Isn't this a continuity goof?? - The Little Mermaid (1992) Discussion

[–] atomicseasoning 16 years ago

Yeah I think so too. Most of the episodes were rather cool in their own way (especially the ones where Ariel crosses paths with Prince Eric early on w/o actually meeting him yet , and the one where she met Hans Christian Andersen in a metal fish, and the eps w/Ursula), however in in reference to the film there are many continuity errors.

Not only were Ariel's interactions with Ursula premature vs the film, but also her relationship with Sebastian was much more common than in the film. I think in the film, Sebastian hadn't normally hung out with Ariel and Flounder than much & thus didn't know about her grotto of human treasures, and Ariel hadn't had much contact with Ursula until the film. (Esp. never to have entered Ursula's cave like in the final episode of the TV program 'Ariel's Treasures.')

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[–] 16 years ago

[deleted]

[–] gurgitoy2 16 years ago

You're right. In the movie when Flotsam and Jetsam mention Ursula, Ariel's first reaction is shock, and she says "The sea witch??". So, she obviously knew who she was, and if the movie were the only thing to go by, she at least knew her reputation, if not already interacted with her. So, the saries seemed to fit in the continuity. I do agree about the Sebastian part. Because when King Triton tells Sebastian to keep an eye on her...he is upset about having to look after a teenager...but in the series he pals around with her all the time...so yeah...

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[–] LoriPettyfan 16 years ago

In the movie, Ariel knew who Ursula, but she was deseperate to turn human, so she went to see her.

I would assume the first time she met Ursula, would be in the series.

http://dantheman0531.blogspot.com

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[–] thelegallywicked 11 years ago

She actually only appears in 4 episodes which is not that shocking seeing there were unfortunately only 31 episodes. However in her first 2 episodes they try to keep her and Ariel from interacting completely that way it could simply just be implied that Ariel had met her but was afraid of her when she is given the offer of being human in the movie. However in the later 2 appearances she does interact fully with her. I think it still works out ok in the long run.

The entire show is also taken out of the movie universe thanks to the lousy prequel movie Ariel's beginning because they changed how Ariel and Flounder meet. They also ignore the fact there is music, and certain characters are not there and others are.

It's not as confusing as watching Hercules where Hercules meeting Hades makes no sense as a midquel because Hades had no idea that Hercules was alive until after he had become a hero.

The only one of the cartoons to have a good continuation was Aladdin.

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[–] otness_e 10 years ago

Yes, and the prequel movie in question was lousy in regards to actually keeping continuity. I mean, come on, Ariel made music legal again, and she has to wait a full year before her sisters to join their band (and missed her debut appearance to plunder a sunken ship, no less), Flounder's change between that film and the first is completely unexplained, there's no hint at what happened between Triton and Ursula, Ariel doesn't even develop her interest in humanity in that film, which makes how she even became interested in humanity in the first film a plothole (and considering she had enough of an interest to secretly build up her collection with what is implied to be a huge amount of human artifacts, such a thing was a really big instance of dropping the ball), and if Marina visiting the surface is anything to go by, there isn't even a ban on surfacing. Honestly, the only things they actually got right in the film are that Ariel's the youngest of her sisters, and Ariel's rebellious streak, and the latter was solely because Jodi Benson fought to retain it (originally, they actually planned to make her more contemporary). Honestly, at least the TV series made sure it was in continuity with the movie (and given it was made by the same guys who actually made the movie, its not much of a surprise), and even Ursula's encounter with Ariel was already implied in the movie. The people who made Ariel's Beginning really should be ashamed with themselves for wrecking continuity. At best, this would qualify as a prequel to the Atlantica level for Kingdom Hearts, not the actual TLM series proper.

I won't say that Ariel's Beginning replaced the TLM TV series, as honestly, there's literally no way it could act as a true prequel to the first movie thanks to the amount of errors it had.

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[–] ZeoRangerFive 8 years ago

The only one of the cartoons to have a good continuation was Aladdin.

