Most fans can agree (I think) that the dress looks quite bad on Ariel. There are several reasons for this: the sleeves are ridiculously puffy and makes her arms look misshapen and the shaping of the skirt looks... Odd. I just think it's too puffy and big in general.
Another popular reason for the dress looking odd is that a red hair/pink dress combo doesn't work:
However, I personally don't feel this is the case. Disney has proven that it is perfectly capable of making a pink dress look super pretty on a red head (a.k.a. Giselle from Enchanted). Look how cute she looks here!
Some of you may now say that the outfit only works because her hair is MUCH lighter than Ariel's, but I disagree. Look what happens when we put Ariel in almost exactly the same dress:
I don't know about you, but I think she looks stunning! Why couldn't Disney put her in a dress more like this? A different shade of pink and different sleeves and Ariel's pink dress could have been BEAUTIFUL.
Would something like this be TOO much to ask?
I guess it could be argued that Disney HAD to make the dress shaped like that with odd sleeves to make it look like a ball gown, but if they had to give her a light pink and puffy dress, couldn't they have given something a lot more like Lottie's from TPATF? Her dress is over dramatic, but still prettier than Ariel's.
Overall, I feel that Disney could have made Ariel's ball gown look amazing if they had put a little more time and thought into it. They just had to change the shade and the shape and I would have adored it. I am really glad that they have decided to scrap the dress almost altogether now in merchandising, because it makes me a little sad to think how breath-taking Ariel could have looked.
Ariel's redesign
(Thanks for bearing with me through this fashion rant :) Comments are always welcome)
