DISCLAIMER: I wrote the Toph section during my first watchthrough of ATLA and I didn’t know how well the show handled her character later on, so take my argument with a grain of salt. Also no transphobia allowed ok yay bye ❤️
Off topic comment here, but I notice the background you use (that one in the neon 80’s arcade) is a 3D environment. Given the definition of it I’d like to ask if you like screen recorded a vr environment. If it’s just a real arcade or render I’d understand, but if it’s a vr environment could I please have a link? I’m a casual vr enjoyer. Liked the video btw, you make good video essays
I also really like that Toph's proficiency doesn't make the show "forget" her blindness. She can't see Sokka's art for the Appa missing sign, she puts it on the wall the wrong way around, and she's completely blind in the air because she has nothing to touch to feel the vibrations.
Yeah, that and Toph is still vulnerable to things like firebending, which is a type of bending that she can't sense, and as shown in the episode she's introduced in, Aang is able to knock her off her feet with airbending since she couldn't tell it was coming. Iirc We never really see her fight a waterbender in any way but presumably she'd encounter the same obstacles. Also, there's her inability to sense vibrations through loose sand or ice. Her abilities are most effective against other earthbenders since she can sense where they are AND what they're bending. Really it's no different from how Katara needs a water source to bend; location is important. She's honed her skills but she, like the rest of the Gaang, relies on her friends to watch her back, and she does the same for them. Idk.
‘I know you wrote this socks toph can’t write’ Aang ‘I can’t believe we forgot toph is blind/cant write’ ‘What if we write it from katara and give it to toph’ ‘I think we might have the same problem’. ‘What is this?!’ ‘‘It SOUNDS like a sheet of paper’
I was looking for a comment like this! Toph is still absolutely disabled. And also Toph’s only sense that became exceptional was earth tremor sense and some hearing. And!! This is important. It her earthbending senses were taught to her by badger moles, she didn’t naturally just develop the skill to compensate. Essentially she trained herself to use a tool available to hers She cannot read, she cannot write, she can’t see facial expressions (but she can interpret at emotion through tone or voice and heart beats/breathing). If the characters needed to convey something through hand symbols it would fail.
actually as someone whos been diagnosed with tourettes since i was a child, i can confirm i have to actively stop myself from phasing through walls. good video regardless
Legit tho it is actually the closest thing, hers just looks really extreme, like entirely leaping in a random direction with multiple limbs and everything.
I didnt fully realise that because the cybug ate her fiancé that it would look like him as she gunned it down. Thats a genuinely horrifying implication
Additional horror; if King Candy/Turbo can be taken as an example, it may well have started ACTING like him as well, if it lived long enough to change that far. The entire scenario is indeed horrifying when you think about it deeper, yeah.
Honestly the thought never occurred to me either and that's criminal. We obviously saw how King Candy/Turbo ended up. Even if you argued that Turbo had a strong will and that's why he had consciousness, you could still see a nightmare scenario where this monstrous bug with her husband's face calls her a "dYNaMitE gAl" as it tries to eat her. On an utterly messed up and unfunny little side note, missed opportunity for her to use dynamite instead of a gun to put him down.
As someone with PTSD, I LOVE CALHOUN!!!! She is absolutely amazing rep for PTSD and I would do anything for her and honestly glad she didn't get the superpower so we could have a mix of superhero trope and realistic af rep
I have PTSD too. I'm glad they didn't frame Calhoun as a ***** for having a flashback and getting mad at Felix. It's treated as something Felix needs to apologize to HER for, not the other way around as is too often the case.
My headcanon is between the six years Felix and Calhoun have been married. Felix has been there for Calhoun every step of the process of her recovery from PTSD
@teenageapple3788 Yes! The fandom basically universally agrees that Felix has stayed up and helped Tamora whenever she's woken up from a PTSD night terror. He's definitely a supportive spouse to her, they have a very sweet relationship
as someone with dyslexia and dysorthography I can confirm it can feel like it when you are struggling super hard with trying to form words but I'm also autistic with adhd so it might be a panic attack (edited my spelling mistake of dysorthography, I had planned to look it up but forgot 💀)
The thing with Vanellope's whole Princess design is that she also has that racer design as well, what with how Turbo stole her kart and all, which singles out the princess as just a *part* of her that she doesn't resonate with,partly due to how the circumstances Turbo forced upon her caused her to grow as a person and loose that resonance. She was always so much more than just a princess that I could see it that she was designed by the in-universe developers to be dissatisfied being a princess, and wanting to race instead. There's definitely a degree of Nature vs Nurture going on with her rejection of her monarchy status.
Even better: there were concepts of Vanellope racing in royal attire, but she's not in her pink dress-she's in King Candy's white kart and wearing a pretty standard cream fire suit and helmet with orange and turquoise accents. (You can see her wearing a version of it with no helmet on the side of the console!) So in the end, it's not even a choice between "princess" and "racer," it's a wholesale rejection of a false binary!
Hmm, interesting perspective here as a venelope fictive. I find it very relatable to my own slow drift from what I "am" to defining myself separate from my source. That sense that the person you were created to be just isn't true to the authentic you anymore. Not that I was ever that closely related to my source but when a part shatters under stress sometimes you just need someone to fill that driving/passion and I could do that so yeah idk how to end this rant🤷♀️
I think that makes sense based on what we know about her as a person, and how quickly she drops the princess get-up after, presumably, getting her memory back.
as someone who suffers from combat PTSD, it is less of "teaching her to love again" and more of "helping get over the fear". the fear and sometimes physical pain of losing someone can make you lose trust in anyone but yourself and sometime even make it you dont trust yourself as well
And the "You don't have to do so by yourself". Having Felix helping over the whole movie, and her comrades armed and ready at her wedding. Both relatively healthy responses that also acknowledge her concerns as valid, just sometimes taking to the extreme due to her PTSD. Also good to not have that "she doesn't need help and must do it all herself for girlboss points"
I was physically disciplined my mother the same way Grandma did with flying pan if she ever signed up for autism speak and/or makes me watch music(context: my family is Hispanic and my grandmother hit my mom in the mouth with a flying pan when she was younger for talking back.)
I have severe chronic pain, I'm on a shitload of painkillers as a result As part of this, and how my body has accepted that pain is a normal muscular response, I can bypass the normal human strength response Yes, it hurts my muscles badly for a few days - but I can, if I need to, perform brief acts of exceptional human strength. We love Disability as a pro and a con
@@suruxstrawde8322Please call me a jerk or an idiot if this comes off as rude, but how does that work? I'm studying to go to college as a psych major, and to my knowledge autism is MOSTLY mental, I remember there being some physical stuff, just nothing that i feel could affect pain tolerance.
damn thats actually awesome!!!! how does it feel being Superman hehe (sorry if im like trivialising your experience being disabled!!!! cause like I already hate pain so like people with chronic pain living in it constantly (even with painkillers cause I doubt those are perfect cures) like you are genuinely super strong already!!!)
Monster's Inc's prequel is a great example of "take your disadvantage" and make something better. Mike wanted to be a Scarer. He wanted to make a difference in a "dangerous job" that provides the society with a much needed resource. But Mike can't become a Scarer, but he used his enormous knowledge of the job to become the best support character ever
I love Calhoun! She made child me think "oh I have that too!" and made me realize that I have PTSD. Great representation and a good way to bring awareness of the disorder to younger audiences
The same thing happened to me, Calhoun reminded me of myself many times and I think I may have PTSD. I also like the good representation of this topic and how they even imply that it was not her fault.
I think an under discussed bit is the part before Vanellope threatens to execute her bullies, the bullies realise she’s a princess and start blaming each other for mistreating her with comments like “those were just jokes” and “I was just doing what Taffyta told me to do”. Compared to Turbo these bullies are just puny kids who start grovelling for forgiveness. When Vanellope says she was just kidding about the executions, Taffyta says “You are?” and can’t stop herself from crying even when Vanellope tells her to stop. Much like the audience watching this movie, the heaviness of what has happened in the film weighs on Taffyta and she can’t stop weeping. It humanises her as a reformed bad person, who was manipulated by Turbo as you explained in the other video. Turbo will go down in history as one of the Disney villains who doesn’t get invited to hang out with the other villains because he threatened to kill a disabled little girl - he’d be exiled to the end of the table where Frollo and Cruella sit because Gaston and company would be like “not cool, man”.
Idk, I don't see Gaston as one to talk. The dude left a feeble old man for dead in the snow and manipulated an entire town just to attack someone he deemed a "monster". He doesn't exactly strike me as one to recognize disabilities and treat said person with fairness. Scar also tried to have a child eaten, Jafar tried to kiss a minor, Hades also tried to kill a baby... More people would be getting exiled with that logic.
To be fair to those bullies, their memories were hard altered. Not like what turbo could do to ralph/normal manipulation, seems like game hacking is nearly mind control.
The funny thing is that Cruella, Frollo, and Turbo are all my three favourite Disney movie villains, so you know what? I can accept them having a small space separated from the rest. Makes them look unique in my opinion.
I never asked for this bird to break into my house and tell me about disabilities and queerness in a 2012 Disney movie, but hey, I'm not complaining this kinda slaps.
*Bird flies through window breaking the glass on its way in and starts squawking up a storm* Bird: "SO IN THE 2012 DISNEY ANIMATED MOTION PICTURE WRECK IT RALPH..." Me: *swipes a broom at the bird* "No! Get out! I told you to stop breaking my windows to lecture me on the socio-political implications of kids' movies!"
This movie was WAAAAAY ahead of its time, dude. Thank you for touching on Calhoun and her struggles throughout the film, rarely ever see this explored (she's stupidly underrated cAN WE TALK ABOUT HER MORE PLEASE I'M BEGGING YOU PEOPLE) which goes to show even those who you think are the toughest nuts to crack suffer from their own internal struggles. Coming from someone with close family members diagnosed with PTSD and suffering from similar symptoms myself, Tammy's triggers are pretty damn accurate to how it works but watered down for a kid's movie of course. Certain things remind you of certain things (Dreams, certain words, seeing certain people, going to certain places, etc.). Certain events that'll freak you out, and you just have to live with it. You close yourself off because you're afraid of being hurt again. Having someone there for you who is willing to be gentle with you and respect your boundaries (Like Felix, he backs off when she expresses discomfort at his advances he literally does as he's told when she tells him to "get out" HELL YEAH FELIX WE LOVE A MAN WHO KNOWS THE DEFINITION OF STOP!! GOLD STAR!) can really help. Living with it sucks but at the end of the day you're set on the same path as your peers, you just got a couple of more potholes to look out for is all. Calhoun is a great example of this and she manages to open up to her peers and ultimately has a happy ending! If you compare her to when we were first introduced to her compared to her nearing the end it's like night and day. She's much happier, STILL STRONG and very obviously still battling her trauma (Which those with PTSD will tend to suffer lifelong symptoms), but _happy_. This movie treats those who are different like they're human and that's genuinely heartwarming oughh...
