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In folklore and ancient stories, who were the real sea witches? And how is the sea witch represented in Andersen’s tale that the classic story is based on? With today’s article, we delve into Ursula’s lair and attempt to answer precisely these questions!
Voiced by actress Pat Carroll, Ursula is a villainous Cecaelian sea witch who offers a mermaid princess named Ariel a temporary opportunity to become human so that she may earn the love of Prince Eric within three days.
29 de ene. de 2018 · You might have noticed that Ursula, the antagonist in Disney's The Little Mermaid (1989), was a sea witch disguised as a half-human, half-octopus mythological hybrid creature . And, the antagonist of the sequel movie The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea , Morgana, was also a sea witch.
25 de oct. de 2023 · Plenty of witches have left their mark on the culture, but Ursula is perhaps best known for her unforgettable musical moment.
- Overview
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Ursula is the main antagonist of Disney's 1989 animated feature film The Little Mermaid. She is a villainous sea witch who strikes deals with unfortunate merfolk with the promise of making their dreams come true. Ursula's contracts, however, are covertly designed to advance her own ambitions and cause general misery. In the past, Ursula was a resident of King Triton's palace, before being banished and exiled by order of the king. Scorned, she has since vowed to exact vengeance by harnessing the power of the king's trident and installing herself as ruler of all the ocean.
Ursula is loosely based on the nameless sea witch from the original Hans Christian Andersen tale, while her characterization takes inspiration from the drag queen Divine. Ursula's fervent confidence and theatricality have been met with critical praise, and have influenced villains that followed. She has since featured prominently as a primary member of the Disney Villains line-up.
When Ursula first appears in the film, she states through a monologue that she once lived in the royal palace of King Triton, the king of the underwater city of Atlantica. She was banished from Atlantica and made her home in the remains of a leviathan, where she waits the chance to get her revenge on Triton and become Queen of Atlantica. She currently resides in a leviathan home lined with a garden of writhing polyps which were merfolk who had previously gone to Ursula for help, but found themselves unable to fulfill their side of the bargain, leading Ursula to claim them as her own and added them to her collection. Though she remains powerful, Ursula laments her distaste for her living conditions, and secretly watches over King Triton's youngest daughter, Ariel, believing her to be "the key to Triton's undoing". With time, Ursula's assumptions are proven correct, as Ariel one day meets and falls in love with a human prince, named Eric, against Triton's explicit rules.
Ursula commands her minions, moray eels Flotsam and Jetsam, to lure Ariel to her lair, claiming that only she can help make the princess' dreams of living on the surface, beside her apparent true love, a reality. Little does Ariel realize that this is part of Ursula's scheme to take the kingdom. Through the song "Poor Unfortunate Souls", Ursula proposes an agreement where she will transform Ariel into a human for three days, during which Ariel must receive the "kiss of true love" from Eric. If Ariel succeeds, her transformation into a human will be permanent, but if she fails, she will turn back into a mermaid and be bound to Ursula for eternity. The price for the transformation is Ariel's voice (which Ursula will keep no matter what happens). Ariel agrees and signs a contract that Ursula has conjured. As Ursula orders Ariel to sing, the sea witch summons magical hands to rip out Ariel's voice, which is then magically pulled into Ursula's Nautilus shell necklace. She then laughs gleefully as her plans begin to unfold: Ariel's tail is split into legs. As she laughs, Ursula allows Sebastian and Flounder to take the human Ariel to the surface. During the time that Ariel is a human and must win a kiss of true love from Eric in order to remain human permanently, Ursula takes every measure to prevent the kiss from occurring, such as when Flotsam and Jetsam tip over the boat in which Ariel and Eric are sitting as the two are close to kissing.
