Noma Dumezweni as Queen Selina, Eric's adoptive mother and the ruler of a Caribbean island kingdom. She is a new character for the film. Dumezweni was announced to have been cast on January 5, 2021.
Actress Noma Dumezweni is a confirmed cast member of the 2023 live-action remake of The Little Mermaid, but the part she will be playing remains a mystery. All that has been revealed is that her character is new to the remake and wasn't part of the original 1989 animated film.
Ariel is the seventh-born and the youngest daughter of King Triton and the late Queen Athena of the merfolk, and over the course of the original film becomes human and marries Eric, a human prince. She is the only Disney Princess to reach parenthood in Disney's animated film canon.
At the beginning of the film, we're introduced to a rainbow collection of mermaids, from Asian to African – in what made-up a kind of all lives matter pool of mermaids. And then Queen Selina, Eric's adopted mother, played by Noma Dumezweni, is also a Black woman (who does not have a Black king as a husband).
There are several instances when Eric's mother Queen Salina (Noma Dumezweni), who is Black and adopted him as a child when he washed up from the ocean, chastises him for his obvious love for beings that are considered other.
MOANA Live Action - Official Trailer (2024) Zendaya, Dwayne Johnson | Disney+
Where are Eric's parents in The Little Mermaid?
In the live-action version, all of that changes. We learn that Eric, now played by John Hauer-King, is not a prince by birth— he was adopted by the king and queen. It's suggested that Eric's biological parents died in a shipwreck.
What happened to Ariel's mother in Little mermaid?
While it is known that her mother perished, there is no story attached to the event. However, much later, in 2008, an animated The Little Mermaid prequel revealed that Ariel's mother was crushed by a pirate ship during an altercation between humans and merpeople.
One theory is that each of Ariel's sisters represents different oceans that are home to various cultures and ethnicities. It's pretty problematic to have mermaids who all look the same representing such an expansive underwater world.
In the revamped version of the musical developed by Glenn Casale in 2012, Ursula and Triton's backstory was changed, making her the youngest of seven sisters like Ariel. Unlike Ariel, she was not a beautiful mermaid like her sisters and was despised and ignored by their father Poseidon while her sisters were adored.
Selina is an original character written for the film, and she is played by Noma Dumezweni. She is a human queen and the adoptive mother of Prince Eric. She has dark skin and curly hair, and she wears elegant gowns and jewelry.
She is born a mermaid and, because of magic, is transformed into a full-blooded human for the limited time span of three days (if she doesn't get the prince to kiss her), if she does get the Prince to kiss her, she would stay human permanently.
Morgana is a villainess who appears in The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea. She is the infamous younger sister of Ursula and the older sister of Ulyana, but Ursula is worse than Morgana.
One unexplored theme in the original film is the story of Queen Athena, Ariel's mother. While she is mentioned a few times in the production, it is not entirely clear what happened to her. Truth is, this queen's tragic story was a turning point in Atlantica and influenced the way King Triton raised their daughters.
Rather, Ursula's appearance is radically different from her family, and she sports tentacles that look like a permanent black dress. It's possible Ursula is not a mermaid in appearance because she and Triton did not have the same mother or father. If they're half siblings, Ursula's tentacles make more sense.
Ariel is the youngest daughter of King Triton and Queen Athena of an underwater kingdom of merfolk called Atlantica. She is often rebellious, and in the first film, she longs to be a part of the human world.
The backstory of Ariel and Eric's daughter. Let's break. down the tale of a princess who was half human and. half mermaid: the adventurous, kind, and brave.
In the 1989 movie, Ariel was born in the fictional underwater kingdom of Atlantica, which technically makes her Atlantican, not Danish. As Ariel is half fish, she cannot be categorized by our ethnicities and races.
Scuttle is not only changed from male to female but is also now a diving bird instead of a seagull. "This was done specifically so that Ariel would only meet Scuttle underwater, because, at the start of our story, Ariel has never dared go above the surface," director Rob Marshall said in production notes.
Triton tosses Melody's locket into the sea and departs. Ariel and Eric then have a large sea wall constructed around the castle to separate the two worlds. Melody, 12 years later. Melody grows up as an ordinary human princess, unaware of her Atlantican ancestry, and banned from entering the sea.
“There's so much you can do with tentacles. They give a creepy feeling,” supervising animator Ruben Aquino told Premiere magazine in 1989, adding the team ultimately decided to make her look like an octopus.
Though it looked like King Triton was dead, Ariel's defeat of Ursula resurrected him. It's possible Ursula held merpeople captive for eternity, but the spell was no longer active after her death, setting Triton free of the contract and restoring him to full health.
However, towards the bottom of the chart are some very young couples, including The Little Mermaid's, Ariel and Eric, who are just 16 and 18, and the youngest, other that Snow White, being Aladdin's Jasmine who is only 15-year-old, who is with 18-year-old Aladdin.
The movie itself does not explicitly state Ariel's age, but Disney's production notes for the film shared by Yahoo! describe the lead character as a "spirited 18-year-old." The evidence behind Ariel being aged up two years compared to the animated movie can be seen in the live-action remake.
The connection between 'The Little Mermaid', 'Frozen', 'Tarzan', and Tangled' Prince Eric from the Little Mermaid is the brother to Anna and Elsa from frozen, and Tarzan, and they're all cousins to Repunzel from Tangled.
