The Princess Blog

I have never been a fan of the Descendants franchise , which was originally created by Disney to take down Mattel's semi-successful Ever After High line of dolls, books , and webisodes. It succeeded in this endeavor thanks to  Disney brand recognition  despite being an inferior product. Coming out nearly a decade after the original , we have a fourth Descendants movie entitled The Rise of Red . This movie introduces a new generation of fairy tale offspring with countless changes to the classic stories, most of which are for the worse. Its only redeeming factor was a heartfelt tribute to Cameron Boyce , who played the son of Cruella de Vil in the original films. The Descendants franchise had very little working in its favor from the start, but it at least had a leg up over The School for Good and Evil  by basing the backstories of the Disney characters on their films instead of superimposing an artificial school setting where they learned to be heroes and villains. T...

If you haven't heard the news, Disney is celebrating its princesses all year long with the Ultimate Princess Celebration . They took things a step further this week with the first ever World Princess Week, a week-long celebration dripping with princess merchandise, videos, specials, and music. Disney is a master of grand finales, so the festivities conclude today with a 30-minute special called Disney Princess Remixed: An Ultimate Princess Celebration airing on Disney Channel at 7:30PM PT/ET. The special is available to watch right now on both the Disney Now and Disney Plus apps. It consists of four remixed Disney Princess songs performed by teen Disney Channel stars and ends with the premiere of the official music video for the newest Disney Princess anthem, "Starting Now." Even if you're not a fan modernized Disney remakes , there were still plenty of fun princess things released this week to brighten our day. My favorite aspect of the Ultimate Princess Celebrat...

It's been four years since Disney introduced us to their first Latina princess, Elena of Avalor . Today, her reign on Disney Channel ends as she takes her place on the throne as queen. Elena's show had a rocky start for me , but it hit its peak somewhere  around the second season . Today's finale movie, Coronation Day , serves as an excellent reminder of all the things it did right. Elena of Avalor has an enormous revolving cast of diverse characters, which can make the show hard to follow for a casual observer. Everyone in the series showed up to celebrate Elena's coronation, reminding us how much work went into building this enormous extended universe of kingdoms that began with  Sofia the First . In addition to its evergrowing familia, the show introduced lots of Aztec mythology that I was not familiar with and some fun new mythological creatures like the jaquins, Avalor's answer to Enchancia's flying horses. This is truly the end of an era as it marks the la...

After months of hiatus, Elena of Avalor finally came back today to kick off a steady march toward the series finale on August 23rd. The long periods of time between episodes made it appear as though Elena's arm has been in a cast for nearly six months due to a minor injury that took place in the February episode "Giant Steps."  It was a relief to see that cast finally removed at the end of "The Lightning Warrior"  today. Our Avaloran princess can now be at her peak physical strength for the final confrontation with the evil sorceress Ash. Despite some scheduling complications, "The Lightning Warrior" was a good pick to bring the show back from its hiatus. It was originally scheduled to air after the Mothers Day episode, "Dia de las Madres," which was delayed due to coronavirus complications . That episode will now air next week, with the rest to follow every consecutive Sunday until the finale. Elena's arm wasn't the only that healed...

Reports of recent production delays  made me question whether or not the upcoming Disney+ original movie  Secret Society of Second-Born Royals  was far enough along to premiere this summer as initially promised . Two days ago, I received my answer when a long-anticipated trailer for the action-packed princess flick was finally dropped alongside a release date of July 17th. I was excited about this movie not because I have a preference for princesses who kick butt , but instead because of its lead actress, Peyton Elizabeth Lee , who starred in the brilliant Disney Channel sitcom Andi Mack . Peyton is an endearing and talented actress who will take on the role of Sam, the younger sister of the crown princess of Illyria. Another familiar face in the Secret Society is its teacher,  Skylar Astin , the second actor to take on the role of Greg in Crazy Ex-Girlfriend  that currently portrays the character of Max in another musical drama, Zoey's Extraordinary Pla...

"I'm not one to walk away from a fight when my friends are in danger, no matter what the odds. Just something I picked up from Rapunzel." Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned is a theme that was heavily encoded into the storytelling DNA of Plus Est en Vous , the series finale of Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure. The show formerly known as Tangled: The Series  reached its ultimate conclusion today, neatly tying up loose ends to make way for the "Tangled Ever After" short , where we see Rapunzel and Eugene tie the knot at last. All in all, Plus Est en Vous  was a mediocre finale for such a strong series, but that was primarily due to how the third season was dragged out. In general, I find that shows tend to lose their traction after the second season, which is why many of my favorite shows, such as Princess Gwenevere and the Jewel Riders , ran for two seasons or less. Destinies Collide , the season two finale of Tangled, was the pinnacle of suspense and emot...

