Coda - Trailers are often misleading. I've had to be cornered into seeing countless borderline amazing films because their trailers passed them off as incredibly idiotic.
Frozen has so many refreshingly unique elements such as secondary princess and a prince who was actually the villain and the concept was thought provokingly in depth but I felt it was underdeveloped, leaving a lot of missed opportunities.
There was absolutely no backstory; no explanation to justify that Elsa was born with magical abilities or how a lone child playing out on dangerous terrain went totally unnoticed by those around him and grew to see human being as betrayers. We don't ever know where the King and Queen were going when they died in that shipwreck or how Olaf came to life.
What bugged me most, however, were all the references to the ritual which took Anna's memory which never came together.
*Anna begging Elsa to know why she shut her out all their lives.
*Hans points out Anna's blonde lock and she responds that she's had it since she was born.
*Anna remembers Olaf.
*Kristoff tells Anna that he knows his "love expert" "friends" can help after Anna is struck in the heart by Elsa because he's seen them do it before.
All these mentions seemed to be a path to a revelation in which Anna and Kristoff would learn of that ritual in Anna's childhood and Anna of why she really had that blond lock, why she presumably never knew about Elsa's powers and why Elsa had been isolated from her. Yet it all led to nowhere. That's just sloppy and thoughtless to me. Not to mention quite disappointing.
I also feel that Anna's character could have used more depth.
Kristen Belle once performed a deleted sang at an event that presumably was replaced by 'Love is An Open Door' as it supposedly used the same music called 'The Spare'. It's Anna saying that she wanted to be more than just Elsa's runner up for Queen of Arendelle.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=dKUGDQCzGz0
I'd have liked to see them go somewhere with this concept. It's such a smart psycological thought process for the younger sibling of an heir.
The rushed love vs. real love thing was great but it didn't really highlight that she's a princess. The least they could have done is discuss corinating Anna when Elsa had scared everyone and taken off. Wouldn't that have even been the logical thing to do?
I appreciate 'Once Upon a Time' for filling in some of these gaps but what they did with it was circumstantial, it can only apply to their show and it was still lacking.
I enjoy the film I just wish better care had been taken to bring out it's full potential.