Review Roundup: Disney's "Raya and The Last Dragon"

[sandstorm]

Disney's 59th Film in their animated canon comes out this Friday.

‘Raya And The Last Dragon:’ A Sweet Southeast-Asian Disney Epic Exploring Trust & Grief [Review] https://t.co/oAHkG0n6tO pic.twitter.com/87CQ1O2UhS
- The Playlist 🎬 (@ThePlaylist) March 1, 2021

• "Disney on autopilot is still pretty good."
• Is kind of "eh" on Raya and Sisu's relationship

Comments

[sandstorm]

she looked really cool:

So some concept art for Sisu dropped and... oh what could have been... pic.twitter.com/gkvYZJbDb6
- Nicky•OB (@Oddaball) February 23, 2021

[la_loony]

The last pic looks a bit like what they have now, but they mixed too many things together. Like she has these fin like things that are too small for wings, idk if the blue part of her body is scales but then her head has hair/fur and she also has horns? Like pick one idea and go with it, preferably drop the fur and the unicorn like horn. Also I'd have vetoed the pink/light purple, go dark blue or dark purple instead.

[froggster]

But SEA dragons do have both scales and fur and a giant horn. That's actually on point.

[la_loony]

I never interpreted that as fur (I guess I thought that was like literally fire because I have a hard time not associating dragons with fireXD), I stand corrected then.
I must be thinking of the wrong kind of dragon then, I never noticed giant horns on the forhead, only a pair but those don't go up but backwards? Like on this one.

[froggster]

The backwards almost antler-like horns are found on Japanese/Chinese dragons. Southeast Asia said nah, we like rhinos better.

[la_loony]

Ah okay, I shall remember that from now on :)

Then I will sit here and just complain about the clear Elsa face the dragon got and a little bit about the colour palette execution, but that might just be personal preference because I am not crazy for the pink and want more blue tonesXD

[sidesmile]

Time to decolonize the mind. :) A lot of dragons/serpents/naga in the East/Southeast Asia are associated with water.

[la_loony]

Time to decolonize the mind.
Working on it :)

[sidesmile]

It's better to compare it to the actual earlier concept arts or designs of Vietnamese dragons (rồng) or naga (which is prevalent in Southeast Asia). Sleeping Beauty is a western dragon, which would not make sense for a film like this.