Overthinking 'The Little Mermaid': 15 Questions You Never Thought to Ask as a Child

We rewatched Disney's The Little Mermaid — the 1989 film that launched the Disney Renaissance — and came away with questions. Among them:

1. Is Ursula's contract enforceable against a minor? 2. Ariel is sixteen; does Triton's kingdom have emancipation law? 3. Why does a mermaid own a fork museum but not know what a fork is called? 4. Sebastian is a court composer; who is paying him? 5. 'Les Poissons' is sung while cooking Sebastian's countrymen — is the palace chef a war criminal? 6. How does Max the sheepdog survive a shipwreck no human notices? 7. If Eric's kingdom is coastal, why is nobody else curious about the singing from the sea?

8. Where do Ariel's sisters stand on the whole trading-your-voice thing? 9. Scuttle identifies objects with total confidence and zero accuracy — media literacy metaphor? 10. Why does Ursula, a self-employed witch, have better contract lawyers than the crown? 11–15: assorted concerns about fire safety on wedding barges.

Hans Christian Andersen's 1837 original, it should be said, answers none of these and adds several darker ones — his mermaid gets knives in her feet and no wedding. Disney's rewrite remains the gentlest thing ever done to the story, singing crustacean war crimes notwithstanding.