YOUR COMMENT IS ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE HELLO??? Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and experience here!! Cuz honestly this is equally as in depth and a really cool perspective :) ALSO I WISH I COULD TALK MORE ABOUT CALHOUN AND FELIX in a less jokey way bc their relationship legitimately has so much nuance, but I’m not like a hardcore fan of their pairing and I feel like someone more dedicated would do a better job understanding them lmfao. Also Vanellope’s whole “it’s in my code” motif is so touching I swear to god. AGAIN THANK YOU!! ❤❤❤
@@Randomalistic RAGHGHGHGH EATING MY KEYBOA R D 💥💥💥 Thank you for sparking long dead neurons!!! YOU'VE AWAKENED THE BRAINWORMS. Honestly same, they got the silly little fella / tall scary lady dynamic going on and watching their relationship with one another grow was stupidly cute BUT YEAH you need advanced brainworms to pick these two apart like a marriage counselor. AGREED!! And she wasn't wrong! It was always in her code :'''] NO YOU!! THANK YOU!! TAKING YOU THANKING AND THROWING RIGHT BACK AT YOU!!! 💥💥🔥🔥🔥💥🔥❗‼
I only saw the movie once and it’s been years but something that always stuck out to me is how they explicitly say in the film that Calhoun was “programmed with” a tragic backstory. To me at the time this essentially implied that her PTSD was something she was created with, it’s in her base code, rather than something acquired through lived experience once her game was plugged in. And I think the reason it’s stuck with me all those years is because when I first heard it, I thought it was a setup; like ooh, look how intense she is all due to something that never even actually happened, so funny…BUT THEY NEVER DO. Her PTSD is treated with so much respect, even if she’s portrayed as “the comically serious” thanks to her intensity and even if the backstory and flashback themselves are presented somewhat comedically, THE OTHER CHARACTERS always take her seriously and her trauma is never treated as invalid for being programmed into her rather than something she acquired, because regardless of whether she was born with it or whether she became afflicted later IT STILL AFFECTS HER and that isn’t dismissed for jokes. Her programmed PTSD isn’t portrayed as something “all in her head” that only affects her because she “lets it” and that she needs to see for the ruse it is and overcome, or whatever; it’s portrayed as something that literally shapes her entire worldview and influences how she approaches life, affects her daily life in both anticipated and unexpected ways (not just as flashbacks; it’s implied that her whole attitude is partially a coping mechanism), something that her coworkers acknowledge and respect, and the way she handles it is through ACCOMMODATION. And I don’t think I would’ve remembered that line all these years if they had just gone with the joke I thought they were setting up.
@@a.n.9800 COULDN'T HAVE SAID IT BETTER HOLY MOLY!! The movie is a comedy and they handle her the best they can given the genre. No spectacle, no making fun, nothing, she's a character just as important as the other protagonists. She deals with struggles much like any other member of the Core 4. She's constantly on guard for any kinds of danger because much like her backstory displayed (fiance getting eaten by a cybug); danger can happen anytime and anywhere. It's her adapting to an ever-dire environment, even if the environment itself is anything but. She was written with care and the fact none of the other characters ever dismissed her concerns goes to show the writers really _did_ care about her portrayal of PTSD rather than going the stereotypical crazy solider with PTSD goes ballistic after hearing a firework route. Her peers respect her and put her on the same level as anyone else if not higher.
As a teen with both neurodivergence and an involuntary movement disorder, I really love vanellope. Even before the tics developed I was able to see myself in the way she was outcasted and then subsequently accepted as she found the right people as a parallel to the way I was treated in school. It was comforting to have a movie look at me and say "she did it, but it took time, you can do it too"
When I was a kid, I would get absence seizures (which I was bullied for heavily) and seeing Vanellope be bullied for a disability she couldn’t control resonated with a lot as a kid. Though I don’t get them anymore, wreck it Ralph made me feel seen in a way no other animated film had at the time.
I think there's definitely one more aspect of this film you could make an essay on: how Sugar Rush and it's despot ruler are reflections of fascist states and all of the horrors THAT entails. I don't know, it's something I picked up on, particularly in this video (I already watched the other video, and it lightly touches on the point.)
I'm autistic and was misdiagnosed with tics disorder as a kid. The scene where the other racers mock venellope and imitate her glitch was extremely hard to watch for me because it was EXACTLY like how kids would bully me and mock my tics/stims growing up. I genuinely teared up and wanted to look away because of how REAL it felt. It makes me think that one or several of the writers or animators is Neurodivergent because there is no way that didn't come from experience. Also no, I can't phase through walls, still working on that 😢
I'm autistic as well (diagnosed this year) and was bullied a lot because of my stims as well. AUTISTICS UNITE! But, in all honesty, Wreck-It Ralph does a great job at reflecting disabilities through relatable characters.
I love how the perspective of this video is that an anthowpromphic bird cornered me in an arcade and started telling me about the disability representation in wreck it Ralph and I stayed because I like wreck it Ralph
It's true that it's not always the case that a disability has an upside (and that's why I'm kind of glad Calhoun wasn't given PTSD camouflage powers), but I do think Vanellope's teleport power falls right in line with the uplifting fantasy of Disney movies. It's also nice to me that disabled kids who relate to Vanellope get this feel-good message, while disabled adults get a more grounded representation in Calhoun where they can still see her end up loved and accommodated.
as someone who _also_ ambiguously might have ptsd, her whole flashback thing was so real to me. i dont have flashbacks much but there was one time where i had one and it was just... brutal. luckily i didnt almost crash and die, i was just playing toontown lol
The bullying of a disabled person part of the movie was actually surprisingly accurate to life, it made me feel seen in a way I couldn't describe when I first watched wreck it ralph as a kid
Wreck it ralph is a movie I feel doesn't get its flowers for how great it is (possibly because its a 3d animated film children's film about video games and that isnt seen as ""high art""?), so it's nice to see people appreciate and analyze it like this. One thing I'd like to add about the trans coding of Vanellope that I'm surprised you didn't mention (maybe you've mentioned it in your other wreck it ralph video I haven't watched yet but plan to) is that not only does King Candy demonize her in a general sense but specifically in her participation in a SPORT (or sport adjacent?) event in the races. Which I'm sure you're aware its connotations with trans women especially. Even the reasoning he gives to the public is similar to the arguments transphobes use to justify trans exclusion from such events (it's unfair, it's dangerous for the other participants (especially young girls, which most of the racers are in wreck it ralph) ect, ect). Overall a good video! Your passion is very clear which makes it that more fun to watch :)
I 100% agree with your opinion about the video quality and that we recently found a splendid content creator (I will definitely stay after seeing the last 2h magnum opus to look for the future content ) Now, the reason I intended to write this response: I really want to support trans people in their desires as human beings but, making my little research on the subject, I couldn't find valid reasons to let trans people be a natural part of professional sports. If you have arguments, I just want to hear them, widen my perspective because, as I see this situation, very long ago, sports were divided into male and female section for a reason. After decades, even hundreds of years, it was only proven that male and female sections in professional and physical power required sports, the high scores or just world records were always considerably different in male's favor. Please, I will just remind you, I just want answers and explanations where I could be wrong or my knowledge could be false. So please, tell me, how to include Trans people into sport, the way they desire to be, the way they see their GENDER if sport, as I believe I shared my thoughts before correctly, sport has an objectively justified difference between BIOLOGICAL SЕХ in maximum possible performance? How to put them in a different Sех Category if it could, only potentially give them an advantage or disadvantage based on their unique trans situation. I ask you, don't delete that, don't ban me from writing or anything, I just can't think of a objectively great solution there they could play as who they want but also without changing their initial chances at winning or losing more.
@@vlad_ruda4202 Ok so I don't know if responding to this is a good idea but I'll give a response assuming you're not just concern trolling (feel free to delete these comments Randomalistic if you don't want this discussion here). I recommend looking elsewhere than a TH-cam comment sections for answers for topics like this in the future. Some trans people have never gone through their natal puberty because of being put on puberty blockers, and those who have often go through hormone replacement therapy which changes how their body functions in many ways heavily impacting their physical ability. "Biological sex" is more complex than most people realize, and most trans people cannot be neatly placed in the "biologically 100% male" or "biologically 100% female". "Advantage" is such a complex subject when it comes to sport. Some people are born with bodies more adept to certain activities (for example: having larger or smaller breasts can impact drag when swimming), I'm sure you've heard of "athletic body types" before. These differences are typically accepted though. That's just how humans are, and that nothing can truly be perfectly fair in terms of physical ability. Lots of humans like and want to do sport. Trans humans exist, and some want to play sport like everyone else does. If the rules we use for sport right now don't work for or respect them when they are included then the rules have to change even if it can be complicated. For example, categories such as weight classes instead of sex/gender classes could work better depending on the sport. One final note, I acknowledge you're specifically speaking about professional sport but please be aware arguments like this do not end at casual sports, school sports or even sports that do not involve much physical movement (such as car racing, chess, and even esports). Young trans people (usually trans girls) in elementary or high school are sometimes banned from joining the team of their gender or even participating in school sport all together. Legitimizing excluding and misgendering the trans student to their peers through official school policy. Which I think is especially relevant considering the topic of the video.
Folks seriously seem to overlook Toph's connection with the badgermoles, but its kinda huge, IMO. Specifically, her other senses didn't just improve because of her blindness- she learned from the badgermoles to use Earthbending as her *primary* means of sensory input- she is shown to directly take after and mimic them, and she states, "it is the way they interact with the world." Toph is disability rep, sure, but more meaningfully, she's a representation of what it means when someone is able to make full use of an alternative means of accessibility. Really, she's like Mako from Ghost in the Shell, in that regard- she adopted an extreme version of a not uncommon fantastical element in this fiction and out of necessitity, became the best. Because when its your way of interacting with the world, you're probably going to get pretty good at it, you know? There's a certain elevation to be found in specific circumstances where disabled persons are so good at unique skills because they're the only people in the world forced to practice a specific technique or talent that's optional for everyone else. Fiction provides ample opportunities for those scenarios- (My Hero Academia also has that) but I like Toph. She hits a sweet spot, and can actually make blind jokes funny. As someone with a blind dog who has a very Toph personality, I feel it. She's turning 11 in a few days, but is still getting me up at midnight for play. And she gets bored before she gets tired. Its a good problem to have
I also love that Vanellope is clearly neurodivergent. I felt super recognized by her when watching the movie as someone with ADHD who blurts things out impulsively and is so curious it can sometimes annoy others!
Honestly, the fact that Calhoun definitely has PTSD has some pretty intriguing (and maybe fucked up??) implications about the worldbuilding. Like. Let’s not forget that Calhoun’s game was plugged in TWO WEEKS AGO during the events of the movie. Technically, this woman has existed for two weeks. But she has a backstory explicitly “programmed” in. which is like. Kind of insane? Because technically, her trauma and her memories kind of never actually happened if you think about it. She’s someone’s oc and that someone wrote these memories and this trauma that constantly affects her into her. She came to life 14 days ago (wtf) but she has like. What. 30 years worth of experience in her? If this movie leaned more into the implications of video game characters being alive, this could’ve been an extremely interesting idea to dive into (edit: i have realized that it is in fact one week, not two)
Unrelated to the actual topic, but I will say, Toph being blind isn’t the ONLY reason she’s the best earthbender. She was also personally trained by the badgermoles while practically a toddler. So that probably helps her case.
2:00 I am a person who ISN'T TOURETTE but has moderated movement tics and I think it's the closest real life equivalent to Vanellope's glitch. Here's why (based on my own experience): 1- She can't erase them or prevent them to happen at all, BUT she can learn how to use that to her advantage when they do happen 2- The triggers for the glitches are unknown, but it's shown in both movies, the glitch gets worse and harder to control when she's stressed or anxious 3- In the bullying scene, what all the other kids say about her glitch, and how they try to imitate it, at least to me, seem to be comparable to how my classmates mocked my own tics. 4- well... it makes her move her body, often against her own will, in a way that often reminds me to my spasms (against the popular stereotypes, tics aren't always unwilling, sometimes it's more like a need or an impulse for the person, one that they can repress for some seconds but it feels impossible. That's how they work for me at least. Vanellope shows both involuntary (like when she gets stressed or anxious) and voluntary tics (like when she uses them to her own advantage in races), which is the closest thing I've ever seen to myself. Maybe i'm just projecting)
I...tics don't have to be involuntary? I thought they were entirely involuntary, like...I have twitches throughout the day, but they always kind of felt like things I would be able to control if I tried really hard and because I just let them happen voluntarily when I think no one is looking I always just kinda...assumed I was faking them somehow. I don't know *why* I would want to fake something like that when no one's looking, but like...is that really true? 🥺
@@PlotMasterX 2 psychologists and 1 psychiatrist told me these things were tics, I didn't believe it at first because they felt completely voluntary, so my therapist had to explain to me that tics weren't always involuntary, tics could feel like an impulse of moving your body, which you can obey or not (and usually do)
I fidget a lot myself, it's not inherently bad, unless you harm yourself while doing it. I usually blink a bit strongly, move my fingers and bounce my leg when I'm too excited, scared, intrigued etc. And they feel voluntary, but they're really not. :>
@@lanonate yeah, those sound like tics!! Especially the "they feel voluntary but they aren't" part, I struggle with that too. Sometimes I end up getting hurt becuz I fidgeted my neck too hard, and if I'm not physically hurt, it usually scares people away
I think... It's been a while and my memory isn't great, but I've been told tics are not voluntary but smth called, if I'm getting this right, unvoluntary or smth similar, which was just a quicker way of saying you can delay them voluntarily or not try to suppress but cannot completely stop them and don't actually choose to do them. It's like blinking, sure, you can do so consciously and it doesn't really do anything, but try not blinking for more then ten seconds ^^'. Idk, it still sounds complicated however one explains it though, despite not being entirely inexperienced with tics and how they work in my own life... Though I still find it interesting as a concept and a mild inconvenience in practice personally ^^'
I think that king candy also has a bit of trans coding to him too. He sticks his face on everything and has probably lived longer as king candy than turbo. When he does eventually become a cybug he's in love with himself. Sure it's for the amount of power he now holds but he doesn't have to pretend to be benevolent and someone he's not. He can fully embrace who he is in that final form and he loves it. In the final fight you can see just how much he enjoys being a giant monstrous virus. This doesn't make him trans and can be interpreted in many ways but I do think this can be interpreted as a bit of trans-coding.
