Disney Bad Boys

"How do you expect kids to listen to their parents when Tarzan lives half naked, Cinderella comes home at midnight, Pinocchio lies all the time, Aladdin is the king of thieves, Batman drives at 200 mph, Sleeping Beauty is lazy, and Snow White lives with 7 guys? We shouldn't be surprised when kids misbehave; they get it from their storybooks."

I saw this posted on Facebook by a cousin of mine and it sparked a stream of thoughts in my mind as soon as I was done laughing at how true this creative tidbit of logic was.

Recently, I watched Walt Disney’s Tangled and it was about 15 minutes into the movie or rather the first scene involving Flynn Rider that I had a revelation.

(Here, I will pause my revelation for a slight digression.)

As the initial quote of this post indicates, we (those of us who grew up watching everything Disney) have been socialized in a certain way by these movies. With the exception of Batman, these are all films made by Walt Disney Studios. I grew up watching them and many more like them in a routine of something like one a day, in rotation. And as it strongly suggests, I’m sure I learned many lessons, morals and values by watching Disney’s classic and latest creations. (For example, I learned the word idiot from 101 Dalmatians- something my parents were thrilled about.) So upon reading my cousin’s status, the wheels that had been turning as I revisited a few of my favorite Disney movies over the past couple years gained momentum.

(And here is where my digression meets my revelation…)

Disney is just one (albeit a very large contributor) to my bad boy-forbidden love complex. It is not that I actively seek out trouble-making, law-bending, heart-breaking bad boys. I swear! It just so happens that they aren’t very few or far between – at least when I’m around, that is.

Bad boys with a heart of gold. The misunderstood guys who only seem bad. The men who get caught up in bad situations because they choose to stick loyally by their friends who do actively seek out trouble but can’t handle the heat alone. The rebels without a cause.

These are the men I expect and hope for when I meet a "bad boy"…. I am always wrong.

I’ve seen them all, all except the ones listed above. Every one has ended the same way. There was no seemingly divine revelation where everyone who warned me I’d get hurt sees what I see and realizes he really is a nice, good guy. There was no turn-around where the guy leaves his wild, reckless, misunderstood ways behind (or mostly behind ;-) )  for the love of an honest woman a.k.a. me. Nope! Those who warned me were right, the guy stayed the same or likely got worse, and I got hurt and/or was left alone.

But as Flynn Rider – a thieving riff-raff hooligan – races across the screen, my heart rate picks up, my excitement builds and my crush on Flynn Rider begins and grows like so many men before him (although the majority of these men have thankfully been made of flesh rather than animated sketches). From that point on, my heart is his. I root for him. My attachment for him only growing as bad guys chase him, as he reluctantly helps the pretty blond with such long hair and just as hesitantly falls in love, as he reveals his sensitive, vulnerable side and his past.

This is the sequence of events I’ve grown up, for the most part, expecting only to find: if a guy seems like or is labeled a “bad boy,” it is not conducive to them later being discovered as a “bad boy with a heart of gold.” They are most likely going to stay a bad boy and will most likely break my heart just a little.

I keep thinking I’m meeting a Flynn Rider, an Aladdin, a Tramp, a Pinocchio, or a Peter Pan and finding out the hard way that that is not the case…Thanks, Walt.