Top 4 Unconventional Heroes From Disney

I like making lists about unconventionality, so let's have another one! Here's a list of times Disney chose a completely different protagonist than you might expect.

Wall•e from Wall•e
       Most robot movies or even near-future movies featuring robots are about the humans, but not Wall•e. For this movie, Disney chose a small and innocent trash robot who accidentally manages to find exactly what all humanity's scanner robots never could.

       The other unconventional and interesting thing about Wall•e is that he doesn't have a fatal flaw or a character arc. Instead, he sets off arcs in the other characters. Eva, the captain, and every other person he touches in this movie is changed from spending time around him.

Marlin from Finding Nemo
       The interesting thing about Finding Nemo is that the hero is not Nemo.

       Sure, Nemo gets his own storyline and POV, but it's not about him. It's about his father Marlin, who's leaving his comfort zone, trying his hardest, risking his life to find him. Nemo manages to escape a fish tank and get back into the ocean, because if he hadn't he might never have been found at all, but Marlin makes the journey it halfway around the world to get him.

Chihiro from Spirited Away
       Any Studio Ghibli fans out there? To me, Chihiro is such an unconventional protagonist because she's so young. I don't know how old she's supposed to be, but at the very beginning of the movie, she acts like a bad-tempered six-year-old.

       Getting stuck in the spirit realm forces her to start thinking like a grownup. Yeah, other people help her set up her new life there, but when it comes down to it, she always has to do the most important parts herself. As the movie progresses, she grows more and more mature, and soon starts acting more like a hero than a little girl. I think the strange choice of protagonist is my favorite thing about this movie.

Ralph from Wreck-It Ralph
       One of my all-time favorite movies!!! Ralph is a very unusual character, not just because he's complicated and multi-layered, but also because he's the villain. Unlike the movie Maleficent, where they took a pre-existing story and looked at it from a different angle, in Wreck-it Ralph they took the POV of the bad guy to start with.

       In this movie, Ralph is the bad guy of his game, and while all the other game villains in the arcade are fine and even happy with their way of life, he wants to find a way to be liked. Besides that, he's temperamental, funny, and somehow a halfway decent mentor to Vanellope, a 'mistake' character from another game who wants the same thing as him. Man, this is just such a great movie. <3

To wrap up...

If you want to come up with great, unconventional heroes, it's easy: Take a look at what's normally done, then take a peek just outside of the spotlight. Characters that might traditionally be sidekicks? Mentors? Top generals to the villain? Any of them could become a protagonist. I mean, how cool would it be to tell a story about what's going on inside the mentor's head as he's trying to prepare the champion for battle? I would read the heck out of that book.

And I'm not saying there's anything wrong with traditional heroes either. Some of the best ones- like Indiana Jones, Captain Kirk, Batman- are what could be called traditional heroes, and there's nothing plain or boring about them. Any character, when given enough life, can be spectacular.

Now go! Write your heroes!

Who's your favorite Disney hero? Who's your favorite Disney villain? Let's talk in the comments!

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