BBC Woman in White miniseries review

The Woman in White BBC mini series from 2018 is a very interesting series and its based upon the book of the same name by Wike Collins the same author as The Moonstone. The plot of the story is kind of complicated to explain. A drawing master Water Hartwright gets involved into solving a scandal that involves his former wealthy client and a mysterious woman in white who had escape from a private alyssum

The mini series was in spirit with the book even if it was only condensed into 5 episodes . The series follows Water Hartwright into getting a job with the help of an Italian friend, Pesca, in Cumberland with a wealthy client Miss Laura Fairlie and her her older half-sister, Miss Marian Halcomb, who seems to be a man trapped in a woman’s body with how passionate she is about stuff. The night before he is to go to Cumberland to be the two women’s drawing master as well as restoring the paintings of their (or at least Miss Fairlie’s) uncle Fredrick Fairlie, her guardian, he meets a mysterious woman in white who is terribly afraid of a baronet and had been in her younger years been in Cumberland. After Water gets her to a carriage to London, he founds out the woman has escaped from an alyssum. Once he gets to Cummberland he founds one of his two students looks strikling simliar to “Woman in White”. Marian founds out that the “woman in white” who name is Anne Catherick had been in her younger years been at the Family home.

Water and Laura become too close to comfort so that he has to leave because Laura is engaged to someone else. But a letter scares Laura about the upcoming marriage to Sir Percivial Glyde, Barnoet. But they put it away. After the marriage of Laura and “Sir” Percival Glyde- terrible things happened. Due to Marian helping Laura sending up for herself -Laura wouldn’t give her rightful inheritance away without knowing the fine print of the paper Percival wants her to sign. So because this and the fact that Anne had “talked” to Laura -Percival thinks Laura knows his dreadful secret., and his Friend the Count Fosco has to act and use Anne’s and Laura’s similarity to their advantage. So for the 2nd half of the story Fredrick Farlie, and the servants at Limerick House, think Laura is dead, and the “Laura” that Marian (or in the min-series Marian and Water)bring to the house is an “imposter named Anne Catherick” who wouldn’t even speak after being stuck in a private asylum for awhile. They do find out Sir Percival’s secert let’s just say he’s doesn’t have any right to his title, property, or wealth he once had but due to him trying to destory the proof of it he ended up being hoisted by his own petard And after Walter facing the count after some help of his Italian friend, Pesca, he gets the truth of what happened and that Laura was still alive when “Laura” died in the Count’s home and they’re able to get the real Laura recognized as herself again.

I have several things I hate about the show. In order to condense down all the testimonies they had to create an “Original Character” who was a friend of Walter’s father. I also hate the fact that they have Walter Hartwright and Sir Percival Glyde meet when they never meet in the book. The worst thing I hate in series is that during the time the real Laura is wrongly impriosned in the asylum is that they put her though worse conditions then she is placed in in the book. I mean a freaking straightjacket plus Solitary confiment?!! At least in the book when Marian is trying to find “Anne” at least “Anne” has the freedom to walk around on the grounds even if it was a nurse!! Was BBC trying to scare modern-day mentally ill people away from places that could help them, because those places have terrible reputations due to stuff like what “Anne” was given in the show even in the 1960s and those mental hospitals are trying to combat those bad reputation for modern day mentally ill people.

But even though I didn’t like the changes in the show I did enjoy the mini-series a lot even though I think they could have done better. I mean come on, could they have Walter do a bit of the detecting and not leave it to the made-up character who doesn’t exist?

Why I don’t think Disney in any trouble

People believe that the Disney company is in a bit of trouble with several movies failing at the box office.    I don’t believe that and this post is going to explain why I think that is.   I’m not thrilled about their redos in the theme parks, but I still would like to visit the theme parks with a group of other Disney fans for personal reasons that I’m not going to get into.  But let’s get into the main topic of the post.

Some people think that Disney will go bankrupt due to failures at the box office during the opening week,  Strange World (2022) or The Marvels (currently out in theatres at the time of this writing; 2023) or Elemental (2023) but the last one recovered its money eventually.   I’m sitting there and thinking “so what if they’re a bit of a flop? They have been there before in history at least twice (maybe three times) and they survived basically unscathed at least.”   The making of Cinderella (1950) and the making of (depending on who you’re talking too) of Touchstone’s (who is a subsidiary of Disney company) Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) or The Little Mermaid (1989) is what made Disney get back on their feet after a slump due to reasons either inside or outside of Disney.

