Tag: folklore

Warning: Potential Spoilers For Frozen 2 Ahead!

The fact that I’m even writing a post about Frozen fan theories says a lot about just how different this sequel is expected to be from the 2013 musical we all know and love. If I had tried to write something similar back then, it probably would have boiled down to: “um, I’m getting the feeling there might be a catchy song and a snowman”. These days, though, we’ve got pages worth of ancient Nordic runes, Scandinavian magic and epic assumptions to scroll through.

Firstly, because this has nothing to do with the rest of the post but is still important to me, I completely overlooked the fact, in my initial Frozen 2 trailer reaction, that Disney released said trailer for their Autumn-themed Frozen sequel on the first day of Autumn: that’s a not-so-subtle nuance that really shouldn’t have escaped my attention, but did. Just thought I should point that out, since it’s a clever little thing that I would have praised, had I been paying attention to the calendar.

Anyway, moving on! We have, surprisingly, quite a lot to talk about in this post: the first Frozen movie might have been a relatively one-dimensional story about an unbreakable bond between sisters and the power of true love, but its sequel is heading in a completely different direction: into the unknown. From here on out, you can trade in your expectations of singing snowmen and dancing trolls for a more bleak, introspective vision of war, dark magic, and the attack of the Autumn leaves (which sounds like a parody of a bad 1950’s horror movie, but whatever).

It looks, from Disney’s hints and fans’ speculation, that the big question we all had after the first movie will finally be answered in some capacity: why, exactly, does Queen Elsa have the power to manipulate ice and wintry climates? How did her parents know about her magic, and how did they know exactly what to do when Elsa nearly killed her own sister with an icicle? How did they know about the trolls? And because they technically died off-screen, are we sure they’re not really still alive?

All of these questions look like they might get answered, because all of them seem to be intertwined with each other. There’s a lot of stuff going on in this latest trailer alone, and, combined with the previous trailer and the initial teaser, we actually have a pretty solid idea of what might be going on in Frozen 2. Let’s go through it all.

Firstly, what is Elsa? Well, so far, the trailers have been hinting that Elsa is wondering that too, and that she’s been receiving strange visions and hearing mysterious voices in her head: she stares off wistfully toward the north, out past the borders of her country, and she receives a visit from a spectral snowflake that leads her astray, dancing wildly, into the wilderness beyond the walls of Arendelle. This bobbing light has much in common with the will-o’-the-wisp of European folklore; a ghostly lamp that guides unwary travelers off the beaten path and into danger. Since Frozen takes place somewhere in a roughly Norwegian-inspired fantasy setting, we can safely assume that the basis for this particular wisp might be the Hessdalen lights, which have been sighted in Norway for about the last years – but there’s also a strong chance that Disney’s creative team is inspired by the legends of phantom horses such as the kelpie and nøkk, whom we’ll talk about a little later.

Wherever the mystery light comes from, it causes Elsa to lose control of herself and accidentally cause a blast of ice-magic that drops hovering, diamond-shaped crystals over Arendelle; diamond-shaped crystals which may or may not be marked with ancient Norse runes signifying the four seasons, and the elements of earth, air, water and fire (for more on that, see here). It’s hard to tell, but this might happen at the same time as the sudden gust of wind that sends Autumn leaves cascading through the city streets, and the strange purple flame that blows up all the streetlamps: the flames look very much like the ones that later encircle Elsa in the enchanted forest, and its erratic nature seems to bear much in common with the will-o’-the-wisp at first, at least until you take a closer look at Norwegian folklore and uncover the little-known (but fascinating) myth of the revontulet, or “fire fox”. A tiny Arctic fox scampering across the sky so fast that the sparks from his tail cause the Northern Lights to appear, the fox is also a manifestation of winter, with some versions of the story suggesting the “sparks” are in fact snowflakes. It might not be a coincidence that the Northern Lights themselves have actually shown up a few times in the trailers for Frozen 2, with Elsa and Anna’s mother seen staring out the window at them in a flashback sequence. For more about the significance of the Northern Lights in folklore, see here.

Elsa and Anna’s mother is, herself, an interesting character. It’s been teased that the sisters’ now deceased parents might have known more than they let on, and I’m beginning to suspect that the mother, especially, had a very intriguing backstory. In this new trailer, we see her watching with a curious expression while her husband, King Agnarr, recounts the story of the enchanted forest to their daughters: she pauses at the door, maybe smiling, maybe saddened, before leaving the room – almost as if she knows a part of the story that even Agnarr doesn’t. But Agnarr certainly seems to know a lot: from the flashback sequence that plays over his narration, it looks like he lived in the enchanted forest as a young man – or was stationed there as a soldier, since everyone there seems to be wearing military uniform. In the flashback, a swirl of Autumn leaves dancing in the wind catches his eye, and leads him to a glade in the forest where a girl appears to be using magic to fly. And if I’m not mistaken, that girl, who everybody thought might be Anna’s daughter when she showed up in the first teaser, is actually Anna and Elsa’s mother, Queen Iduna – and that means Agnarr is the boy we glimpsed flying through the air with her, too. Which means that, assuming that was Idunna’s magic and not the inherent magic of the forest, Elsa inherited her power from her mother; just in a slightly different form.