The only reason Aladdin had good continuity was because it was a sequel series, so unless they had gone back and changed something from the first or second films then they could make up whatever they wanted. Little Mermaid and Hercules were prequels and midquels so if they wanted certain characters in them then they had to change the continuity and that ruined everything.

Dragonzord! Mastodon! Pterodactyl! Triceratops! Saber Toothed Tiger! Tyrannosaurus!

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[–] otness_e 8 years ago

The only reason Aladdin had good continuity was because it was a sequel series, so unless they had gone back and changed something from the first or second films then they could make up whatever they wanted. Little Mermaid and Hercules were prequels and midquels so if they wanted certain characters in them then they had to change the continuity and that ruined everything.

In all fairness, at least with original film for TLM, it was implied that Ariel had encountered Ursula before, or at least heard of her (when Flotsam and Jetsam tried to goad Ariel into going to see Ursula to make her dreams come true, Ariel instantly recognized Ursula as being the sea witch and clearly refused to go.), so Ariel and Ursula encountering each other in the TV series is somewhat plausible (besides, the first few times Ursula appeared in episodes, Ariel never actually encountered her, and only really fought her near the series' end.). It's better than the bit regarding Hades and Hercules at least, where it was made clear that they never even met each other until nearly halfway through the film (in fact, Hades never even knew Herc was still alive until the latter exposed his powers for the first time, and Herc likewise never seemed to even hear about Hades at all).

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[–] Boricanator 9 years ago

I always saw this show as a spinoff, not a prequel. The same goes for the Hercules series, Aladdin, Timon and Pumba and any other series that came from a disney animated film in the 1980s and 1990s.

I enjoy them better when I see it that way.

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[–] otness_e 9 years ago

If it were merely a "spinoff", I doubt the writers would have cared about ensuring Ariel and Eric not getting any direct visuals on each other, not to mention meeting each other.

In fact, the TV series was surprising continuity-mindful especially compared to the above (save for possibly Aladdin, and even that was basically caused by Return of Jafar).

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[–] Andthatismytwocents 9 years ago

Disney's approach to the film ESPECIALLY at this time was indifferent
Continuity issues started with the Storm ep Ariel is using a utensil regardless what it was made from as a fork AND it looks like one

Sebastain put on a puppet show AND what does Ariel do when she sees puppets in the film?

AND Sebastain knew about Ariel's grotto small and large
and lastly quote 'I never seen a human this close up before" (more or less) YET in Metal Fish..........................

A side note Peter David wrote most of the first comics dealing with Ariel and in The Hunt For The Red Mermaid a scientist builds the equivilant of a submarine a tries to capture Ariel only to stop after she saves him he blacken the glass on his sub so no one could see the human inside

And slightly off topic during the American Revolution a man named David Bushnell designed a submersable veichle the Turtle for planting explosives on British ships
Way ahead of it's time the craft did not do well to to technical limitations at the time

So the concept of the craft in the comics and TV show was not just pure whimsey It worked better there then in real life

cause that's Hollywood

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[–] otness_e 9 years ago

In all fairness, the fork thing was a problem even in the original movie since the fork and trident do look somewhat similar.

And as far as Sebastian, they kind of addressed that issue by having Ariel blow up her first grotto in the penultimate episode, so it can be explained away that Sebastian believed the collection to be destroyed and Ariel stopped doing a collection.

As far as Metal Fish, technically Anderson was obstructed by glass, while the sailors actually were out in the open, so she may have meant "this close and in the open."

Besides, there have been plenty of franchises that had lots of canonical stuff despite it having wonky continuity. Just look at the old Expanded Universe of Star Wars, for example. Or heck, even the Metal Gear games (and those had even worse continuity, being particularly infamous for Kojima constantly retconning his story with each installment, especially the stories of the MSX2 games).

Besides, it still doesn't change the fact that of all the things the writers did with the series, they made sure that at the very least, Eric and Ariel directly encountering each other in the episodes was avoided to keep continuity to the film.