Yeah, adding to that, even after being outed, he seems to prefer his King Candy persona. Maybe there’s some insecurity about being the boring old simplistic racer nobody cares about anymore.
You're making me wanna rewatch this movie; last time I watched it was from a once-in-a-lifetime 2015 rerun. The way you compare King Candy to an allistic parent who speaks on behalf of their disabled child hits close to home for me as an autistic 20 y/o whose allistic mom speaks on behalf of them.
"Gender dysphoria is not something you need to feel to be trans" Dude I'm gonna cry it is so nice to finally hear another person say that out loud. When I first was finding out I was nonbinary, I mentioned my feelings on my Tumblr. I spent the next few months or more being relentlessly bullied and harrased by truscum who were SO mad that I dared be nonbinary and happy with myself. It was a really rough time and I even lost a friend over it because she agreed with them. These days i have a little dysphoria, but it's less about my body and more about everyone's perceptions. Like, if I could keep my current body but no one ever assumed I was a woman again, I'd be perfectly happy in my body, voice, and all that. Anyway, thank you for saying that it's not required, it's rare for me to hear someone say it so it means a lot to me (a nice note: that friend I lost did send me a message a few years later out of the blue, apologizing for how she had treated me. Even though it had been a long time, I appreciated the apology a lot and totally forgave her since it was clearly genuine. So sometimes people do grow as people and come back to surprise you!)
Oh man 🥺❤ I'm so glad that connected with you specifically. Honestly I wasn't sure of my own identity either until i realized that trans joy is what really matters. I'm also really glad to hear that your friend apologized, that was good of her to do
Y’all when I tell u Vanellope saved my life as a kid (in a self worth way) she legit did. To keep it short my parents hid my autism diagnosis from me three years after my doctor told them. When I was told about it I felt like there was something wrong with my and justified all the bullying I endured as a kid. Then at age 11 I saw Wreck it Ralph and everything changed for the better
With Toph, her power doesn't really come from her blindness, it comes from her earthbending, so it's more so her finding ways to work around a lot of her struggles rather than treating blindness as if it isn't a struggle itself. It's treating earthbending kinda like an accessibility tool.
1:54 I had a fun association I wanted to share. There's a very old video game called Nethack, a rougelike that was first made in 1987. There are certain monsters you can eat which will inflict you with uncontrolled teleporting, called Teleportitis in the community. Teleportitis can be managed with a Ring of Teleport Control. Vanellope may not have needed a ring, but she's not the first video game character to gain control over a disability like that!
im SO obsessed with how expressive your parrot is like omg do u just have a massive folder of expressions or are you drawing them specially because they always fit SO PERFECTLY
OMG THIS IS SO GOOD WHAT!! Its genuinely so rad to hear a new interpretation of a movie I hold very close to me that I've never even rly thought about before ! I will now be rewatching Wreck-It-Ralph for the 200th time with this in my brain :D Extremely excited for the King Candy video !!
I AM EXPLODING!!! 🔥🔥❤️❤️❤️🔥❤️THANK YOU SO MUCH, I’m so glad you found it to be interesting!!!! :] Also YES REWATCH IT!!! & the king candy video will be so messed up.
2:13 For a second I was thinking how it's kinda funny that these little candy people think the girl with tourettes is a criminal because of her condition, but then I remembered that epilepsy used to be considered a symptom of demonic possession.
the bit about making sure disability isn't idealized and that the realities of it are actually shown reminds me of edward elric from fullmetal alchemist. yes he's insanely talented and strong. yes his prosthetics give him the advantage of being able to transmute it and block with it. but it's also screwed him over several times by giving him frostbite when the metal gets cold, malfunctions that need constant maintenance, full on falling to pieces at times, etc. his brother is the same in that even though he can't feel pain, he also can't feel warmth either, yet both of them are loved so strongly by the people around them that they truck through it anyway. plus at the end of the series, even though both of these specific conditions get "cured", they're replaced by others (ed unable to use alchemy like everyone else and al having severe physical weakness) and are STILL loved just the same :')
Calhoun's squad all having their weapons drawn ready to protect their boss, even if it's more for show than in anticipation of a real threat is the wholesome support structure I aspire to have in life. 10/10
I have epilepsy and kinda feel her. I wasn't just teased by kids, but also kicked out of classes because teachers thought I was a threat since I was the first and only student with seizures. They even tried to find an excuse to expel me.😑
9:18 hai i do have ptsd myself, and yeah, the flashbacks can happen at random times, you could be studying at it hits you, you could be having lots of fun and it happens, you could be trying to sleep at it happens, I've honestly had it happen much more times at random that by a trigger (can be either a word or something else like objects)
12:51 - "You can still be cis and defy gender norms" My goofy ass over here being a cis straight woman who got down on one knee to propose to her boyfriend: "Yeah, I see some truth to that"
Oh my goodness this video was stellar I had such a horrible day today, even cried, but this video cheered me right up. Your voice and delivery are so captivating and upbeat, catching my attention right away and keeping me so engaged! You made such amazing points and I literally can’t fully type out how much I loved this video. Thank you so much! I love your little bird sona too, it’s really cute ❤️ hope you have a good day/night
I was today years old when I realized the CyBugs take on the appearance of the people they assimilate, so Calhoun had to merk a CyBug that had her fiance's face....
So I saw it pointed out once that the fact the chapel is a physical place in the game they can all go to makes it extremely likely that players get to see Calhoun's backstory after reaching a certain point int he game, forcing her to relive her trauma every time a player reaches that point. So she's not only managing to heal, she's healing despite being stuck in an environment that's actively retraumatizing her all the time.
To be fair to Vanellope, her glitch can be read as a disability, but it isn't explicitly disability representation, so the writers probably felt more freedom to make it her superpower. Toph is more egregious because she has a real condition (blindness) and is explicitly disabled.
Toph is very good representation, actually. She DOES struggle in places and deals with issues related to her disability. A lot of people with Disabilities have different little skills here and there. People with anxiety can often notice things that others wouldn't, albeit at some cost. People with BPD can be exciting and make friends easily, albeit often unstable Source: I have both
@@katiemorison7969 I'm not disagreeing I'm just saying that Toph leans further into the "disability as a superpower" trope more than Vanellope because her blindness is a real condition and Vanellope's pixlexia is not, so whether Vanellope is disabled or disabled-coded, or neither, is up to personal interpretation while Toph is incontrovertibly disabled
@@katiemorison7969 Yes, Toph is amazing, and it is tragic she is one of the few really good disabled rep characters out there when she's a shining example of how to do it that's been around for years yet no one seems to want to learn for her and it's genuis simplicity. She has all the realistic limitations of being blind, but her superpower that doesn't render it completely moot, and she has a whole character beyond being blind rep. When people think of Toph, they aren't just going to be thinking of her blindness. They're also going to be thinking of how she is a skilled prodigy and an unbelievably tenacious and sassy young girl. She has an identity beyond being blind and is just as much a human and person like the rest of Team Avatar and isn't just a walking blindness advertisment. And the realistic limitations of her blindness aren't treated in any tragic or condescending way. It's just treated as how she lives. She can't see but that's not here nor there. As an spiring author, I really wanna be able to create a physically disabled character as well done as Toph, but I just haven't had any opportunities so far to include a physically disabled character. Just a few with learning disabilities, but that's easy for me as I have a few myself. Maybe one day.
Ehh... I mean, Toph's tremorsense isn't sourced from her blindness. At most her blindness gave her a motive to get so good at it. It's perfectly within other Earthbender's abilities to bend like Toph does. King Bumi does it. Toph teaches Aang how to do it. Toph is just way better at it because she's the greatest Earthbender in the world
11:56 You know, after watching your King Candy video, (Loved it, BTW. Absolutely amazing. It's one of my new go to videos when I feel I have nothing else to watch.) part of me wonders if Vanellope would've still turned out the way she did if Turbo didn't immediately take over Sugar Rush once it released. Cause, quoting what you quoted from the movie's directors, Turbo *immediately* took over Sugar Rush the minute it was plugged in and before anyone else got to play it. Which would, theoretically mean that Vanellope never even got to execute her princess programming to begin with. Plus, is this the only copy of Sugar Rush in the movie's universe? Or are there other Sugar Rush Arcade Cabinets? Would Turbo taking over Sugar Rush have affected EVERY copy of Sugar Rush or just the specific one we focused on in the movie? If there are multiple copies of Sugar Rush, Is this the only version of Vanellope to act like this and go through this character arc while every other version is following their original princess programming, or did Vanellope fundamentally change her coding across every copy? I have *A LOT* of questions that I want answered from this movie that I'm probably never going to get. Still, great video!
I have Tourettes and I love Vanellope. Imperfect representation or not, I love how her glitch doesn’t get cured but does become destigmatized and accepted as part of who she is.
Although I am cisgender, I really liked what you said about how our programming is outside of our control. For me, I can relate that to my experiences of where I grew up, my appearance, and what I can do with my life because of the circumstances in which I was born. I apologize if this isn't phrased well, I guess I just wanna say that, to some capacity, I too can relate to "programming" being out of our control. I just felt like saying that. Great analysis!
I would say the big point with Toph is the fact that, even with her other senses being heightened because of her missing sight, if she had viewed herself as incapable, and had given up on living her life to the fullest, if she had believed what others did about her, it wouldn't have mattered. Those other things became strengths because Toph didn't believe her disability made her less capable, and because she chose to hone her other strengths to make up for her lack of sight.
Oh my god, I just realized. Her husband was EATEN by a Cybug, that’s huge! Turbo was eaten by one and we saw what HE turned into! Imagine having to kill a giant bug with your husbands FACE ON IT!
this after the hyper long king candy analysis is such a delicious dessert i know it was mostly a one off joke comment but slash gen as a trans dude the whole king candy murder bug thing is relatable af. (or maybe i just want to be a massive bug monster idk) that entire analysis reignited so much love that i have for this movie and specifically the KIND of twist that turbo is this dude is FUCKED UP and its probably not a good idea to say i relate to him but i DEFINITELY see where his motivations came from also, i forgot how much this lined up with the kind of internet horror i loved as a kid?? until the tangent about turbo and childhood trauma i didn't even begin to connect "oh i probably loved turbo so much bc my favorite creepypasta was sonic.exe" overall i cant get enough of this kind of analysis and i am SO excited for what you may cook in the future; these two videos have reignited such an insane creative spark in me during a time where everything has been feeling like nothing TLDR you now have a permanent fan because of king candy bug trans allegory
GAAHHH NO UR SO RIGHT BC COSPLAYING AS CYBUG KING CANDY WAS THE MOST GENDER AFFIRMING THING IVE DONE IN MY LIFE. LIKE GODDDD I NEED TO BE HIM anyways haha sorry I’m SO GLAD YOU ENJOYED ❤
as a trans person, I can't explain how much I resonated with Vanellope and her character. people judging her for being who she is, acting like she shouldn't exist. reminds me of when I tried to kinda tell my mother about identifying as a guy, and she just brushed it off as a "phase." like I literally can't explain the SCREAM of joy I made when I saw the princess dress scene.