Realizing Ariel is doing a much better job earning Eric's love that she thought she could do and thus, will definitely share a kiss before the deadline, Ursula decides to take matters into her own tentacles. With intent to sabotage Ariel's relationship with Eric, so she can continue with her evil plan, Ursula takes the form of a beautiful human female with Ariel's voice. Under the alias "Vanessa", Ursula hypnotizes Eric into forgetting all about Ariel and marrying her. However, Ariel's seagull companion, Scuttle, discovers Ursula's villainy and quickly alerts Ariel and King Triton's court composer, Sebastian, who rushes off to alert the king. Before she can completely misdirect Eric into marrying her, Scuttle and many other animals are able to stall the wedding for the time being and, in the chaos, destroy the Nautilus shell containing Ariel's voice, breaking Eric's trance and returning Ariel's voice to its rightful owner. However, the sun sets before Ariel and Eric can kiss and Ariel transforms back into a mermaid. Ursula changes back to her true form, grabs Ariel and jumps back into the sea, where she is confronted by King Triton.
Ursula reveals her true goal and forces Triton to choose between his freedom and his daughter's. Triton agrees to take Ariel's place, and once Triton is transformed into a polyp, Ursula takes his crown and trident. Furious with Ursula's trickery, Ariel attacks the sea witch, who immediately retaliates and threatens to destroy the former with the power of the trident. Before she can, Ursula is attacked with a harpoon by Prince Eric. Flotsam and Jetsam are sent to capture the Prince and successfully do so while dragging him down into the sea before Sebastian and Flounder rush to the prince's aid. Ursula readies a killing shot for Eric, but Ariel grabs hold of her hair, thus redirecting the blast towards Flotsam and Jetsam—killing them. Saddened and enraged by the death of her minions, Ursula seeks vengeance on Ariel and magically alters herself to a massive size. With her new form, Ursula declares herself as ruler of the entire ocean and creates a powerful storm. Eric takes control of a surfaced ship while Ursula's attention is on Ariel. As Ursula wickedly taunts the idea of "true love" and prepares to kill Ariel using the power of the trident, Eric impales the sea witch by plunging his ship's splintered bow through her abdomen. Ursula screams in pain, and the bow catches lightning, brutally electrocuting her body. As Ursula loses her last ounces of life, she drops onto the ship and sinks into the sea as her dismembered body remains fall to the ocean floor.
•The name of Ursula's human disguise "Vanessa" is derived from the Latin word "Vanitas", meaning "vanity", "worthlessness", "emptiness", and "nothingness". Also, it is Greek for "butterfly", as seen in the potion that Ursula uses to become human.
•She is ranked #5 in the Top 30 Disney Villains.
•In an original draft for The Little Mermaid, Vanessa's role in the plot was quite different than in the final version. Originally, Eric proposed to Vanessa willingly after he discovered that she had the voice he was looking for, although he later had second thoughts at the actual wedding, when Vanessa intimidated him into saying "I do". Also, Vanessa was originally supposed to wear a scarf in order to ensure that her identity as Ursula was safe (as it hid her nautilus) when meeting people up close (such as Ariel).
•The attack on Ursula was actually much different in the original version, as Scuttle and the various aquatic fauna did not start attacking her and the ship until just before the priest could pronounce them husband and wife. While fighting off the animals, Vanessa also nearly hinted that she was never who she claimed she was so she faked fear at a suspicious Eric. Scuttle, in this version, also decided to exploit the fact that Vanessa's true form can be revealed from her reflection by airlifting the mirror from the bridegrooms over to her and positioning it near her, but she caught on and destroyed it before he could get into position. However, her reflection was already exposed from water seeping onto the deck from the animals, thus giving away who she really was to Eric. Perhaps the biggest difference is that Vanessa still kept Ariel's voice, though for some reason, she was unable to use it anymore.
•Often in storybooks, Ursula is known as "The Maiden".
•Vanessa is one of the four Disney characters to possess violet eyes, the other three being Aurora, Megara, and Dr. Facilier. On a related note, Vanessa was also the first villain to possess purple eyes, eventually being succeeded by Facilier.
Ursula is the main antagonist of Disney's 1989 animated feature film The Little Mermaid. She is a villainous sea witch who strikes deals with poor unfortunate merfolk with the promise of making their dreams come true. Ursula's contracts, however, are covertly designed to advance her own ambitions and cause general misery.
Ursula, also called The Sea Witch or Vanessa in her human form, is the main antagonist of Disney's The Little Mermaid franchise. She is Ariel, Eric, and Triton 's arch-nemesis and is loosely based on the sea witch in the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale of the same name.
