Erin Edwards
Section Editor
December 2nd, 2019
Warning: Frozen II spoilers ahead.
On November 22nd, Disney released it’s follow-up to the smashing hit Frozen with Frozen II. This continues the empire that Disney has held over society for the last 96 years.
Audiences were left in 2013 with Anna and Elsa returning to Arendelle after defeating Prince Hans and melting Anna’s frozen heart. Olaf, Sven, and Kristoff joined the sisters to rule over the kingdom.
Somehow, I have made it through every Disney movie without shedding a single tear, a fact that I pride myself on. But Frozen II broke this streak for me. I bawled like a baby, but we will get into that later.
Overall, I do not know if there will ever be a movie that tops the original Frozen in my books. Frozen II came close, but there were not as many banger songs as the original movie. The comparison that I make between Disney movies is the music in it, which I feel the original movie excelled in. “Into the Unknown” performed by Idina Menzel/Elsa is quite the track, I did in fact scream-sing the song after the movie with my friend in the car. However, the quality and quantity of songs could not meet that of the original Frozen.
I really enjoyed the storyline of Frozen II as each character worked on improving themselves independently, contrasting from the group mentality of the first film. Anna learned how to live on her own, outside of Elsa’s frigid shadow. Elsa learned how to perfect her powers to do just as she needs. Kristoff found that couples can work independently of each other. The various characters each expressed a different lesson that I think is important for all age groups, whether it is applicable now or later in life.
The most pivotal scene to me came about three quarters of the way through the movie. Elsa freezes to death trying to give Anna important information and, since Elsa was not there to keep Olaf frozen, he ends up melting in Anna’s arms. I do not know what it was but this scene really hit me hard. This was when I started bawling, thinking about how lonely the groups’ lives would be without that happy little snowman and how much joy he had brought to me.
Frozen II came just as Disney unveiled one of their biggest leaps yet – Disney+. The continuation of the Frozen series emphasizes Disney’s everlasting and evolving presence in media. Back in November 2018, Disney CEO Bob Igor announced the name of Disney’s upcoming streaming service, Disney+, and set the release time as late 2019, throwing themselves into the rising streaming war. Disney+ was released as a prototype version available to customers in the Netherlands in September 2019 and the final version was released in three countries on November 12th, 2019, including the US. Instantly, social media platforms blew up with posts from users of all generations, each with a large bout of nostalgia.
Instantly after release, there were issues with the streaming platform. When the platform was dropped, the servers were flooded with eager customers ready to take a trip down Memory Lane. However, since the servers were so congested, Disney+ continuously crashed or buffered when trying to load titles. On November 18th, just six days after the release, thousands of Disney+ accounts were hacked by online thieves, being sold back to customers for $3-$11 each according to CNN Business.
Additionally, the layout of the platform does not seem as user friendly as other streaming services like Netflix. There is no “Currently Watching” section on Disney+ like on Netflix and Hulu for the viewer to resume watching the show or movie that they had paused. When selecting a title that you are currently watching, there is no progress bar or indication of how far through the program the viewer is, which seems minor but threw me off at first.
Furthermore, there are very few procured categories on the homepage like Netflix making it hard to browse content without specifically searching for a specific movie or TV show. Hopefully, these layout issues can be resolved quickly for the aesthetic and ease of the platform.
All in all, it seems as though the current state of Disney+ is a nice foundation for the platform to grow on. Frozen rocked my world and I’ll be sure to watch the movie and blast the sound track a hundred more times.
atholtonnews.com 