The "glitch" is similar to tourrettes syndrome, a stress induce neurological disorder that can cause tics, whether it be motor vocal or otherwise, there are also co-morbidities which means no two people with tourrettes have the same exact tics. Co-morbitities include: Dislexia Autism Social anxiety Etc...
I heard from somewhere that Vanellope's glitch is more akin to seizures. And when I see her glitch in the movie, I can't help but notice the similarities from when I saw them in others myself. To note on what I noticed with glitch It can happen randomly for any reason, but an outside factor can also trigger it. Sounds a lot like seizure.
i think venelope's glitch is kinda comparible to cataplexy: -happens when she's feeling intense emotions -loses control of her body and can put her danger at times too bad cataplexy cant make you teleport
okay but felix never called her anything similar to "dynamite gal" ever again, they didnt brush it off as "omg she's healed!! he can call her the name now!!" NO they make sure he only calls her things like "love" or "dear" and i love that fact
@Randomalistic HE MADE SURE THAT AFTER HE GAVE HER A FLASHBACK THAT INSTEAD OF TELLING HER TO GET OVER IT AFTER THEY GOT MARRIED THAT HE MADE SURE TO CHANGE HIS VOCAB TO MAKE SURE HE DOESNT UPSET HER AGAIN AAAAAAAAAA
I just spent a lot of time watching both of your wreck-it-ralph video essays, and I think I will now spend more time trying to delve into the lore and representation of this film that will probably take over my life. thank you for putting the time into making such amazing content, that was truly a fantastic two and half hours of my day
i always related to vanellope as an autistic girl growing up who was bullied for not fitting in, especially when she chose at the end to forgo the dress and title and just be herself. to no one's surprise i am not a girl anymore lol
Very emotional tangent from a person who never sounds real but I have had feelings about Venellope & her 'glitching' for a long time now and this feels like the video to reveal it; As stupid as it sounds, Vanellope's disability was a reality to me. Not being able to fully control my movements as a child was something that was laughed at and mocked instead of looked at or diagnosed. I ran into things and fell down for seemingly no reason. Sometimes I would be standing still and just _collapse._ It was something I spent a lot of time laughing off because, well. Everyone else was laughing. Nobody ever provided a solution for me. They just watched as I leaned against walls and sat down constantly, ignored how I sometimes couldn't even keep myself upright while _sitting down,_ and told me 'someone will find it attractive someday.' Which. Eugh. Granted, Vanellope's method is technically very general advice, but I took it _very literally._ This stupid-ass movie showed me an arguably stupider solution to a problem that, to most people, seems like a superpower in a movie and not real applicable advice to anything. I watched Wreck-It-Ralph and, upon seeing Vanellope's stuttery movements, I realized something. I can't do anything about how my sitting still goes. But if I just _fling myself in the direction I want to go, disregarding balance or bodily movement?_ ... The weird thing is. Is that _flinging myself in directions?_ It WORKS. It's become so ingrained in my movements that I can't even imagine living my life without doing so. Well. I _can_ suppose that it would probably end up with me on the ground more frequently. But ah, I'm not about to test that.
The disability as a superpower trope is interesting to me as an autistic person. I mean. Yes. My disability’ sucks. But i also wouldn’t become neurotypical if i was hypothetically offered the chance. it’s part of my identity and as a matter of fact, it actually DOES do me favors sometimes. My brain just works differently, but not all of those differences are worse. I know the whole “smart/talented autistic person/savant” thing is cliche and whatever but like. M. Yknow. I kinda do be. There’s things i excel at some things abnormally higher than the average person in a way I’ve only seen in fellow autistic people. There’s also things i fucking suck at abnormally more than the average person in a way I’ve only seen in fellow autistic people. But it’s a part of who i am, and im happy with that
Cool video. I love the comparison to Toph, how you validate Calhoun's feelings, and I find the trans allegory interesting. I hope your channel takes off more every day, you deserve it!
Before I watch this, I want to quickly comment saying that as a kid with terrible ADHD and symptoms of autism, Vanellope was SUCH good representation for that in my opinion. Yes, dyslexia is referenced in the movie I think by her in the bully scene. But the ways she’s bullied, the ways the glitch works, it feels like a clear allegory for many forms of neurodivergence Edit: When it comes to ADHD and autism, I feel like Vanellope works best because those disorders CAN benefit you but only in very specific circumstances. They can sometimes change how you’re visually perceived based on your physical behaviors (IE “glitching”) I could go on a whole rant listing the similarities but I won’t lol. But I will say my biggest gripe was making her capable of controlling it. It would’ve been way cooler imo if she just got really determined and lucky when she glitched away from Turbo
Subscribed. The algorithm led me to this channel and I appreciate it. 😊 I think what I really like about Vanellope learning to control her glitch is just that, she learned to control it. She had put a lot of effort into it, and we get to see her fail several times before she succeeds. And ability to teleport is a common ability in video games. So we can see Vanellope developing this as reasonabe racer ability. The other thing I'd note is that Vanellope is shown as a racer on the cabinet. While she looks cleaner and presumably wealthier then her homeless glitch persona, she is wearing a jumpsuit and so could probably be described as tomboyish. She isn't just the ruler who referees the races, she competes in them directly as an equal. So I find it interesting that Vanellope rejects her princess persona, and returns to her scruffy tomboy appearance. She was literally shaped by Turbo's meddling with her code, and she embraces that, instead of just returning to the role she was programmed for. Just because the game is reset, she isn't willing to forget what she went through and lose what it taught her. I have often wondered what it would be like if Vanellope were to meet a verson of herself from the unaltered game. She would probably share some similarities with her "original version", but our Vanellope exaggerates those traits. For instance, the original Vanellope might be competitive, but very proper and polite. She could be much more reserved and less excitable.
On the subject of Felix, I could make a joke about "I can fix her", but I don't think that was ever his intention. My guess is that he was drawn to her strength and independence but he may have empathetically seen that her persona was a mask. Felix is really a very passive person, he does not fight against Ralph or punish him for the damage he causes, he just follows around behind him and fixes it. He doesn't even toss Ralph off the building, he just watches passively while the Nicelanders do it. And it's established that he is a very caring person. He tries to make peace between Ralph and the Nicelanders, and when he realizes how they've been treating Ralph his whole attitude towards him changes. Even Felix is annoyed that "Everything I touch gets fixed" but that is really his role. Calhoun gets a sense of security and support that she desperately needs, and Felix gets the chance to be more adventurous and confident in himself.
Personally I feel like the fact that the movie never actually labels or even directly states Sergeant Valhoun's issues is a great strength. I have ASD and I've always felt that giving neurodivergencies and psychological conditions like this hard names and definitons makes them feel like external setbacks rather than being part of who you are. You never need to give Sergeant Valhoun's issues a label because you can easily understand them without one. Naming the issue would only dumb down the story, patronize the character, and make the problem feel less like an organic result of a tragic event.
as someone with (a form of) ptsd i can confirm i can also hide and camouflage perfectly (shut everything off and go to bed) when i have an episode type moment
DISCLAIMER: I wrote the Toph section during my first watchthrough of ATLA and I didn’t know how well the show handled her character later on, so take my argument with a grain of salt. Also no transphobia allowed ok yay bye ❤️
"Transphobic comment" lol
(don't cancel me im scared)
@@xanderestes6023*trans offended gasp*
(you’re good)
Oh i thought you meant in the title that being queer was disabled 😭
@@xanderestes6023 gasps in trans masc
(You’re fine i thought your comment was funny)
Off topic comment here, but I notice the background you use (that one in the neon 80’s arcade) is a 3D environment. Given the definition of it I’d like to ask if you like screen recorded a vr environment.
If it’s just a real arcade or render I’d understand, but if it’s a vr environment could I please have a link? I’m a casual vr enjoyer.
Liked the video btw, you make good video essays
I also really like that Toph's proficiency doesn't make the show "forget" her blindness. She can't see Sokka's art for the Appa missing sign, she puts it on the wall the wrong way around, and she's completely blind in the air because she has nothing to touch to feel the vibrations.
Yeah, that and Toph is still vulnerable to things like firebending, which is a type of bending that she can't sense, and as shown in the episode she's introduced in, Aang is able to knock her off her feet with airbending since she couldn't tell it was coming. Iirc We never really see her fight a waterbender in any way but presumably she'd encounter the same obstacles. Also, there's her inability to sense vibrations through loose sand or ice. Her abilities are most effective against other earthbenders since she can sense where they are AND what they're bending. Really it's no different from how Katara needs a water source to bend; location is important. She's honed her skills but she, like the rest of the Gaang, relies on her friends to watch her back, and she does the same for them. Idk.
‘I know you wrote this socks toph can’t write’
Aang ‘I can’t believe we forgot toph is blind/cant write’
‘What if we write it from katara and give it to toph’
‘I think we might have the same problem’.
‘What is this?!’
‘‘It SOUNDS like a sheet of paper’
same with needing assistance while on wood/carpet!!
I was looking for a comment like this! Toph is still absolutely disabled.
And also Toph’s only sense that became exceptional was earth tremor sense and some hearing. And!! This is important. It her earthbending senses were taught to her by badger moles, she didn’t naturally just develop the skill to compensate. Essentially she trained herself to use a tool available to hers
She cannot read, she cannot write, she can’t see facial expressions (but she can interpret at emotion through tone or voice and heart beats/breathing). If the characters needed to convey something through hand symbols it would fail.
@@bavard100 wasn't all of that in the same episode?
actually as someone whos been diagnosed with tourettes since i was a child, i can confirm i have to actively stop myself from phasing through walls. good video regardless
I have tics and i hate waking up inside the floor at 3am cus i glitched trough it /j 🙄
Legit tho it is actually the closest thing, hers just looks really extreme, like entirely leaping in a random direction with multiple limbs and everything.
relatable
Me too me too
I have tics and hate my head accidentally clipping through my neck. :/
Calhoun and Felix make me think of the "bride and the ugly ass groom" meme and i love it
Heyyy hes not ugly >:(
@@VictoriaBarrios96 lmao I'm not calling Felix ugly I'm just referencing the meme
I hope someone drew it lol
@@Lemonnitenite lmao same
“He makes me laugh” ahh relationship
felix and calhoun are peak "girlboss x just some guy" and i love it
Felix is my favorite girlboss
@@TheThing4444LMAO
@@TheThing4444+
You’re so real for that
girlboss and malewife (one of the best ship dynamics)
Also has that quality tall girl x short guy dynamic that i also love, like Roger & Jessica Rabbit, and Crash and Tawna Bandicoot
I didnt fully realise that because the cybug ate her fiancé that it would look like him as she gunned it down. Thats a genuinely horrifying implication
Wow what the fuuuck
*holy shit*
That is so dark
Additional horror; if King Candy/Turbo can be taken as an example, it may well have started ACTING like him as well, if it lived long enough to change that far. The entire scenario is indeed horrifying when you think about it deeper, yeah.
Honestly the thought never occurred to me either and that's criminal. We obviously saw how King Candy/Turbo ended up. Even if you argued that Turbo had a strong will and that's why he had consciousness, you could still see a nightmare scenario where this monstrous bug with her husband's face calls her a "dYNaMitE gAl" as it tries to eat her.
On an utterly messed up and unfunny little side note, missed opportunity for her to use dynamite instead of a gun to put him down.
This bird broke into my house and started talking about wreck it ralph. please help, im actually interested.
Hahahaha! no one will save you
being held hostage and I don't really mind. This is concerning (and incredibly interesting) :,)
WHENS MY TURN I LOVE WRECK IT RALPH
You too?
i don't think you want my help...
"Look at the bad bitch i pulled by been autistic! :D" - Felix
I LOVE THIS COMMENT!
