Perhaps it's just as well that Mulan remains on the sidelines of the Disney Princess lineup. In some ways, her story is more toxic than the straight princess fantasy.

Mulan rebels against an arranged small town marriage. Out of a combination of admiration for her father and the desire to escape, she goes out into the male world of violent aggression, where her brains and courage win her a successful career. So what does she do with her success? She declines the Emperor's invitation to sit on the imperial council and goes home to care for Dad. There she is followed by the lovestruck Captain Li, who is handsome, brave, of excellent family, but not the sharpest knife in the drawer. He will propose, and we are left in no doubt that she will accept.

All that her talent and striving in the outside world have done is to (i) convince her that the male world of career is something to turn away from and (ii) introduce her to a better class of husband material than she would have met staying home. Excuse me if this looks like the story of too many educated young women who exercise the option to drop out for marriage and motherhood.

Except the entire purpose of running away to join the army was not for her own individual wants but to save her crippled father; she succeed saving her father, her commander, and her entire country due to her courage and ingenuity.

She succeed on her own terms even in doing her duty to her family. Her conflict between individual desire and filial obligation was resolved due her own choices and actions-- even in finding a husband.

Mulan goes out into the world, for love and duty, succeeds and comes back an adult. The story is a fairy tale, a rite of passage, not a narrow 'feminist' tale about how motherhood and marriage are somehow shortchanging the sisterhood.

Oh come on...leave us not be so sanctimonious. Could it at all have been possible that Mulan decided--of her own free will--to refuse an appointment to a major government position for the sake of her love for her father? That takes some serious character, to ignore ambition in favor of the love of the family, and those rare souls who do it are so often second-guessed by everyone around them. Frankly, I say kudos to the woman who sacrificed so great an honor for the sake of the father she loved more than herself.

We ought to be holding up that particular story as a true example of that old threadbare bogey of noblesse oblige--the people come first. And to her, the people were right in her own home.

Aren't you being almost as judgemental as the man who says the woman belongs in the kitchen? Your saying, the women belongs in the 'real' world.... but you don't think its ok for a smart woman to choose to stay home? why? Isn't the point supposed to be freedom of choice, not freedom to do what you believe and only that? To a point your right, the idea is a little toxic, but would it bet better if she became a blood thirsty warrior/emperor? I don't know that I find that option appealing for her, or a male either. You can find faults to all endings... Still, cartoons for males are the same story, they have to attack some monster to save the girl they love, or they have to fight some evil guy thats after the girl... Isn't it a little dangerous for guys as much as girls, the guys learning that women really can't be trusted, you have to beat up/kill/outsmart the guy that she loves so that she'll love you instead, cuz you know, women can't decide to love you.