In June 2022 Walt Disney Pictures and Pixar Animation Studios release the movie Lightyear (2022), a film that tells the story of Buzz Lightyear and his friendship with Alisha Hawthorne, who marries a woman and in one scene she kisses her wife. A big controversy started due to this scene; some people agreed, and others disagreed with the inclusion of a gay character in a children’s movie. At the same time, the movie was banned in almost 14 countries.

This was the first time that Disney shows a kiss between a same-sex couple but previously had to have some inclusion in its movies, especially in its villains’ characters. Abril Chiara Vercelli, in her dissertation Queer coding in Disney villains and its impact on the formation of opinions about sexual identity, argued that Disney movies included some characters that have appearances of the LGBTQ+, but for some reason, these characters were always the villains (Vercelli, 2022).

Vercelli’s analysis is focused on three movies: Little Mermaid (1989), Hercules (1997), and Pocahontas (1995). In the Little Mermaid, Ursula the villain was inspired by a drag queen, which is the reason for her thick tone of voice and excessive makeup. Also, she is an octopus, representing in some way her masculinity (Vercelli, 2022).

In Hercules, Hades does not show masculinity or courage, in contrast with the hero. Besides, his hair is related to the term “flaming”, which means fire and it is associated with queer people who are extravagant (Vercelli, 2022).

Pocahontas’s villain, Ratcliffe, shows his queer side in the first scene. He arrives in a purple carriage with feathers, he is wearing a purple and pink suit, walks into the boat through a pink carpet, and is carrying a little dug with a pillow. In contrast, John Smith comes to the boat with a rifle and a sword and gets on the boat with the help of a rope (Vercelli, 2022).

With these three examples Vercelli, argues that in these movies Disney associates queer representation with a synonym of negativity, while the heroes of the story do what is socially acceptable in terms of what masculinity and femininity are supposed to be. 

Most recently, in a more positive representation of the community, LGBTQ+ Disney causes another controversy when the director of the live-action Beauty and the Beast (2017), Bill Condon, admitted that the character Lefou, is gay (Contreras, Guzman, Vizcaíno 2019). In this movie, there are no kisses between the characters, just one scene of Lefou dancing to Gaston. The film was also banned in different countries, especially in Asia.

According to a study by GLAAD, an organization that analyses the representation of LGBTQ communities in media, Disney still has a long way in terms of inclusive of LGBTQ+ in movies (Mana, Pereira, Oliveira, 2021). Nevertheless, it is important to highlight the progress that LGBTQ+ representation has made in his films. Going from stigmatizing his villains with queer characteristics to having a same-sex couple in his characters and including a kiss in one of his films.

By Tianna Montes
Student ID: 33700373

Bibliography:

• Chiara Vercelli, A. (2022). La codificación queer en villanos/as de Disney y su impacto en la formación de opiniones sobre la identidad sexua (thesis). Repositotio Universidad de Belgrano, Buenos Aires.
• Contreras Pulido, P., Guzmán Franco, M. D., & Vizcaíno Verdú, A. (2020). ‘La Bella y la Bestia’ y el movimiento Lgtb en Disney: empoderamiento y activismo en YouTube. Área Abierta. Retrieved 2022, from https://reunir.unir.net/handle/123456789/10128.
• Mana Vaz, P., Pereira Toth, J., & de Oliveira Moreira, T. (2022). From Disney to LGBTQ tales: The South-American Snow White in Over the Rainbow: Um Livro de Contos de Fadxs. In Snow White and the seven dwarfs: New perspectives on production, reception, legacy (pp. 218–230). essay, Bloomsbury Academic.
• Ives, M. (2022). Disney’s ‘Lightyear,’ With a Same-Sex Kiss, Faces a Backlash in Some Muslim Countries. The New York Times. Retrieved 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/15/movies/lightyear-banned-kiss-lgbt.html.