“The autism scores him bitches”
-Luigi, 2024
I love this except he would NEVER say bitch that man doesn't say curses stronger than a darn and that's why we love him
@@strangeandinteresting yeah Felix would say something like "sweet gal"
I love FELIXX
As someone with PTSD, I LOVE CALHOUN!!!! She is absolutely amazing rep for PTSD and I would do anything for her and honestly glad she didn't get the superpower so we could have a mix of superhero trope and realistic af rep
Yes
(Thanks for having the ability to phrase things)
I have PTSD too. I'm glad they didn't frame Calhoun as a ***** for having a flashback and getting mad at Felix. It's treated as something Felix needs to apologize to HER for, not the other way around as is too often the case.
My headcanon is between the six years Felix and Calhoun have been married. Felix has been there for Calhoun every step of the process of her recovery from PTSD
I'm glad she doesn't have a superpower. She gets to show off her pure badassery without any "help" from powers.
@teenageapple3788 Yes! The fandom basically universally agrees that Felix has stayed up and helped Tamora whenever she's woken up from a PTSD night terror. He's definitely a supportive spouse to her, they have a very sweet relationship
My dad has Dyslexia, and I can confirm that he cannot phase in-and-out of existence (to my knowledge).
If he could would you know about it...
As somebody with tourrettes i can confirm i do phase in-and-out of existence
as someone with dyslexia and dysorthography I can confirm it can feel like it when you are struggling super hard with trying to form words
but I'm also autistic with adhd so it might be a panic attack
(edited my spelling mistake of dysorthography, I had planned to look it up but forgot 💀)
As a person with dysgraphia I can confirm I can phase in and out of existence
As a dyslexic person I can also confirm that
The thing with Vanellope's whole Princess design is that she also has that racer design as well, what with how Turbo stole her kart and all, which singles out the princess as just a *part* of her that she doesn't resonate with,partly due to how the circumstances Turbo forced upon her caused her to grow as a person and loose that resonance. She was always so much more than just a princess that I could see it that she was designed by the in-universe developers to be dissatisfied being a princess, and wanting to race instead. There's definitely a degree of Nature vs Nurture going on with her rejection of her monarchy status.
Even better: there were concepts of Vanellope racing in royal attire, but she's not in her pink dress-she's in King Candy's white kart and wearing a pretty standard cream fire suit and helmet with orange and turquoise accents. (You can see her wearing a version of it with no helmet on the side of the console!) So in the end, it's not even a choice between "princess" and "racer," it's a wholesale rejection of a false binary!
Hmm, interesting perspective here as a venelope fictive. I find it very relatable to my own slow drift from what I "am" to defining myself separate from my source. That sense that the person you were created to be just isn't true to the authentic you anymore.
Not that I was ever that closely related to my source but when a part shatters under stress sometimes you just need someone to fill that driving/passion and I could do that so yeah idk how to end this rant🤷♀️
I think that makes sense based on what we know about her as a person, and how quickly she drops the princess get-up after, presumably, getting her memory back.
@@solsystem1342 Call me curious but how old are you?
@@Liam_PhoenixDon't ask for people's ages. It's just weird
as someone who suffers from combat PTSD, it is less of "teaching her to love again"
and more of "helping get over the fear". the fear and sometimes physical pain of losing someone can make you lose trust in anyone but yourself and sometime even make it you dont trust yourself as well
And the "You don't have to do so by yourself". Having Felix helping over the whole movie, and her comrades armed and ready at her wedding. Both relatively healthy responses that also acknowledge her concerns as valid, just sometimes taking to the extreme due to her PTSD. Also good to not have that "she doesn't need help and must do it all herself for girlboss points"
I made the autism speak joke like seconds before it slightly appeared on the screen omg
SAME BRAIN CELL🤝
I was physically disciplined my mother the same way Grandma did with flying pan if she ever signed up for autism speak and/or makes me watch music(context: my family is Hispanic and my grandmother hit my mom in the mouth with a flying pan when she was younger for talking back.)
I have severe chronic pain, I'm on a shitload of painkillers as a result
As part of this, and how my body has accepted that pain is a normal muscular response, I can bypass the normal human strength response
Yes, it hurts my muscles badly for a few days - but I can, if I need to, perform brief acts of exceptional human strength.
We love Disability as a pro and a con
Yooooo, similar thing here with autism, if I want I can force my muscles so incredibly far they deplete their energy and can bruise or cramp.
@@suruxstrawde8322Please call me a jerk or an idiot if this comes off as rude, but how does that work? I'm studying to go to college as a psych major, and to my knowledge autism is MOSTLY mental, I remember there being some physical stuff, just nothing that i feel could affect pain tolerance.
i have cerebral palsy so i can't do magic strength...but same
@@suruxstrawde8322 I have ADHD and I've noticed that I can tense my muscles so hard it feels like my bones hurt under them, is that similar?
damn thats actually awesome!!!! how does it feel being Superman hehe (sorry if im like trivialising your experience being disabled!!!! cause like I already hate pain so like people with chronic pain living in it constantly (even with painkillers cause I doubt those are perfect cures) like you are genuinely super strong already!!!)
Monster's Inc's prequel is a great example of "take your disadvantage" and make something better.
Mike wanted to be a Scarer. He wanted to make a difference in a "dangerous job" that provides the society with a much needed resource. But Mike can't become a Scarer, but he used his enormous knowledge of the job to become the best support character ever
Monsters University for that reason is yet another criminally underrated and surprisingly amazing movie. UGHHH!!!!❤❤❤
So how long till we get a two hour breakdown on it?
Damn another good movie. What has Disney done to itself??
@@annf2220It’s done nothing. What are you talking about?
@@quangamershyguyyz7166Wish.
I love Calhoun! She made child me think "oh I have that too!" and made me realize that I have PTSD. Great representation and a good way to bring awareness of the disorder to younger audiences
The same thing happened to me, Calhoun reminded me of myself many times and I think I may have PTSD. I also like the good representation of this topic and how they even imply that it was not her fault.
As someone who has C-PTSD, the bit where you said "it's not her fault" genuinely warmed my heart. thank you.
Felix and Calhoun are so “doom guy and Isabel”. I’m choosing to believe that they were memed as a couple in universe and then the devs made it canon
They’re only together because Felix needed a reference for his height
Which of course doesn’t make it any less funny
Down to "The enemy of my game brutally murdered the one person I loved, so now I'm the boss level"
Dad the fucking bird is talking about wreck-it Ralph again
THAT FUCGJIN BIRD THAT I HATE
I want that bird if you dont want it :D
We'll be having macaroni
@@Randomalisticthat fuckin bird that i hate! that fuckin bird that i hate! THAT FUCKIN BIRD THAT I HATE!
MA! THERE'S A WEIRD FUCKIGN BIRD OUTSIDE! *MA!*
I think an under discussed bit is the part before Vanellope threatens to execute her bullies, the bullies realise she’s a princess and start blaming each other for mistreating her with comments like “those were just jokes” and “I was just doing what Taffyta told me to do”. Compared to Turbo these bullies are just puny kids who start grovelling for forgiveness. When Vanellope says she was just kidding about the executions, Taffyta says “You are?” and can’t stop herself from crying even when Vanellope tells her to stop. Much like the audience watching this movie, the heaviness of what has happened in the film weighs on Taffyta and she can’t stop weeping. It humanises her as a reformed bad person, who was manipulated by Turbo as you explained in the other video. Turbo will go down in history as one of the Disney villains who doesn’t get invited to hang out with the other villains because he threatened to kill a disabled little girl - he’d be exiled to the end of the table where Frollo and Cruella sit because Gaston and company would be like “not cool, man”.
@@JadeCryptOfWonders ok but Frollo tried to drown Quasimodo as a baby he’s not one to talk LOL
Idk, I don't see Gaston as one to talk. The dude left a feeble old man for dead in the snow and manipulated an entire town just to attack someone he deemed a "monster". He doesn't exactly strike me as one to recognize disabilities and treat said person with fairness. Scar also tried to have a child eaten, Jafar tried to kiss a minor, Hades also tried to kill a baby... More people would be getting exiled with that logic.
ironically enough i think cruella has a better chance of respecting people's disabilities than gaston. it's her sister you really have to worry about
To be fair to those bullies, their memories were hard altered. Not like what turbo could do to ralph/normal manipulation, seems like game hacking is nearly mind control.
The funny thing is that Cruella, Frollo, and Turbo are all my three favourite Disney movie villains, so you know what? I can accept them having a small space separated from the rest. Makes them look unique in my opinion.
I never asked for this bird to break into my house and tell me about disabilities and queerness in a 2012 Disney movie, but hey, I'm not complaining this kinda slaps.
*Bird flies through window breaking the glass on its way in and starts squawking up a storm*
Bird: "SO IN THE 2012 DISNEY ANIMATED MOTION PICTURE WRECK IT RALPH..."
Me: *swipes a broom at the bird* "No! Get out! I told you to stop breaking my windows to lecture me on the socio-political implications of kids' movies!"
This movie was WAAAAAY ahead of its time, dude. Thank you for touching on Calhoun and her struggles throughout the film, rarely ever see this explored (she's stupidly underrated cAN WE TALK ABOUT HER MORE PLEASE I'M BEGGING YOU PEOPLE) which goes to show even those who you think are the toughest nuts to crack suffer from their own internal struggles.
Coming from someone with close family members diagnosed with PTSD and suffering from similar symptoms myself, Tammy's triggers are pretty damn accurate to how it works but watered down for a kid's movie of course. Certain things remind you of certain things (Dreams, certain words, seeing certain people, going to certain places, etc.). Certain events that'll freak you out, and you just have to live with it. You close yourself off because you're afraid of being hurt again. Having someone there for you who is willing to be gentle with you and respect your boundaries (Like Felix, he backs off when she expresses discomfort at his advances he literally does as he's told when she tells him to "get out" HELL YEAH FELIX WE LOVE A MAN WHO KNOWS THE DEFINITION OF STOP!! GOLD STAR!) can really help. Living with it sucks but at the end of the day you're set on the same path as your peers, you just got a couple of more potholes to look out for is all. Calhoun is a great example of this and she manages to open up to her peers and ultimately has a happy ending! If you compare her to when we were first introduced to her compared to her nearing the end it's like night and day. She's much happier, STILL STRONG and very obviously still battling her trauma (Which those with PTSD will tend to suffer lifelong symptoms), but _happy_. This movie treats those who are different like they're human and that's genuinely heartwarming oughh...
YOUR COMMENT IS ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE HELLO??? Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and experience here!! Cuz honestly this is equally as in depth and a really cool perspective :) ALSO I WISH I COULD TALK MORE ABOUT CALHOUN AND FELIX in a less jokey way bc their relationship legitimately has so much nuance, but I’m not like a hardcore fan of their pairing and I feel like someone more dedicated would do a better job understanding them lmfao. Also Vanellope’s whole “it’s in my code” motif is so touching I swear to god. AGAIN THANK YOU!! ❤❤❤
@@Randomalistic RAGHGHGHGH EATING MY KEYBOA R D 💥💥💥 Thank you for sparking long dead neurons!!! YOU'VE AWAKENED THE BRAINWORMS. Honestly same, they got the silly little fella / tall scary lady dynamic going on and watching their relationship with one another grow was stupidly cute BUT YEAH you need advanced brainworms to pick these two apart like a marriage counselor. AGREED!! And she wasn't wrong! It was always in her code :'''] NO YOU!! THANK YOU!! TAKING YOU THANKING AND THROWING RIGHT BACK AT YOU!!! 💥💥🔥🔥🔥💥🔥❗‼
I only saw the movie once and it’s been years but something that always stuck out to me is how they explicitly say in the film that Calhoun was “programmed with” a tragic backstory. To me at the time this essentially implied that her PTSD was something she was created with, it’s in her base code, rather than something acquired through lived experience once her game was plugged in. And I think the reason it’s stuck with me all those years is because when I first heard it, I thought it was a setup; like ooh, look how intense she is all due to something that never even actually happened, so funny…BUT THEY NEVER DO. Her PTSD is treated with so much respect, even if she’s portrayed as “the comically serious” thanks to her intensity and even if the backstory and flashback themselves are presented somewhat comedically, THE OTHER CHARACTERS always take her seriously and her trauma is never treated as invalid for being programmed into her rather than something she acquired, because regardless of whether she was born with it or whether she became afflicted later IT STILL AFFECTS HER and that isn’t dismissed for jokes.
