Kristoff from Frozen is Emotionally Abusive*
*or, “The Anatomy of Clickbait.”
Start with a click-bait-y title. Here we have a beauty: Frozen is well known all over the world, emotional abuse is a charged subject, and I even managed to get one of the characters’ names right. Then I say something like:
Frozen is a wholesome, if sometimes gratingly catchy, Disney film that charmed audiences back in 2013, with a follow-up in 2019. It seems like a wholesome story of girl meets boy, other boy, reindeer, talking snowman, non-talking snowman, sister, sword, magic, and then falls in love with that other boy, but also learns the power of family. But is the Anna’s romance with Kristoff so simple?
It’s the classic set up of “say a bunch of things people agree with, then ask a rhetorical question to make them doubt everything said so far.” No one wants to seem dumb. They don’t want to feel like they can’t see where this is going. Which is why it’s easy to lead into the next section:
Sure, the film pays lip service to issues of abusive relationships with the character of Hans, with whom Anna has great chemistry at the beginning of the film and sings a great duet with, only to learn later that he’s willing to manipulate Anna into loving him then let her die to take her kingdom. But that’s the kind of showy super-villainy that doesn’t impact real audiences, and it’s clearly portrayed as wrong because of the attempted murder and lack of follow-up to that early duet. The much more troubling examples come from Kristoff, who is played off as a more grounded, kind character, but is just as guilty of playing with Anna’s emotions.
Again, a thing we agree with, and then following that up with some new stuff that makes a reader questions their notions of the story. It helps to minimize counterarguments early on with phrases that say: “yeah, that doesn’t really matter. Everybody KNOWS this is bad.” After that, it’s just a matter of finding small pieces of evidence that could support the “hot take” and citing them as gospel. For instance:
Think about how Kristoff tells Anna he “doesn’t trust her judgment” because “who marries a man they just met?!” Given the romance that sparks between Anna and Kristoff, it’s hard to take this as anything else than jealousy. Bitter much? He seems to think he can neg Anna into a relationship, and worse, it works! Then there’s the moment where, after Anna narrowly evades death in Kristoff’s crashing sleigh, his entire focus is on the sleigh, shouting, “I just paid that off!” There’s a human woman in front of you, pal! Maybe treat her with some of the consideration you show to your whip. Caring about Anna only when it’s convenient sure sounds a lot like that other villain in the movie.
Last, it’s time to take something you thought you knew and understood and pull the rug out from under you:
Some Kristoff stans may point to his awkward scene at the end asking permission for a kiss from Anna as evidence that he’s really sweet and adorable: “I could kiss you! I-I could. I mean, I'd like to—may I? We me? I mean, may we—wait, what?” But isn’t this a little too familiar? This is the kind of stumbling, cutesy behavior we’re used to from Anna. So why is Kristoff doing it? Mimicking another person’s behavior is called “mirroring” and is a favorite trick of slimy pick-up artists who want to seem like they have a lot in common with a potential target. If this is the kind of trick that Kristoff likes to pull, it’s no wonder Elsa had to save Anna: Kristoff’s “true love” could be just as much a trick as Hans’ but better hidden. And what kind of lesson is that for kids?
Then tomorrow it’s trending on Buzzfeed.
Look, there’s nothing wrong with reading a character in a new way, or trying to point out potentially harmful messages in stories everyone thinks they know. One of my favorite web-series to watch in college was Cracked.com’s After Hours, where most of the episodes did just that: read heroes as villains, silly things as serious, and vice versa. It’s a fun brain exercise. The problem with “hot takes” is taking them as gospel, because that’s just replacing one simplistic reading with another. Good is bad. Bad is good. Putting that aside and looking at nuances: characters who are heroic with serious flaws, or villainous with some redeeming features means reconciling good with bad and seeing the whole picture.
That’s the work of an invested reader, and it’s more complicated than just playing
“gotcha” with a fictional character.
But if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to my fan-fic where Belle sees that Gaston really loved and supported her all along, and Beast is locked up for kidnapping. Later.