Mulan

When thinking about the Disney movies of when I grew up, everything always seemed like it went downhill a bit after The Lion King.  While Hercules, Pocahontas, and Mulan were good, they weren't quite up to par with The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin.  And the ones that came after that were even worse.  However, when we watched Mulan again I realized that I really enjoyed this one, much more so than I thought I would.

Like many Disney movies, Mulan is based on a story that came before it; in this case it's an old Chinese legend.  I never knew this until I looked it up on wikipedia right now, but it's interesting to know.  In the movie, you'd think Mulan's character would be really tough and awesome at everything, and while she's intelligent, she also kinda lacks good social skills.  Even though she may not be too suave with the other guys at the camp, at least she comes up with the brilliant idea to get the avalanche to fall on the Huns.  Speaking of which, the fact that any of them rose out of that avalanche was pretty unbelievable.

It was also a lot funnier than I remembered.  Eddie Murphy is a fun character as Mushu, the dragon.  Mulan herself is pretty endearing, too.

One interesting thing that Jason pointed out is that he thinks this is one of the only Disney movies where the hero actually intentionally kills the villain.  We're still trying to figure out others, but it actually is kind of true.  I tried to argue Simba, but we decided that was really more self-defense and not actual intentional murder.  Mulan definitely wanted to kill that hun, though!

The Music
The music in this one is pretty good.  There are two really excellent songs in it: "Reflection" and "I'll Make a Man Out of You."  None of the others are really all that memorable, though, so while it has two good songs the soundtrack overall isn't the best.

The Villain
Shan Yu is a jerk, certainly, but he's not really all that interesting of a villain.  I tend to think of the villains here as "The Huns" overall, and so the villain is just an idea, not a specific person.  Shan Yu really has no personality, he's just "the bad guy."  Anyway, Mulan's personal struggles and fight against societal norms is really the more interesting plot.

The Disney World Connection
Mulan never really hit off with the world all that well, so it's not too surprising that she doesn't make a huge appearance in Disney World.  Mulan herself appears around the park, specifically in the Japanese pavilion in Epcot, but as far as I can remember there's no ride or attraction in WDW dedicated to the movie.  She can be found other places as well, and Mushu can be seen sometimes too.

My rating:  8 out of 10
Jason's rating:  9 out of 10