Her programmed PTSD isn’t portrayed as something “all in her head” that only affects her because she “lets it” and that she needs to see for the ruse it is and overcome, or whatever; it’s portrayed as something that literally shapes her entire worldview and influences how she approaches life, affects her daily life in both anticipated and unexpected ways (not just as flashbacks; it’s implied that her whole attitude is partially a coping mechanism), something that her coworkers acknowledge and respect, and the way she handles it is through ACCOMMODATION. And I don’t think I would’ve remembered that line all these years if they had just gone with the joke I thought they were setting up.
@@a.n.9800 COULDN'T HAVE SAID IT BETTER HOLY MOLY!! The movie is a comedy and they handle her the best they can given the genre. No spectacle, no making fun, nothing, she's a character just as important as the other protagonists. She deals with struggles much like any other member of the Core 4. She's constantly on guard for any kinds of danger because much like her backstory displayed (fiance getting eaten by a cybug); danger can happen anytime and anywhere. It's her adapting to an ever-dire environment, even if the environment itself is anything but.
She was written with care and the fact none of the other characters ever dismissed her concerns goes to show the writers really _did_ care about her portrayal of PTSD rather than going the stereotypical crazy solider with PTSD goes ballistic after hearing a firework route. Her peers respect her and put her on the same level as anyone else if not higher.
*youre telling me vanellope transed my gender?*
As a teen with both neurodivergence and an involuntary movement disorder, I really love vanellope. Even before the tics developed I was able to see myself in the way she was outcasted and then subsequently accepted as she found the right people as a parallel to the way I was treated in school. It was comforting to have a movie look at me and say "she did it, but it took time, you can do it too"
When I was a kid, I would get absence seizures (which I was bullied for heavily) and seeing Vanellope be bullied for a disability she couldn’t control resonated with a lot as a kid. Though I don’t get them anymore, wreck it Ralph made me feel seen in a way no other animated film had at the time.
I think there's definitely one more aspect of this film you could make an essay on: how Sugar Rush and it's despot ruler are reflections of fascist states and all of the horrors THAT entails. I don't know, it's something I picked up on, particularly in this video (I already watched the other video, and it lightly touches on the point.)
THIS IS A GREAT THING TO DIVE INTO. I would have to do a bunch more research but YES
Yeah looking again his policies do suggest a eugenics program
@@Randomalisticyay
:D
What eugenics program?
I'm autistic and was misdiagnosed with tics disorder as a kid. The scene where the other racers mock venellope and imitate her glitch was extremely hard to watch for me because it was EXACTLY like how kids would bully me and mock my tics/stims growing up. I genuinely teared up and wanted to look away because of how REAL it felt. It makes me think that one or several of the writers or animators is Neurodivergent because there is no way that didn't come from experience. Also no, I can't phase through walls, still working on that 😢
I'm autistic as well (diagnosed this year) and was bullied a lot because of my stims as well. AUTISTICS UNITE! But, in all honesty, Wreck-It Ralph does a great job at reflecting disabilities through relatable characters.
Shout out to Calhouns soldiers for respecting her, supporting her, and being ready to throw down for her
I love how the perspective of this video is that an anthowpromphic bird cornered me in an arcade and started telling me about the disability representation in wreck it Ralph and I stayed because I like wreck it Ralph
It's true that it's not always the case that a disability has an upside (and that's why I'm kind of glad Calhoun wasn't given PTSD camouflage powers), but I do think Vanellope's teleport power falls right in line with the uplifting fantasy of Disney movies.
It's also nice to me that disabled kids who relate to Vanellope get this feel-good message, while disabled adults get a more grounded representation in Calhoun where they can still see her end up loved and accommodated.
@@AnalogSystem This is a good point!
i'd kill for felix video essay like i don't even care what its about as long as it involves felix and i will loop it all day and fall asleep to it
@@mason.topaz_ I PROMISE THERE ARE A FEW FELIX CRUMBS IN MY UPCOMING VIDEO 🧢🔨 STAY STRONG OUT THERE
oh buddy did they just drop the video for you, 10/10 new upload
Hey same hat!🎉
Oh hey look it's Mannequin_Mark
WIR FAN WHOS A COPINGLINK......ur so cool omfg can we be friends
JUST REALIZE CALHOUN PULLED THAT GUN OUT FROM UNDER HER WEDDING DRESS GIRLLLLLLL WHERE WERE YOU KEEPING IT UNDER THERE WHATTTTTTT
Inventory
as someone who _also_ ambiguously might have ptsd, her whole flashback thing was so real to me. i dont have flashbacks much but there was one time where i had one and it was just... brutal. luckily i didnt almost crash and die, i was just playing toontown lol
2:34 Oh my God. King Candy is Autism Speaks.
Autism Speaks…?
EWW
The bullying of a disabled person part of the movie was actually surprisingly accurate to life, it made me feel seen in a way I couldn't describe when I first watched wreck it ralph as a kid
Wreck it ralph is a movie I feel doesn't get its flowers for how great it is (possibly because its a 3d animated film children's film about video games and that isnt seen as ""high art""?), so it's nice to see people appreciate and analyze it like this.
One thing I'd like to add about the trans coding of Vanellope that I'm surprised you didn't mention (maybe you've mentioned it in your other wreck it ralph video I haven't watched yet but plan to) is that not only does King Candy demonize her in a general sense but specifically in her participation in a SPORT (or sport adjacent?) event in the races. Which I'm sure you're aware its connotations with trans women especially. Even the reasoning he gives to the public is similar to the arguments transphobes use to justify trans exclusion from such events (it's unfair, it's dangerous for the other participants (especially young girls, which most of the racers are in wreck it ralph) ect, ect).
Overall a good video! Your passion is very clear which makes it that more fun to watch :)
OH MY GOSH YOU'RE RIGHT I DIDNT EVEN REALIZE THAT??? HELLO. THANK YOU FOR UR COMMENT
@@RandomalisticNO PROBLEM!! I cant believe King Candy is ableist and transphobic wtf
I 100% agree with your opinion about the video quality and that we recently found a splendid content creator (I will definitely stay after seeing the last 2h magnum opus to look for the future content )
Now, the reason I intended to write this response: I really want to support trans people in their desires as human beings but, making my little research on the subject, I couldn't find valid reasons to let trans people be a natural part of professional sports. If you have arguments, I just want to hear them, widen my perspective because, as I see this situation, very long ago, sports were divided into male and female section for a reason. After decades, even hundreds of years, it was only proven that male and female sections in professional and physical power required sports, the high scores or just world records were always considerably different in male's favor.
Please, I will just remind you, I just want answers and explanations where I could be wrong or my knowledge could be false. So please, tell me, how to include Trans people into sport, the way they desire to be, the way they see their GENDER if sport, as I believe I shared my thoughts before correctly, sport has an objectively justified difference between BIOLOGICAL SЕХ in maximum possible performance? How to put them in a different Sех Category if it could, only potentially give them an advantage or disadvantage based on their unique trans situation.
I ask you, don't delete that, don't ban me from writing or anything, I just can't think of a objectively great solution there they could play as who they want but also without changing their initial chances at winning or losing more.
@@vlad_ruda4202 Ok so I don't know if responding to this is a good idea but I'll give a response assuming you're not just concern trolling (feel free to delete these comments Randomalistic if you don't want this discussion here). I recommend looking elsewhere than a TH-cam comment sections for answers for topics like this in the future.
Some trans people have never gone through their natal puberty because of being put on puberty blockers, and those who have often go through hormone replacement therapy which changes how their body functions in many ways heavily impacting their physical ability. "Biological sex" is more complex than most people realize, and most trans people cannot be neatly placed in the "biologically 100% male" or "biologically 100% female".
"Advantage" is such a complex subject when it comes to sport. Some people are born with bodies more adept to certain activities (for example: having larger or smaller breasts can impact drag when swimming), I'm sure you've heard of "athletic body types" before. These differences are typically accepted though. That's just how humans are, and that nothing can truly be perfectly fair in terms of physical ability.
Lots of humans like and want to do sport. Trans humans exist, and some want to play sport like everyone else does. If the rules we use for sport right now don't work for or respect them when they are included then the rules have to change even if it can be complicated. For example, categories such as weight classes instead of sex/gender classes could work better depending on the sport.
One final note, I acknowledge you're specifically speaking about professional sport but please be aware arguments like this do not end at casual sports, school sports or even sports that do not involve much physical movement (such as car racing, chess, and even esports). Young trans people (usually trans girls) in elementary or high school are sometimes banned from joining the team of their gender or even participating in school sport all together. Legitimizing excluding and misgendering the trans student to their peers through official school policy. Which I think is especially relevant considering the topic of the video.
@@gd9210
@vlad_ruda4202 I am more than happy that mature discussion is happening :) don't be ashamed to ask questions!
Folks seriously seem to overlook Toph's connection with the badgermoles, but its kinda huge, IMO.
Specifically, her other senses didn't just improve because of her blindness- she learned from the badgermoles to use Earthbending as her *primary* means of sensory input- she is shown to directly take after and mimic them, and she states, "it is the way they interact with the world."
Toph is disability rep, sure, but more meaningfully, she's a representation of what it means when someone is able to make full use of an alternative means of accessibility.
Really, she's like Mako from Ghost in the Shell, in that regard- she adopted an extreme version of a not uncommon fantastical element in this fiction and out of necessitity, became the best. Because when its your way of interacting with the world, you're probably going to get pretty good at it, you know?
There's a certain elevation to be found in specific circumstances where disabled persons are so good at unique skills because they're the only people in the world forced to practice a specific technique or talent that's optional for everyone else.
Fiction provides ample opportunities for those scenarios- (My Hero Academia also has that) but I like Toph. She hits a sweet spot, and can actually make blind jokes funny.
As someone with a blind dog who has a very Toph personality, I feel it. She's turning 11 in a few days, but is still getting me up at midnight for play. And she gets bored before she gets tired. Its a good problem to have
I also love that Vanellope is clearly neurodivergent. I felt super recognized by her when watching the movie as someone with ADHD who blurts things out impulsively and is so curious it can sometimes annoy others!
Honestly, the fact that Calhoun definitely has PTSD has some pretty intriguing (and maybe fucked up??) implications about the worldbuilding. Like. Let’s not forget that Calhoun’s game was plugged in TWO WEEKS AGO during the events of the movie. Technically, this woman has existed for two weeks. But she has a backstory explicitly “programmed” in. which is like. Kind of insane? Because technically, her trauma and her memories kind of never actually happened if you think about it. She’s someone’s oc and that someone wrote these memories and this trauma that constantly affects her into her. She came to life 14 days ago (wtf) but she has like. What. 30 years worth of experience in her? If this movie leaned more into the implications of video game characters being alive, this could’ve been an extremely interesting idea to dive into
(edit: i have realized that it is in fact one week, not two)
Unrelated to the actual topic, but I will say, Toph being blind isn’t the ONLY reason she’s the best earthbender. She was also personally trained by the badgermoles while practically a toddler. So that probably helps her case.
2:00 I am a person who ISN'T TOURETTE but has moderated movement tics and I think it's the closest real life equivalent to Vanellope's glitch. Here's why (based on my own experience):
1- She can't erase them or prevent them to happen at all, BUT she can learn how to use that to her advantage when they do happen
2- The triggers for the glitches are unknown, but it's shown in both movies, the glitch gets worse and harder to control when she's stressed or anxious
3- In the bullying scene, what all the other kids say about her glitch, and how they try to imitate it, at least to me, seem to be comparable to how my classmates mocked my own tics.
