Flirting between teens. A couple of kisses. One character flirts heavily, breathy and sexualized when singing and dancing. A sweet relationship develops between unlikely partners.
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This movie blends many familiar fairy tales and extrapolates the stories of the characters' kids.
Positive Messages
a lot
Strong messages of self-empowerment and following your heart, which guides the main characters to choose good over evil and be true to themselves. Unfortunately, doing so puts them at odds with their parents, who want the teens to be bad, but the overall message is a positive one. Racial diversity is a welcome change to some classic characters. The importance of not prejudging people is a recurring theme.
Positive Role Models
a lot
Mal and her friends wrestle with their parents' expectations of evil and their growing desire to be good. Maleficent tries to force her beliefs on her daughter, but she suffers consequences for it. Ben's determination to see past stereotypes is what sets these positive changes in motion.
Educational Value
none
The movie entertains rather than to educate.
Parents Need to Know
Parents need to know that Descendants is a highly anticipated Disney movie that's packed with familiar faces like Dove Cameron, Cameron Boyce, and Booboo Stewart. It blends the continuing story of many fairy tale favorites -- and favorite villains -- as it follows new relationships forged between their teenage kids. The main characters wrestle with pressures of good and evil, and their parents nudge them toward unsavory behavior like trickery, lying, and stealing. On the other hand, the teens are influenced in positive ways by people who are patient, caring, and forgiving. Much of the story follows a blossoming romance between two teens, and they share a couple of kisses. Young kids might need some reassurance during a tense scene in which a character turns into a massive dragon. The movie's soundtrack is bound to win some fans as well, so be prepared for your kids to want to buy it. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails.
The worst stereotypes, particularly about girls & relationships between girls. Also, dating is a huge theme, so not a great fit for my 9 year old (I don’t understand common senses rating!!)
Where do I start. My seven year old watched this because her best friend was having a Descendants birthday party, and I immediately regret it. The movie reinforces so many damaging stereotypes in American culture. The girls use their magic skills to "fix" their friends to make them "more beautiful" - according to white Hollywood pop culture, while the boys play sports and learn how to be a team. Then there's the scene where the boys are playing sports while cute cheerleaders in short skirts cheer them on, culminating in the two rival girls fighting over a boy. This kind of content reinforces a very strong subliminal message to girls that what's important is "getting a man" and "being beautiful" according to an extremely narrow standard. Then there are the token minorities, with cringe-worthy costumes - Mulan's daugher, anyone? I could go on and on. If you are fine with our shallow American colonial, white-centric, heteronormative, patriarchal culture this is the movie for you. I know that sounds harsh, and it's probably in line with most other Disney content these days, but I'm just frustrated. There are some good messages in the film too, but in my view they are far outshadowed by the bad.
What's the Story?
DESCENDANTS is set in the serene kingdom of Auradon, where fairy tale figures and their families live harmoniously under the reign of Belle (Keegan Connor Tracy) and the Beast (Dan Payne), thanks to the longtime exile of their enemies on the distant Isle of the Lost. As the royal couple's son, Prince Ben (Mitchell Hope), prepares to assume the throne, he decrees that the offspring of notorious villains Maleficent (Kristin Chenoweth), the Evil Queen (Kathy Najimy), Jafar (Maz Jobrani), and Cruella de Vil (Wendy Raquel Robinson) be permitted to leave the island and come to Auradon to attend school with the descendants of their parents' sworn enemies. Predictably, not everyone is enthused about the arrival of the self-proclaimed "rotten" teens -- Mal (Dove Cameron), Evie (Sofia Carson), Jay (Booboo Stewart), and Carlos (Cameron Boyce) -- but no one suspects that their true intention is to steal the Fairy Godmother's (Melanie Paxson) wand and turn it over to Mal's domineering mom, Maleficent. But as time goes on and the teens acclimate to Auradon, they begin to question their parents' influence and wonder whether they're really evil at all.
This much-anticipated fairy tale add-on isn't perfect, but it's highly entertaining in the kind of young-love, flash-mob, song-and-dance manner that tends to thrill the youngsters. Kids won't notice or care about such trivial plot inconsistencies as every classic character existing in the same time and place AND having kids at exactly the same time, for instance (really, what are the chances?), but parents might grit their teeth over some the rewrites. On the other hand, some aspects are welcome changes, namely some racial diversity that's a pleasant surprise.
Descendants is decent family fare, and with the exception of one tense scene, it's a fine pick for just about any age. Kids will love the creative play on classic characters, the unlikely relationship between Ben and Mal, and the handful of musical numbers that can feel a little cheesy to the older set. (Except for a reprisal of "Be Our Guest," that is. It's golden.) For adults, though, there's much joy to be found in Chenoweth's electrifying performance as the scheming Maleficent, and her constant bickering with Najimy's Evil Queen makes for many hilarious scenes.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the choices the characters in Descendants make. To what degree does their parents' influence affect Mal and her friends? Is it OK that they wind up making their own decision? Would you feel differently if they defied their parents to become evil instead of good?
Does the music help this movie? Was it ever a distraction from the plot? If it didn't add to the story, what was the purpose of it?
Kids: What made you want to watch Descendants? Were any of your favorite actors or actresses in the cast? Do you find your watching habits influenced by the ads you see on TV?
Research shows a connection between kids' healthy self-esteem and positive portrayals in media. That's why we've added a new "Diverse Representations" section to our reviews that will be rolling out on an ongoing basis. You can help us help kids by
suggesting a diversity update.
Common Sense Media's unbiased ratings are created by expert reviewers and aren't influenced by the product's creators or by any of our funders, affiliates, or partners.
By Emily Ashby
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