I watched today's Elena of Avalor special, The Magic Within , expecting a drawn-out about Elena getting new powers that cause her dress to change color with her emotions using them to win a temporary victory over her current foe, Ash Delgado. All of this happened within the first few minutes, and then I got something I did not expect--Elena coming to terms with her cousin Esteban's deception. Betrayal has been an ongoing theme in princess shows as of late. Last week's Tangled season premier, Rapunzel's Return  saw Rapunzel dealing with the effects of Cassandra's betrayal. The new season of Disenchantment  had Bean struggling with her conflicted feelings after learning that her mother was actually evil. Esteban's betrayal of Elena was a little different from these, however, because it happened long before the beginning of the series. The third season of Elena of Avalor premiered last week and left me underwhelmed compared to the massive revelations in Tang...

There are few season premieres  as anticipated as the third season of Tangled. The season 2 finale, Destinies Collide , left fans with chills as Cassandra betrayed Rapunzel within the final seconds of the episode by snatching the Moonstone Opal right out of her hands. I avoided jumping too deep into the fan theory vortex since only one explanation for Cassandra's actions would ever truly be canon. That explanation came within the opening minutes of today's season premiere, Rapunzel's Return . It was a shocking twist of events, but not one that was completely unfounded . According to series creator Chris Sonnenburg , the final season of this series had been planned since the beginning, which is made clear by Cassandra's character design as well as some subtle foreshadowing in the second season. Let's just say Rapunzel and Cassandra have a lot more in common than they may have thought. For me, the most disappointing thing about Rapunzel's Return  was learn...

Last week, I wrote about how Tangled: The Series would return to Disney Channel on October 7th with a new episode every weekday for two weeks. As it turns out, Rapunzel will not be alone in this endeavor. I'm not sure why it wasn't announced at the time, but we now have official confirmation that new episodes of the third and final season of Elena of Avalor will air alongside Tangled starting October 7th. This news accompanied other announcements about the final season of Elena, such as a list of upcoming guest stars that includes Auli'i Cravalho , the leading voice of Moana, who will also star as Ariel in the upcoming November 5th live special to celebrate the 30th anniversary of The Little Mermaid . Is this girl living the princess dream or what? Elena of Avalor began as a spin-off of Sofia the First  and broke boundaries as the first Latina Disney Princess. She currently does regular meet'n'greets at Walt Disney World alongside Cinderella. The show had a ...

It's been a while since we've heard from Rapunzel or Bean , and their creators seemed to be perfectly happy leaving us hanging. The previous seasons of both Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure and Disenchantment  ended on cliffhangers. Luckily, the story gods have finally heard our desperate pleas as both these shows are coming back from the dead with new episodes less than a month from now! The third and final season of Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure  will premiere on October 7th, and Disenchantment will be back with what they are referring to as  "Part 2"  on September 20th. We've been theorizing and worrying for a long time about the fate of these two princesses, so it's a huge relief to know that it won't be much longer before we learn how they overcome their shocking betrayals. When we last saw Rapunzel, she was feeling hurt and anguished by Cassandra's untimely betrayal. Just when Rapunzel was about to grab the Moonstone Opal and potentiall...

It's hard to get excited about something as cringe-worthy as Descendants , which premiered on Disney Channel in 2015 as a blatant ripoff of Mattel's Ever After High . It was followed up with an even more cringe-worthy sequel in 2017 that barely had any semblance of a plot. These movies seemed like an easy cash-grab to show off the singing and dancing talents of various Disney Channel teens by turning them into rebellious offspring of classic animated Disney characters  who jump around in leather '90s grunge and brightly colored hair. They focused mainly on the villains' kids, with the cliché message that you shouldn't judge people by first impressions. That's all well and good, but there weren't many royal children to demonstrate that princesses aren't always sugar sweet either. The only token princess to fill this role was Audrey, the daughter of Princess Aurora from Disney's  Sleeping Beauty . Instead of being polite and loving, Audrey comes off...

Today I'm going to talk about a show I have barely ever mentioned before in my blog. Star vs. the Forces of Evil  is an animated Magical Girl Princess series that premiered on Disney Channel in 2015. I watched the first few episodes, decided it wasn't my cup of tea, and ignored it for the next four years until they announced that series was about to end. I caught up with the last few episodes leading up to today's finale  so I could determine if it got any better. This is not a traditional review because I don't consider myself a fan of the show. I skipped over most of the episodes leading up to the finale, including the entirety of the second and third seasons. If you are a long-time fan of the series, you are welcome to comment below and correct me on any inaccuracies that you will likely find in this post. I would love to hear about why the show appealed to people in ways that it did not appeal to me. This is Star vs. the Princess Blogger. Game on! My first i...