4- well... it makes her move her body, often against her own will, in a way that often reminds me to my spasms
(against the popular stereotypes, tics aren't always unwilling, sometimes it's more like a need or an impulse for the person, one that they can repress for some seconds but it feels impossible. That's how they work for me at least. Vanellope shows both involuntary (like when she gets stressed or anxious) and voluntary tics (like when she uses them to her own advantage in races), which is the closest thing I've ever seen to myself. Maybe i'm just projecting)
I...tics don't have to be involuntary? I thought they were entirely involuntary, like...I have twitches throughout the day, but they always kind of felt like things I would be able to control if I tried really hard and because I just let them happen voluntarily when I think no one is looking I always just kinda...assumed I was faking them somehow. I don't know *why* I would want to fake something like that when no one's looking, but like...is that really true? 🥺
@@PlotMasterX 2 psychologists and 1 psychiatrist told me these things were tics, I didn't believe it at first because they felt completely voluntary, so my therapist had to explain to me that tics weren't always involuntary, tics could feel like an impulse of moving your body, which you can obey or not (and usually do)
I fidget a lot myself, it's not inherently bad, unless you harm yourself while doing it.
I usually blink a bit strongly, move my fingers and bounce my leg when I'm too excited, scared, intrigued etc. And they feel voluntary, but they're really not. :>
@@lanonate yeah, those sound like tics!! Especially the "they feel voluntary but they aren't" part, I struggle with that too. Sometimes I end up getting hurt becuz I fidgeted my neck too hard, and if I'm not physically hurt, it usually scares people away
I think... It's been a while and my memory isn't great, but I've been told tics are not voluntary but smth called, if I'm getting this right, unvoluntary or smth similar, which was just a quicker way of saying you can delay them voluntarily or not try to suppress but cannot completely stop them and don't actually choose to do them. It's like blinking, sure, you can do so consciously and it doesn't really do anything, but try not blinking for more then ten seconds ^^'. Idk, it still sounds complicated however one explains it though, despite not being entirely inexperienced with tics and how they work in my own life... Though I still find it interesting as a concept and a mild inconvenience in practice personally ^^'
I think that king candy also has a bit of trans coding to him too. He sticks his face on everything and has probably lived longer as king candy than turbo. When he does eventually become a cybug he's in love with himself. Sure it's for the amount of power he now holds but he doesn't have to pretend to be benevolent and someone he's not. He can fully embrace who he is in that final form and he loves it. In the final fight you can see just how much he enjoys being a giant monstrous virus. This doesn't make him trans and can be interpreted in many ways but I do think this can be interpreted as a bit of trans-coding.
IKR IM SO HAPPY HE FINALLY GOT THE EVIL BUG HRT HE NEEDED❤
@@Randomalistic he went from male to giant metal bug of horrors, so happy for the little freak 💞
Yeah, adding to that, even after being outed, he seems to prefer his King Candy persona. Maybe there’s some insecurity about being the boring old simplistic racer nobody cares about anymore.
You're making me wanna rewatch this movie; last time I watched it was from a once-in-a-lifetime 2015 rerun. The way you compare King Candy to an allistic parent who speaks on behalf of their disabled child hits close to home for me as an autistic 20 y/o whose allistic mom speaks on behalf of them.
"Gender dysphoria is not something you need to feel to be trans"
Dude I'm gonna cry it is so nice to finally hear another person say that out loud.
When I first was finding out I was nonbinary, I mentioned my feelings on my Tumblr.
I spent the next few months or more being relentlessly bullied and harrased by truscum who were SO mad that I dared be nonbinary and happy with myself. It was a really rough time and I even lost a friend over it because she agreed with them.
These days i have a little dysphoria, but it's less about my body and more about everyone's perceptions. Like, if I could keep my current body but no one ever assumed I was a woman again, I'd be perfectly happy in my body, voice, and all that.
Anyway, thank you for saying that it's not required, it's rare for me to hear someone say it so it means a lot to me
(a nice note: that friend I lost did send me a message a few years later out of the blue, apologizing for how she had treated me. Even though it had been a long time, I appreciated the apology a lot and totally forgave her since it was clearly genuine. So sometimes people do grow as people and come back to surprise you!)
Oh man 🥺❤ I'm so glad that connected with you specifically. Honestly I wasn't sure of my own identity either until i realized that trans joy is what really matters. I'm also really glad to hear that your friend apologized, that was good of her to do
@@Randomalistic exactly! So many people are taught that transness is defined by suffering that they forget that gender euphoria exists too!
@@cajunking5987 oh yeah? What am I then?
@@cajunking5987*[loud incorrect buzzer]*
@@cajunking5987 "oh now that your say it i am not, thank you random man that litteraly never spoke to me irl !! How could I have been so wrong !!!"/j
Calhoun and Felix were the original "me and the bad bitch I pulled by being autistic"
Y’all when I tell u Vanellope saved my life as a kid (in a self worth way) she legit did. To keep it short my parents hid my autism diagnosis from me three years after my doctor told them. When I was told about it I felt like there was something wrong with my and justified all the bullying I endured as a kid. Then at age 11 I saw Wreck it Ralph and everything changed for the better
@7:40 also the fact that shes like 90% taller than felix is and could absolutely crush him and his entire game if she wanted...
man.
Felix got a type.
I have Dyslexia (and other disabilities) and PTSD AND I'm transgender. This video was made for me...
Ya know, I never really made a connection between King Candy and Autism Speaks, but they really are a match made in heaven
With Toph, her power doesn't really come from her blindness, it comes from her earthbending, so it's more so her finding ways to work around a lot of her struggles rather than treating blindness as if it isn't a struggle itself. It's treating earthbending kinda like an accessibility tool.
I love the scene in the wedding where EVERY SINGLE SOLDIER is just aiming at the window just in case
1:54 I had a fun association I wanted to share. There's a very old video game called Nethack, a rougelike that was first made in 1987. There are certain monsters you can eat which will inflict you with uncontrolled teleporting, called Teleportitis in the community. Teleportitis can be managed with a Ring of Teleport Control. Vanellope may not have needed a ring, but she's not the first video game character to gain control over a disability like that!
As someone with CPTSD I never realized how special this movie is, especially seeing ptsd representation in a cartoon it makes me feel warm and fuzzy
**transphobic little candy children**
I’m howling omg
10:20 he’s fix it Felix he can fix ANYTHING
"I can fix her" but he actually can 🤣
13:07 the term “trans coded” is really funny in this story’s context. But yes I also agree and love this take
It's in my code!
'This character is missing something.'
'I know! Make her trans.'
'THAT'S GENIUS!'
@@MeemahSNme, this is me your describing my character making process
15:15 "Being Transgender scares your senators, so keep doing it!"
This is one of the best things I've heard in a while, I love it!
im SO obsessed with how expressive your parrot is like omg do u just have a massive folder of expressions or are you drawing them specially because they always fit SO PERFECTLY
@@ieatmud24 I have a huge folder😭 I did draw a few for specific scenarios and I was able to make them work elsewhere. ANYWAYS THANK YOU !!! ❤️
0:37 NOOOOOO MEGAMIND ATE MY DOG 😭😭😭 I CANT SUPPORT THIS RADICALISM 😡😡😡
OMG THIS IS SO GOOD WHAT!! Its genuinely so rad to hear a new interpretation of a movie I hold very close to me that I've never even rly thought about before ! I will now be rewatching Wreck-It-Ralph for the 200th time with this in my brain :D
Extremely excited for the King Candy video !!
I AM EXPLODING!!! 🔥🔥❤️❤️❤️🔥❤️THANK YOU SO MUCH, I’m so glad you found it to be interesting!!!! :] Also YES REWATCH IT!!! & the king candy video will be so messed up.
2:13 For a second I was thinking how it's kinda funny that these little candy people think the girl with tourettes is a criminal because of her condition, but then I remembered that epilepsy used to be considered a symptom of demonic possession.
I like the way you describe trans-coding Venelope, it kind of reminds me of how (the movie) Nemona describes her shapeshifting
@@RobotCupcakee Nimona is so good ughhgrhghrhhvb…..
the bit about making sure disability isn't idealized and that the realities of it are actually shown reminds me of edward elric from fullmetal alchemist. yes he's insanely talented and strong. yes his prosthetics give him the advantage of being able to transmute it and block with it. but it's also screwed him over several times by giving him frostbite when the metal gets cold, malfunctions that need constant maintenance, full on falling to pieces at times, etc. his brother is the same in that even though he can't feel pain, he also can't feel warmth either, yet both of them are loved so strongly by the people around them that they truck through it anyway. plus at the end of the series, even though both of these specific conditions get "cured", they're replaced by others (ed unable to use alchemy like everyone else and al having severe physical weakness) and are STILL loved just the same :')
Felix just pulling up the baddest-hardcore women by being loving has always been a crazy facts
5:22 i just have to say how amazing this edit is. the rock throw into the car jumping down. just beautiful 🙏🙏
Calhoun's squad all having their weapons drawn ready to protect their boss, even if it's more for show than in anticipation of a real threat is the wholesome support structure I aspire to have in life. 10/10
I have epilepsy and kinda feel her. I wasn't just teased by kids, but also kicked out of classes because teachers thought I was a threat since I was the first and only student with seizures. They even tried to find an excuse to expel me.😑
9:18 hai i do have ptsd myself, and yeah, the flashbacks can happen at random times, you could be studying at it hits you, you could be having lots of fun and it happens, you could be trying to sleep at it happens, I've honestly had it happen much more times at random that by a trigger (can be either a word or something else like objects)
12:51 - "You can still be cis and defy gender norms"
My goofy ass over here being a cis straight woman who got down on one knee to propose to her boyfriend: "Yeah, I see some truth to that"
The definition of Gender Nonconforming Queen. :>
Anyway, congratulations pal!
Oh my goodness this video was stellar
I had such a horrible day today, even cried, but this video cheered me right up. Your voice and delivery are so captivating and upbeat, catching my attention right away and keeping me so engaged! You made such amazing points and I literally can’t fully type out how much I loved this video. Thank you so much! I love your little bird sona too, it’s really cute ❤️ hope you have a good day/night
🥺I'm so glad to hear it helped, THANK YOU
ive never heard anyone make the comparison between venelope and gender identity, it makes SO much sense????? impeccable thinking
I was today years old when I realized the CyBugs take on the appearance of the people they assimilate, so Calhoun had to merk a CyBug that had her fiance's face....
ohhh the trans vanellope angle is very interesting and fun! and it kinda sheds a light on why i mustve been so attached to her as a kid. oh well
HOORAY FOR AWARENESS AND POSITIVE REPRESENTATION ♥👏
YEAHHHH YEAH WAHOOOO!!!!!! 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉❤❤❤
So I saw it pointed out once that the fact the chapel is a physical place in the game they can all go to makes it extremely likely that players get to see Calhoun's backstory after reaching a certain point int he game, forcing her to relive her trauma every time a player reaches that point. So she's not only managing to heal, she's healing despite being stuck in an environment that's actively retraumatizing her all the time.
To be fair to Vanellope, her glitch can be read as a disability, but it isn't explicitly disability representation, so the writers probably felt more freedom to make it her superpower. Toph is more egregious because she has a real condition (blindness) and is explicitly disabled.
Toph is very good representation, actually. She DOES struggle in places and deals with issues related to her disability.
A lot of people with Disabilities have different little skills here and there. People with anxiety can often notice things that others wouldn't, albeit at some cost. People with BPD can be exciting and make friends easily, albeit often unstable
Source: I have both
@@katiemorison7969 I'm not disagreeing I'm just saying that Toph leans further into the "disability as a superpower" trope more than Vanellope because her blindness is a real condition and Vanellope's pixlexia is not, so whether Vanellope is disabled or disabled-coded, or neither, is up to personal interpretation while Toph is incontrovertibly disabled
@@redtailarts101 You could very easily see them as ticks, but I do see your point.
Fair play to you!
@@katiemorison7969 Yes, Toph is amazing, and it is tragic she is one of the few really good disabled rep characters out there when she's a shining example of how to do it that's been around for years yet no one seems to want to learn for her and it's genuis simplicity. She has all the realistic limitations of being blind, but her superpower that doesn't render it completely moot, and she has a whole character beyond being blind rep. When people think of Toph, they aren't just going to be thinking of her blindness. They're also going to be thinking of how she is a skilled prodigy and an unbelievably tenacious and sassy young girl. She has an identity beyond being blind and is just as much a human and person like the rest of Team Avatar and isn't just a walking blindness advertisment. And the realistic limitations of her blindness aren't treated in any tragic or condescending way. It's just treated as how she lives. She can't see but that's not here nor there. As an spiring author, I really wanna be able to create a physically disabled character as well done as Toph, but I just haven't had any opportunities so far to include a physically disabled character. Just a few with learning disabilities, but that's easy for me as I have a few myself. Maybe one day.