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[–] watcher101 9 years ago

It was never stated or even implied that Ariel's meeting with Ursula was the first time they met. If you exclude the series, they knew each other by reputation, if you include the series, then they knew each other from having met before. It works either way, so no, it's not a continuity error. There's only one continuity error, and that's on the episode Evil Manta where Ariel has a flashback to how she met Flounder, which is slightly different from Ariel's Beginning (nothing major, just their ages and their reactions to meeting each other). Other then that, the series fits in perfectly fine with all 3 movies, and even has Easter Eggs connecting them. So we can just dismiss Ariel's flashback as not being accurate with how she actually met Flounder and there's no problem.

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[–] Andthatismytwocents 8 years ago

Actually there are conntinuity issues only supporting the love /HATE relationship Disney has with the film

How Ariel met Flounder (counting Ariel's Beginning there are THREE different origins)

Ariel is at a Dinner Table UNDERWATER using what is CLEARLY a fork thougn made out of rock or coral

In the film Ariel states I've Never seen a human this close up before

YET in Metal Fish...........

Plus Ariel's Friend Archimedes is better versed in Humanology then Scuttle

But the episode that prove continuity issues was Thingamajiger

At the end Ariel takes the boots tooa secret Trove Stands to reason she started small and eventually had to find a bigger cave

BUT Sebastain knows about the first one The film he did not

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[–] otness_e 8 years ago

How Ariel met Flounder (counting Ariel's Beginning there are THREE different origins)

Actually, that storybook thing from your description was pretty similar to the Evil Manta episode's rendition of their first meeting so I'm not entirely sure it's three times, more like two at best.

Ariel is at a Dinner Table UNDERWATER using what is CLEARLY a fork thougn made out of rock or coral

Yeah, but then again, I've seen people having trouble with new cultures to the extent they actually do get confused over objects that were prevalent even in their home countries, so that's probably not much of an issue.

In the film Ariel states I've Never seen a human this close up before

YET in Metal Fish...........

Okay, now THAT I'll acknowledge as a plothole. Then again, technically, HCA was obscured by a window, while the humans onboard the ship were clearly out of the open.

Plus Ariel's Friend Archimedes is better versed in Humanology then Scuttle

Considering his age, he's probably dead by the time of the film (and that's assuming of course Triton didn't just find out about him and had him arrested because of possibly fraternizing with humans), so we could explain that regarding how Ariel's going for Scuttle instead of Archimedes.

But the episode that prove continuity issues was Thingamajiger

At the end Ariel takes the boots tooa secret Trove Stands to reason she started small and eventually had to find a bigger cave

BUT Sebastain knows about the first one The film he did not

In all fairness, that got rectified in the penultimate episode of the series (namely, Ariel was forced to destroy her original grotto thanks to Ursula creating the objects), so that's probably not even an issue. Besides, Sebastian could have been expressing shock that she started a new collection.

Either way, it definitely has a lot less plot holes that cannot be resolved compared to Ariel's Beginning, now THAT was just sad. I guess you could count the Serpentine Teen two-parter, though.

EDIT: Besides, I can name plenty of other plotholes in various Disney media at the time that were arguably even MORE severe than the TV series for The Little Mermaid. Like Beauty and the Beast Marvel Comics: They characterized the triplets as spiteful little shrews who were obviously jealous of Belle's status of being Gaston's beloved, and have gone to great lengths to sabotage Gaston's plans for Belle in practically every issue they appeared him, and even their failures at least succeeded in stopping Gaston, which conflicted with their behavior in the actual film. Or how about the Dove Tales two-parter, where Maurice managed to win the fair despite sabotage from the triplets to ensure they can't come back to the village, yet they stayed at the village until the movie as planned despite the fact that Maurice explicitly stated they would move out to a better life if they win. And don't get me started on how Disney Comics' New Adventures of Beauty and the Beast and the Marvel Comics serial managed to conflict with the original film constantly and with each other. Or how Winter Wonderland didn't seem to even remotely hint at Christmas being the time Beast and the castle got cursed, or how in the main Marvel storyline, Beast actually HELPED decorate the castle with boughs of holly in stark contrast to his attitudes towards Christmas in Enchanted Christmas. Aladdin even had a different sequel to the film than Return of Jafar in Disney Comics, one where Jafar just got imprisoned again, and Iago NEVER reformed.

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