Are all your favourite villains gay? By Libby Driscoll
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In case you aren’t quite convinced yet, I will break down a few of the villains I have mentioned. Ursula is perhaps the clearest example. Her character design was inspired by Divine, the legendary drag queen, with eyebrows, makeup, and a low, husky voice to match. She also possesses negative stereotypes associated with queerness: jealousy, over-sexualisation and obsession with appearance. Similarly, look at the trope of the ‘sissy villain’, covering Hades, Jafar, Scar, and Captain Hook – they are all very flamboyant, sassy, and weaker than their counterparts. Even more clearly, Governor Ratcliffe from Pocahontas is very vain, wears bows in his hair, is obsessed with gold and glitter, and hates physical labour – he is even the only character to wear bright pink!
hink of a villain. Any villain. Let’s start basic, maybe a Disney villain. Who comes to mind? Ursula, Maleficent, Scar, Cruella De Vil, Captain Hook? You’ll find all of these characters have certain common traits that aren’t shared by their heroic counterparts. They’re flamboyant and camp, with stereotypically queer personalities and appearances. This is called ‘queer coding’ when an author or director assigns a character stereotypically queer traits without specifically labelling their identity. While this may sound perfectly harmless, and perhaps it has created many of our favourite characters, it does create a dangerous association between queerness and villainy that can be instilled at an early age, especially in the case of Disney films.
Queer Coded Villain Queen Ursula from The Little Mermaid character design was inspired by the drag artist Devine
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