What’s so Good About Merida from Brave?

Merida – the red-headed princess of Scotland who is most of the time irritated of her demanding mother Elinor insisting her to become the perfect princess of their own country. From the movie Brave, you’d be surprised that she is not just a typical princess we all expect. She is not like Sleeping Beauty who forever waits for her prince charming’s kiss, or even Cinderella who also waits for her own prince charming to come rescue her from her dreadful stepmother and stepsisters. Merida is very different, different among the Disney princess. I could connect her somewhat to Mulan, an average woman who chooses to replace her weak father to fight for war and save China. She is a Disney princess – a brave one. Same goes to Merida, a brave one. She made mistakes, she was able to correct it all, plus she saved her transformed mother from the hideous bear. I want to point out the kagandang-loob I found in her after watching the movie.

First, the movie actually led us to the information that she is a princess. And we all know that a princess has to act like a real princess. She has to be gentle, classy, demure, and definitely not hard-headed. Merida doesn’t want to act like one. She wanted to be free out of the castle and go to the woods to do her favorite thing – archery. But despite her desire for freedom, she openly accepted everything what her mother teaches her. She did her responsibility as a princess even she doesn’t like it at all.

Second, I read an article about what makes Merida “brave,” and according to Stephanie Medley-Rath, Merida’s fate is to marry one of the princes from the other clans to keep the peace. Well, the “brave” thing about Merida is she had successfully avoided the arranged marriage contact. The whole movie did not revolve around the fact that Merida falling in love or getting married. She wanted to do something more for herself. The kagandahang-loob I establish here may not be for others, but for herself. Her honesty that she showed to everyone who she truly is and it is not about pleasing others. Her beauty outshined.

Lastly, from the film, she was very annoyed by her mother, demanding her to marry one of the sons of the Lords, although her mother only wanted what’s good for her daughter and for their kingdom. Merida went to a witch, asks for to create a spell to change her mother and to change her fate as well. It turned out that her mother became a bear. One of the qualities I love about her is her willingness to correct things right. The spell thought us a very powerful lesson, “Fate be changed, look inside. Mend the bond torn by pride.” Both Merida and Queen Elinor changed. She saved her mother from her transformation of being a bear, from the clans of her father, and from the monstrous bear. It’s called – selflessness.

“We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.”
– Winston Churchill