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Who is the main character of "Aladdin"?

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[quote="Salukfan"]To me, Shang's case kind of comes to how you define "roles" in a story.  I think a film can have more than one hero.  I'm drawn to HoND-- there are two heroes in that story, in Quasimodo and Phoebus.  Quasi is the protagonist and the one who motives and drives the plot, but Phoebus sacrifices himself, rallies defenses for Quasi/Esmeralda, and opposes Frollo directly.  While Quasi's [i]the[/i] hero, Phoebus is [i]a[/i] hero.  Uh, if that makes sense. :lol:

Shang's is similar to Phoebus, IMO.  He's way beyond sidekick but it's hard to pull him into the archetypal hero role.  Part of that comes from Shang's role in the story--- he's a representation of what Mulan and Shan Yu need to overcome to get to their final goal.  You can't pull him out of that story, which I think you can with other "assistant" characters (this requires re-writes, of course, but bear with me)

Mulan wouldn't have developed without Shang.  He needed to challenge her and yes, that's a function of job title as much as character, but Shang represents what she's trying to be.  For Shan Yu, Shang represents his path to the Emperor.  At some point, whether he already had control of China or not, Shan Yu would face Shang.

Shang is a hero for what he does.  He leads our heroine through her story.  He never overcomes Shan Yu to save her, but his act to spare her life is just as heroic. Like Mulan, he defies what he's been taught to do what he believes is right.  It's not as grand scale (plotwise). But he's tries to almost his dying breath to take out Shan Yu.  He would die for the good of his country as Mulan would for the good for the family.  It's not his story, but Shang is also a hero.

In the same breath, I wouldn't call Mushu a hero.  He does a hell of a lot, but he doesn't drive Mulan to change. He's a part of her change, definitely.  But he doesn't move her forward in the same way that Shang does, and he doesn't have the same overall "importance" that Shang does.

I hope this doesn't sound like BS.  I've been sitting here for 45 minutes figuring out how to phrase it all.    :lol:[/quote]

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