In the 1940s due to the World War II closing the overseas markets, so movies like Pinocchio (1940) Fantasia (1940), Dumbo (1941) and Bambi (1942) couldn’t be released overseas and then, on top of that, Disney studios were hired by the USA’s Army to make propaganda films like a certain cartoon which is Donald Duck having a nightmare about serving the Nazi that people believe is banned.  So, because of their focus, mainly being that the North American market had to be content with what, is known as “package  films”, like: Saludos Amigos (1943) Three Caballeros (1945)  Make Mine Music (1946), Fun and Fancy Free (1947) Melody Time (1948) and  The Adventures of Mr. Toad and Ichabod Crane (1949),   Between the three things, there wasn’t a lot of money in the studio at that point. Disney Studios was going to go bankrupt. They were pinning their hopes on Cinderella being a success in the theatres to get them back on their feet.   And as they hoped, Cinderella (1950) actually was the last successful “Princess” film until 1989- Sleeping Beauty wasn’t successful at the box office for some reason, but that’s an entirely different story for another day).

After Walt Disney’s death in 1966, the company released The Jungle Book (1967) and then there was one last movie that Walt gave the green light to before he died- The Aristocats (1970).  But after that, the Disney company was floundering for awhile without him.  

 In the 1980s they tried to appeal to, I assume, the teen market with darker, more realistic films like  The Black Cauldron (1985) and the Great Mouse Detective (1986).  The Black Cauldron didn’t do so well at the box office due to the fact it got majorly messed up by a change in the management, so to speak, with Jeffery Katzenberg and Michael Eisner coming on board as part of the management team.  I have to admit I don’t know Katzenberg’s history pre-Disney,  but it seems to be that he  mostly worked with live-action films previously, so he didn’t understand how animation couldn’t be “as easily edited” as live-action films, so he fiddled around with the The Black Cauldron until I believe Michel Eisner talked to him.  And the company couldn’t go back to the “pre-edit” animation because of Katzenberg’s messing around, so the movie got released in the messy state it was in.  Which wasn’t good because the Disney company had been pinning its hopes on the movie to the point that they were even planning on making a restaurant in  a Disney park which was going to be named after the Gurgi character from the movie.  

During the making of The Fox and the Hound (1981), some middle-ground animators- people who came after the Nine Old Men animators  but before people like Tim Burton took over-like Don Bluth, quit working with Disney due to issues on the production and left the studios, which meant that young people like Burton who was starting out at the Disney company had to take over with making the movie.

Their next successful movie was either Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) by the Disney subsidiary of Touchstone Pictures or The Little Mermaid (1989). Both movies were successful at the box office -the latter is known for setting off the Disney Renaissance which lasted until 1999 with Tarzan (1999).  

Their last time the company had a series of flops or movies become popular later on was in the 2000s after the Tarzan (1999) movie. With movies like  Emperor’s New Groove (2000) Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) Lillo and Stich (2002) Treasure Planet (2002) Brother Bear (2003)  Home on the Range (2004)  Chicken Little (2005) Meet the Robinsons (2007) and Bolt (2008).  

Their first successful animated film in this time period was The Princess and the Frog (2009) even though not a lot of men or boys went to this movie, which meant they changed the name of the movie Rapunzel to Tangled (2010) for marketing purposes.  But that’s a different story for another day.

In conclusion, this is why I don’t believe Disney company will be going bankrupt anytime soon due to the fact, yes, they might be having flops at the moment, but they did it before and they still survived and they will do it again. They’re like the saying by Yoda. “Do or Do not, There is No Try”. They keep at it until something is successful. 

Is it time for Disney to create disabled protagonists?

I’m wondering if it’s time for Disney to create more disabled protagonists. The company already has people of different cultures. We have Native Americans in Pocahontas, Romiani with Esmeralda, African-Americans, with Tiana, Colombians with Mirabel, and Asians with both Muslan and Raya, that makes it already a diverse group, and having disabled characters would make the group even more diverse (and not all the disabled protagonists have to be white). And before you say Nemo is disabled-first that’s Pixar, and second-that Nemo isn’t the main protagonist his Dad Marlin is. And don’t mention Daredevil either-one that’s Marvel related and second-I want a disabled progtanists who doesn’t rely on “super powers” and isn’t a super hero. Not so sure what to think of Quasimodo or Elsa though. This post might be a bit rambling and going off topic now and then but let’s get down to business to defeat ableism.