But it’s not that simple. Agnarr’s narration is quite obviously edited to hide a secret (probably the “that’s where I met your mother” moment), but he also doesn’t say what caused him and the rest of his people to leave the enchanted forest. But again, I have some guesses, and I’m kind of excited, because it looks like Disney might – might – be going in a very unexpected direction with this story. One of the most interesting new snippets of material in this trailer is a flashback where people dressed in the military uniform of Arendelle are seen fighting others clad in the heavy furs of the indigenous Sámi peoples of Scandinavia. Could it be that Disney is attempting a fantasy allegory for the real-life persecution of the Sámi by the Norwegian and Swedish governments – a wide-spread persecution that spanned several centuries, during which the native peoples were exiled from their ancestral homelands, converted to Christianity, burned at the stake for witchcraft, and robbed of their culture: to this day, the damage done to the Sámi has not been made up for, and countries such as Sweden and Finland continue to stamp on their freedoms, and use their lands for mining, wiping out the reindeer that the Sámi depend upon to live: speaking of reindeer, an entire herd of them is seen in the Frozen 2 trailers, adopting Sven into their ranks and riding into battle. Is it possible that the battle we see in the trailer is partly inspired by this historical tragedy, and that that is the reason why Agnarr says the people of the enchanted forest hid themselves from the rest of the world, behind a wall of magical mist, never to be seen again? Is that why Iduna, possibly a Sámi herself, seems so sad when she hears the story? If Disney is doing this, and can pull it off with some degree of sensitivity and logic, it could make this movie a very important one indeed: if done wrong, well…it could become another Pocahontas.

The Sámi also have a rich magical history, one that could easily make the move to the big screen: in their culture, men and women known as noaidis acted as shamans and guardians of the community, using magic and meditation to speak with spirits and ward off evil. In the trailer, we catch a glimpse of a woman with long gray hair who appears to act as a noaidi for the enchanted forest, questioning Anna and Elsa about their own magic. We also see a man, Lieutenant Matthias, who is dressed in the Arendelle uniform but is quite clearly living in the forest, and is quite friendly with the rest of his people. Did he choose to stay there because he saw the error of his ways? Or does he have a different purpose? It’s hard to say just yet. For more information on the history of the Sámi, see here.

Whatever Elsa might find out in the forest, she is probably not the only one who wants to find it: somebody, or something, is coming after her, and is using magic to do so. We see a large giant made of stone, possibly one of the Stallo of Sámi folklore, chasing Anna and Kristoff through the woods, and hunting for Elsa at night, while she cowers behind a tree. The “fire fox” could also be an enemy, assuming it’s not one of Elsa’s accidents. In the teaser, we saw its pink flames encircling Elsa and Olaf in a heart shape; in the first trailer, it was seen leaping from tree to tree, spreading rapidly, and we also got a quick look at its aftermath – a burned out clearing in the woods, and Elsa hunched over in the ashes and snow, crying, while Anna came slowly to her side; before being abruptly carried out of the scene by Kristoff, who appeared to be trying to save her from Elsa. Now, something that I think is pretty important to note is that in between the fire starting and the fire ending, Olaf disappears. I’m not saying that he gets melted, but…well, actually, that is what I’m saying. Obviously, he’d probably be brought back to life soon enough (Elsa being a walking ice-machine and all), but a tragic death scene would certainly raise the stakes and remind us that this isn’t the Frozen we thought we knew.

As for what happens in the third act, when all is said and done, I can’t even hazard a guess, but I feel pretty certain that the scenes of Elsa’s underwater battle with the horse, Anna’s captivity in the cave, and all of that amazing ice-magic imagery from the new trailer might come from the latter part of the movie, as Elsa unlocks her full potential and gains new purpose, understanding whatever it is she has to do in order to save Arendelle from…whoever or whatever her enemy is.

But why, you ask, is she fighting an underwater battle with a horse? Well, I’m glad you asked, because I have an answer. That horse is in fact a Nøkk, a creature very similar to the kelpie of Scottish legend: a male water-spirit taking the form of a horse, the nøkk is a master of music and magic, a malevolent phantom that carries its victims into the ocean to drown – something it clearly tries to do to Elsa in the trailer, holding her underwater with its hoofs, before Elsa responds with a blast of ice magic. But it looks like Elsa is eventually able to tame this nøkk; possibly, as in the legends, by using his true name. Does this mean that Elsa will also be allowed to learn the enchanting song of the nøkk, which bestows its singer with the power to basically mind control your enemies?

So…what are your ideas? Am I overthinking everything, or is there a possibility that Disney is, in fact, drawing on the depths of Scandinavian folklore for this new movie? Share your own thoughts and theories in the comments below!