldn't act like her past didn't matter. I like to think she would have had the same reaction even if she had more time to decide everyone else was wrong, but I don't know. Maybe if Anna hadn't gotten there when she did...
I didn't really get a "villainous posturing" vibe off those lines, except for "no right no wrong no rules for me". (You could also argue "I'll rise like the break of dawn".)She's exalted at being able to express the side of herself she'd had to hide, and since she was showing off powerful elemental magic of course she feels in touch with nature. In the line "I am one with the wind and sky", it's about acceptance, feeling like she belongs. This is emphasized in the Spanish translation (which I have been listening to as well), where the line is "El viento me abrazará". That translates to "the wind will embrace me". (Note that I don't actually speak Spanish, I took a few years in school and found this translation on Tumblr. I really like the Spanish translation in general - "Conceal don't feel don't let them know/well now they know" is roughly "You must not open up your heart/well I opened it".)
Sorry, I've spent a lot of time thinking about this. Specifically, falling in love with Loki made me think about what villainy means, and my sister and I are learning the First Time in Forever reprise, and I'm singing Elsa.
Oh, and I hope there's a good sequel. Although I don't think Disney will do the story I want. That story being an idea I saw on Tumblr involving a fire queen and a romance. With said fire queen. To quote Olaf - "The hot and cold are both so intense, put them together it just makes sense!" Although in my headcanon the fire queen melts Olaf because he annoys her. In general she and Elsa hate each other at first, but in the process of fighting some sort of mutual problem have to put their differences aside and learn to respect each other. If I could come up with a more coherent plot than that I'd write it and submit it to Disney.