Growing up with some of the Disney movies beside cherry picking parts of the Disney princesses, I identified with-(Ariel’s red hair, or Belle like reading)- the closet movie I got to in a sense feel represent was 1996’s Hunchback of Notre Dame. Even at the age of 6 I know I was “different” from my classmates. Basically I was an outcast, unlike my classmates-like the outcasts of the movie. Even though now I can also identify as a sort of cross between Lilo (of Lilo and Stitch)- and Elsa’s powers (aka “special needs”) from Frozen.

The only disablied characters so far have been villians who happen to be pirates of some kind. Captian Hook from Peter Pan and also the futuristic Long John Sliver from Treasure Planet who is a cyborg. But in the pirates’ cases they got their disabltiies later in life.

I can’t think of any example of characters from animated Disney or Pixar movies of a character having a temporary disablitiy not counting the “Sleeping Curse” (Snow White/Sleeping Beauty) or being turned into a bear (Brave). Well there’s also is Ariel’s temporary muteness (The Little Mermaid). Those kind of “disablities” you would actually want to cure. I can think of one live-action one which was based upon a book Johny Treamine. In the book Johnny Treamine he doesn’t get his hand fixed until after the story ended. Well in the movie it happens at least 30mins into the film.

And apperently the characters in Enchanto apperently have mental health problems of somekind like Abula has PTSD and I have no clue what the others characters (Tia Pepa for instance) are experiencing.

But there’s seem to be a great progess in disablited represenation. In 2021’s Luca there’s a supporting character who was born with limb difference. He has a great sense of humour about it which able-bodied people either are catious about making limb (or whatever the disablity is) jokes or over doing it to the point that it annoys the disabled person. There’s going to be another character with a disablity in the upcoming WISH film that Dalihia, the unoffical leader of Asha’s friend group of seven teens, has a musclar disablity so that means she has to walk with a cane. I have just found out that the voice actor for Dahilia also has muscalr disablity and uses a wheelchair. So that’s bonus points as well.

I don’t think it would be that hard to great blind, deaf, or other kind of disabled heroines. We do know that Disney is excellent at doing research for their films. Wether its bringing in animals for Bambi (1942)and The Lion King (1994), to actually going to the country they’re doing a film on going all the way back to the Three Callberos. To connecting with the cultural and people to make movies- a espcially big deal for Lilo and Stich, Moana/Vallias, Raya and the Last Dragon, Enchanto and presumbly WISH as well which is set off the Iberian Peninsula and for the opening song they have used Castendas, as well as some other instruments from around the area.

I have heard that sometimes they take the voice actor’s requests into consideration that apperently out of the 13 (soon to be 14) offical Disney Princesses that only one of them- Tiana is Left handed and that’s was only became the actor Rose (last name) request Tiana to be left handed because Rose herself is left hand. She litereally insisted (twice even!) to make sure thaat Tiana actually looked likea real African-American woman and not Caucasian interpretation of it. The first time was for The Princess and the Frog while the 2nd time was for Ralph Breaks the Internet Beside that that sometimes the animators replica something that the actor does. That when Paige O Hara was voicing Belle for Beauty and the Beast – O’Hara had a habit -of moving her hair which kept falling in her face and the animators incooperate that into Belle’s character. Apperently the Arinna Debose, the voice actor for Asha, the Main Character of WISH when she was vocing Asha she kept dancing around in the recording booth to the point the animators decided to include the dancing into Asha’s character.

Because they’re very throughly on checking carefully about culture about a place and how that sometimes even changes the movie how interesting would it be to have a world either fantasy or a half-fantasy and half something else like Turning Red that takes place in the real world and show a disabled person living their live and being able to go on adventures with supports of some kind. I would find it awesome if there was a fantasy Medvial Ages school and they had something like educational assistant helping the disabled progtangist with like writing or something. They might have to invent an small early version of a comptuer that could help the character write if writing by hand is a problem. Or a fantasy-medival version of a physiotherapist or other kind of supporting programs like speech thepary, or occupational thepary.

But if they do make up a character with a disablilties based on actual people with disablities the main thing that at the end of the movie the disablity does NOT and I repeat does SHOULD NOT be taken away from the character it was part of whom they are espcially if they’re as Lady Gaga puts it “born this way” (Note: don’t screw disabled people over twice like a show did with Molly Burke forgot the name of the show but it was losely based on her but she got screwed over twice-once with not being cast as the main part and then again being screwed over as a blind advisor).

In conclusion these are my thoughts on why Disney should included disablities and how they’re are the perfect company to even start to having animated disabled protaganists in their films and not just as supporting characters but as the hero or heorine of the story the progtaganist. themselves.