Over the years, Disney has been responsible for some of the most beloved animated films of all time. They’ve cemented themselves as the powerhouse studio for the entire medium.
Additionally, they’ve also managed to make their fair share of mistakes. Below is a collection of some of the worst offenders. Check out 10+ of the biggest Disney animated film mistakes.
1. What happened to the oars of the row boat?
The Little Mermaid is bursting with some of Disney’s most popular songs. One of which is “Kiss The Girl.”
If you watch closely, as the fish are spouting around the boat, the oars completely disappear!
2. How does this picture exist?
If we’re to believe that the Beast and Belle are roughly the same age, that would put him at around 21 years old.
That would mean that he was cursed by the sorceress when he was only ten, so shouldn’t he be depicted as a young boy instead of a man?
3. Do time zones not exist?
One of the best scenes of the film is when Randall chases Mike and Sully through the doors of the Monsters Inc. factory.
Clearly, there’s something not quite right going on with the time zones. It’s daylight in Tokyo, Paris, as well as Hawaii.
4. Why aren’t their shadows holding hands?
As you can see, Pocahontas and Nakoma are holding hands in this scene.
But if you take a look at their shadows cast on the ground, for some reason their hands are shown at their sides.
5. That’s a speaker, not a microphone.
In the first Toy Story film, the toys deploy the army men to spy on Andy’s birthday party and relay back to the bedroom what his new gifts are.
That half of the monitor that they’re using doesn’t have a microphone. It’s just a speaker. So how could the toys hear anything at all?
6. The Eiffel Tower didn’t exist.
During the musical montage for “Be Our Guest,” there’s a brief visual reference made to the Eiffel Tower.
Beauty and the Beast takes place in the 17th century. The Eiffel Tower wouldn’t be built for another 200 years.
7. That’s not a Chinese flag.
Take a look at the medic tent in Mulan . That’s a Japanese flag adorning the side!
It’s a pretty embarrassing mix up, considering the film takes place in China during the Han Dynasty. Not Japan.
8. Where did they find tomatoes?
Poor Quasimodo. I hate watching this scene. To top it off, it’s actually incredibly inaccurate.
The Hunchback of Notre Dame is set in the 15th century, almost one hundred years before Europe discovered the tomato.
9. How are those bags floating on top of the water?
In perfect spheres no less! Shouldn’t they have sunk below the surface of the water? Or, at the very least, leveled off?
It’s an easy thing to overlook but pretty obvious once you notice it.
10. Just where did Grumpy find a piano?
Is Grumpy a time traveler? He must have been because Snow White takes place in the early 14th century. Modern pianos weren’t created for almost another three hundred years.
So, although it’s a lovely scene, it’s a pretty big goof.
11. Did she just pull her hair through her body?
You’ll probably need to pause and rewind several times to be able to see this one.
But when Elsa is in the middle of singing “Let It Go,” she actually pulls her hair right through her body instead of wrapping it around her shoulder.
12. What happened to the sleeves on Cinderella’s dress?
As Cinderella and her prince are entering their carriage, you can clearly see that her dress has sleeves. She even waves goodbye!
But as soon as the camera angle cuts to show the carriage driving away, the sleeves have somehow disappeared.
13. Megara’s eyes keep changing colors.
Hercules might be one of the most underrated Disney movies ever.
However, if you watch Megara’s eye color closely, it seems to switch between a deep purple to a bright blue at random intervals throughout the film.
14. Are Ham and Rex ghosts?
After violently clicking through the channels, the TV goes dark and we get a shot of the set from Ham and Rex’s vantage point.
Take a look at the TV and you’ll notice they have no reflection!
15. Why don’t all of Boo’s laughs cause a power surge?
The central premise of Monsters Inc. revolves around the monster world using children’s screams as a power source. Thanks to Boo, they learn that a laugh is ten times as powerful!
The only problem is that Boo is laughing for pretty much the entire film, yet it only causes a reaction at certain moments.
