Ah, I see #NotMyAriel is trending on Twitter… *goes to check* Yeah, that’s pretty much what I expected. Ridiculous. I, uh, tend not to applaud Disney for many things but I DO applaud them for casting a black actress as Ariel. She’s a mermaid. Her skin colour (and even her hair colour really) is totally irrelevant.
I’m really curious how this will work with regards to the Disney Princess merchandise and the face characters at the parks, though. Are they going to phase out original Ariel? I hope whatever they do end up doing, they have someone play the new dark-skinned Ariel at the parks, because it would really suck for black children if they come to Disneyland hoping to see the princess mermaid who looks like them and not getting it.
I reckon this tweet I found sums my feelings up best, though I am not a natural redhead:
Anyway! Dudes, she is NOT your Ariel because she’s not supposed to be! She can now be your Ariel AND someone else’s! LET IT GO. (Sorry, wrong movie.)