Ehh... I mean, Toph's tremorsense isn't sourced from her blindness. At most her blindness gave her a motive to get so good at it.
It's perfectly within other Earthbender's abilities to bend like Toph does. King Bumi does it. Toph teaches Aang how to do it.
Toph is just way better at it because she's the greatest Earthbender in the world
11:56 You know, after watching your King Candy video, (Loved it, BTW. Absolutely amazing. It's one of my new go to videos when I feel I have nothing else to watch.) part of me wonders if Vanellope would've still turned out the way she did if Turbo didn't immediately take over Sugar Rush once it released. Cause, quoting what you quoted from the movie's directors, Turbo *immediately* took over Sugar Rush the minute it was plugged in and before anyone else got to play it. Which would, theoretically mean that Vanellope never even got to execute her princess programming to begin with. Plus, is this the only copy of Sugar Rush in the movie's universe? Or are there other Sugar Rush Arcade Cabinets? Would Turbo taking over Sugar Rush have affected EVERY copy of Sugar Rush or just the specific one we focused on in the movie? If there are multiple copies of Sugar Rush, Is this the only version of Vanellope to act like this and go through this character arc while every other version is following their original princess programming, or did Vanellope fundamentally change her coding across every copy? I have *A LOT* of questions that I want answered from this movie that I'm probably never going to get. Still, great video!
Why does this sound like the perfect video game take on fictive identity?
This birb broke into my recommended and they brought a Wreck it Ralf dvd and are reviewing it at length. I'm not upset
I have Tourettes and I love Vanellope. Imperfect representation or not, I love how her glitch doesn’t get cured but does become destigmatized and accepted as part of who she is.
Although I am cisgender, I really liked what you said about how our programming is outside of our control. For me, I can relate that to my experiences of where I grew up, my appearance, and what I can do with my life because of the circumstances in which I was born. I apologize if this isn't phrased well, I guess I just wanna say that, to some capacity, I too can relate to "programming" being out of our control. I just felt like saying that. Great analysis!
oh my GOD that trans headcanon is actually SHOCKINGLY irl accurate what
As a person with combined type ADHD, I can kinda understand Venelopes finding advantages trope
I would say the big point with Toph is the fact that, even with her other senses being heightened because of her missing sight, if she had viewed herself as incapable, and had given up on living her life to the fullest, if she had believed what others did about her, it wouldn't have mattered. Those other things became strengths because Toph didn't believe her disability made her less capable, and because she chose to hone her other strengths to make up for her lack of sight.
Oh my god, I just realized. Her husband was EATEN by a Cybug, that’s huge! Turbo was eaten by one and we saw what HE turned into! Imagine having to kill a giant bug with your husbands FACE ON IT!
this after the hyper long king candy analysis is such a delicious dessert
i know it was mostly a one off joke comment but slash gen as a trans dude the whole king candy murder bug thing is relatable af. (or maybe i just want to be a massive bug monster idk)
that entire analysis reignited so much love that i have for this movie and specifically the KIND of twist that turbo is
this dude is FUCKED UP and its probably not a good idea to say i relate to him but i DEFINITELY see where his motivations came from
also, i forgot how much this lined up with the kind of internet horror i loved as a kid?? until the tangent about turbo and childhood trauma i didn't even begin to connect "oh i probably loved turbo so much bc my favorite creepypasta was sonic.exe"
overall i cant get enough of this kind of analysis and i am SO excited for what you may cook in the future; these two videos have reignited such an insane creative spark in me during a time where everything has been feeling like nothing
TLDR you now have a permanent fan because of king candy bug trans allegory
GAAHHH NO UR SO RIGHT BC COSPLAYING AS CYBUG KING CANDY WAS THE MOST GENDER AFFIRMING THING IVE DONE IN MY LIFE. LIKE GODDDD I NEED TO BE HIM anyways haha sorry I’m SO GLAD YOU ENJOYED ❤
as a trans person, I can't explain how much I resonated with Vanellope and her character. people judging her for being who she is, acting like she shouldn't exist. reminds me of when I tried to kinda tell my mother about identifying as a guy, and she just brushed it off as a "phase." like I literally can't explain the SCREAM of joy I made when I saw the princess dress scene.
The "glitch" is similar to tourrettes syndrome, a stress induce neurological disorder that can cause tics, whether it be motor vocal or otherwise, there are also co-morbidities which means no two people with tourrettes have the same exact tics.
Co-morbitities include:
Dislexia
Autism
Social anxiety
Etc...
I heard from somewhere that Vanellope's glitch is more akin to seizures.
And when I see her glitch in the movie, I can't help but notice the similarities from when I saw them in others myself. To note on what I noticed with glitch
It can happen randomly for any reason, but an outside factor can also trigger it.
Sounds a lot like seizure.
i think venelope's glitch is kinda comparible to cataplexy:
-happens when she's feeling intense emotions
-loses control of her body and can put her danger at times
too bad cataplexy cant make you teleport
okay but felix never called her anything similar to "dynamite gal" ever again, they didnt brush it off as "omg she's healed!! he can call her the name now!!" NO they make sure he only calls her things like "love" or "dear" and i love that fact
@@Expriexp HE ALWAYS MEANS SO WELL UGHH❤️❤️
@Randomalistic HE MADE SURE THAT AFTER HE GAVE HER A FLASHBACK THAT INSTEAD OF TELLING HER TO GET OVER IT AFTER THEY GOT MARRIED THAT HE MADE SURE TO CHANGE HIS VOCAB TO MAKE SURE HE DOESNT UPSET HER AGAIN AAAAAAAAAA
I just spent a lot of time watching both of your wreck-it-ralph video essays, and I think I will now spend more time trying to delve into the lore and representation of this film that will probably take over my life. thank you for putting the time into making such amazing content, that was truly a fantastic two and half hours of my day
I'M SO GLAD YOU HAD A GOOD TIME! ❤ also believe me there is so much more to this movie w/ its representation especially with Ralph himself
i always related to vanellope as an autistic girl growing up who was bullied for not fitting in, especially when she chose at the end to forgo the dress and title and just be herself. to no one's surprise i am not a girl anymore lol
Very emotional tangent from a person who never sounds real but I have had feelings about Venellope & her 'glitching' for a long time now and this feels like the video to reveal it;
As stupid as it sounds, Vanellope's disability was a reality to me. Not being able to fully control my movements as a child was something that was laughed at and mocked instead of looked at or diagnosed. I ran into things and fell down for seemingly no reason. Sometimes I would be standing still and just _collapse._ It was something I spent a lot of time laughing off because, well.
Everyone else was laughing.
Nobody ever provided a solution for me. They just watched as I leaned against walls and sat down constantly, ignored how I sometimes couldn't even keep myself upright while _sitting down,_ and told me 'someone will find it attractive someday.' Which. Eugh.
Granted, Vanellope's method is technically very general advice, but I took it _very literally._
This stupid-ass movie showed me an arguably stupider solution to a problem that, to most people, seems like a superpower in a movie and not real applicable advice to anything. I watched Wreck-It-Ralph and, upon seeing Vanellope's stuttery movements, I realized something. I can't do anything about how my sitting still goes. But if I just _fling myself in the direction I want to go, disregarding balance or bodily movement?_
...
The weird thing is.
Is that _flinging myself in directions?_
It WORKS.
It's become so ingrained in my movements that I can't even imagine living my life without doing so. Well.
I _can_ suppose that it would probably end up with me on the ground more frequently. But ah, I'm not about to test that.
The disability as a superpower trope is interesting to me as an autistic person. I mean. Yes. My disability’ sucks. But i also wouldn’t become neurotypical if i was hypothetically offered the chance. it’s part of my identity and as a matter of fact, it actually DOES do me favors sometimes. My brain just works differently, but not all of those differences are worse. I know the whole “smart/talented autistic person/savant” thing is cliche and whatever but like. M. Yknow. I kinda do be. There’s things i excel at some things abnormally higher than the average person in a way I’ve only seen in fellow autistic people. There’s also things i fucking suck at abnormally more than the average person in a way I’ve only seen in fellow autistic people. But it’s a part of who i am, and im happy with that
Cool video. I love the comparison to Toph, how you validate Calhoun's feelings, and I find the trans allegory interesting. I hope your channel takes off more every day, you deserve it!
AAUGHHHH THAT'S SO NICE.... Thank you SO much!!!!!🥺💜💜💜
Before I watch this, I want to quickly comment saying that as a kid with terrible ADHD and symptoms of autism, Vanellope was SUCH good representation for that in my opinion. Yes, dyslexia is referenced in the movie I think by her in the bully scene. But the ways she’s bullied, the ways the glitch works, it feels like a clear allegory for many forms of neurodivergence
Edit: When it comes to ADHD and autism, I feel like Vanellope works best because those disorders CAN benefit you but only in very specific circumstances. They can sometimes change how you’re visually perceived based on your physical behaviors (IE “glitching”) I could go on a whole rant listing the similarities but I won’t lol.
But I will say my biggest gripe was making her capable of controlling it. It would’ve been way cooler imo if she just got really determined and lucky when she glitched away from Turbo
Subscribed. The algorithm led me to this channel and I appreciate it. 😊
I think what I really like about Vanellope learning to control her glitch is just that, she learned to control it. She had put a lot of effort into it, and we get to see her fail several times before she succeeds. And ability to teleport is a common ability in video games. So we can see Vanellope developing this as reasonabe racer ability.
The other thing I'd note is that Vanellope is shown as a racer on the cabinet. While she looks cleaner and presumably wealthier then her homeless glitch persona, she is wearing a jumpsuit and so could probably be described as tomboyish. She isn't just the ruler who referees the races, she competes in them directly as an equal.
So I find it interesting that Vanellope rejects her princess persona, and returns to her scruffy tomboy appearance. She was literally shaped by Turbo's meddling with her code, and she embraces that, instead of just returning to the role she was programmed for. Just because the game is reset, she isn't willing to forget what she went through and lose what it taught her.
I have often wondered what it would be like if Vanellope were to meet a verson of herself from the unaltered game. She would probably share some similarities with her "original version", but our Vanellope exaggerates those traits. For instance, the original Vanellope might be competitive, but very proper and polite. She could be much more reserved and less excitable.
On the subject of Felix, I could make a joke about "I can fix her", but I don't think that was ever his intention. My guess is that he was drawn to her strength and independence but he may have empathetically seen that her persona was a mask. Felix is really a very passive person, he does not fight against Ralph or punish him for the damage he causes, he just follows around behind him and fixes it. He doesn't even toss Ralph off the building, he just watches passively while the Nicelanders do it. And it's established that he is a very caring person. He tries to make peace between Ralph and the Nicelanders, and when he realizes how they've been treating Ralph his whole attitude towards him changes.
Even Felix is annoyed that "Everything I touch gets fixed" but that is really his role. Calhoun gets a sense of security and support that she desperately needs, and Felix gets the chance to be more adventurous and confident in himself.
Felix thinking "I can fix her" and then actually helping her to get better will never be not funny
Personally I feel like the fact that the movie never actually labels or even directly states Sergeant Valhoun's issues is a great strength. I have ASD and I've always felt that giving neurodivergencies and psychological conditions like this hard names and definitons makes them feel like external setbacks rather than being part of who you are. You never need to give Sergeant Valhoun's issues a label because you can easily understand them without one. Naming the issue would only dumb down the story, patronize the character, and make the problem feel less like an organic result of a tragic event.
as someone with (a form of) ptsd i can confirm i can also hide and camouflage perfectly (shut everything off and go to bed) when i have an episode type moment
As a trans guy I hadn't thought of Vanellope being trans coded but I absolutely love it :D