16. Just how did Mike and Sully meet in *Monsters University*?
In the first film, Mike proclaims to Sully that he has “been jealous of me since the 4th grade .” If that’s the case, then how does the entire plot of this movie make any sense?
Is it an alternate timeline?
17. You’re going to need bigger balloons in *Up*.
Not just bigger balloons, but a heck of a lot more of them, too!
According to a rough calculation from Wired Science Blog , the number of helium balloons needed would be anywhere from 100,000 to 23.5 million!
18. What happened to the purple bottle on Ursula’s vanity table?
This is easily one of the creepiest Disney scenes ever! Pay special attention to the purple perfume bottle on the table.
As Ursula steps up onto the table, the bottle is crushed beneath her foot.
But look again and there are no traces of the broken shards anywhere to be seen!
It kind of makes you wonder what the point was of showing her break the bottle in the first place.
What purpose did that serve at all other than to give the animators more work?
19. *Brave* is incredibly fashion forward.
By about a few centuries, give or take. The dresses worn by the women in the film didn’t become popularized until the High Renaissance — not even by royalty.
They look especially out of place in the Middle Ages.
20. How did that poster get there in *Finding Nemo*?
When the pelican first arrives through the window, the wall on the right side of the office is completely bare.
But after the dentist has his squabble with the squab, a poster can suddenly be seen hanging.
21. The Great Wall of China didn’t exist during the time of *Mulan*.
Yes, the Great Wall was up, but only in portions and not as a defense! That didn’t happen until the Ming Dynasty in the early 1300s.
Mulan takes place somewhere in between the Han Dynasty and the Sui Dynasty.
22. How do Jane and her father even know who Rudyard Kipling is in *Tarzan*?
After making the discovery of the Great White Ape, Jane and her father begin listing off all the people who will want to meet him.
The pair name Queen Victoria, Charles Darwin, and Rudyard Kipling.
The problem here lies with Rudyard Kipling, author of *The Jungle Book*.
Tarzan takes place in the late 1880s and Rudyard Kipling didn’t write his classic novel until 1894!
It’s incredibly unlikely they’d know who he was, especially if he hadn’t even written the book yet!
23. Wait, what color are Nala’s eyes supposed to be in *The Lion King*?
This one is about as flagrant as they come. You’d almost think they were changing color with her mood.
Take a look at Nala’s eyes as she stalks Pumbaa from the tall grass. They’re green, right? Look again…
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Later on in the film, when she and Simba confront Scar at Pride Rock, her eyes have changed to blue!
They actually jump back and forth at random intervals all throughout the movie.
It’s kind of hard to unsee once you notice it.
24. Those would have been considered pretty risque dance moves in *Sleeping Beauty*.
It’s crazy to think but there was once a time when The Beatles singing “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” was considered taboo. You can, therefore, imagine how conservative things were in the 15th century!
Furthermore, the Waltz wasn’t even popularized until the late 1700s.
25. Where the heck are they in *Aladdin*?
It’s a fair question, considering Agrabah appears to be a fictional city/state somewhere in the Middle East. If that’s the case, then why does the fashion as well as the architecture appear to be of Indian influence?
Even the palace itself resembles the Taj Mahal .
26. There’s no light inside a whale in *Finding Nemo*.
During the scene where Marlin and Dory are eaten by the whale, there’s a beam of light that illuminates the scene coming from the blowhole.
This is a complete error as light can’t enter into a whale in this manner.
27. Kano is speaking with the wrong accent in *Wreck-It Ralph*.
Any old school Mortal Kombat fan will be able to spot Kano from about a mile away. He’s easily identified by his silver face plate, red eye, and Australian accent.
The film managed to get two out of three right.
28. What year is it in *The Incredibles*?
The timeline of the film takes place somewhere in the 1960s.
Take a careful look at the date on this newspaper, however, and it appears to have been printed almost 40 years in the future!
