weeeee now that I've more or less stopped being high about having a heroine that looks like me, it's time for me to dissect the #RayaAndTheLastDragon trailer as a former Southeast Asian Studies student and actual SEAsian person of Thai, Malay, Bugis and Baba-Nyonya descent

DISCLAIMER: while i did read SEA studies in university, i'm more specialised in maritime SEA and thailand so this dissection MIGHT contain some inaccuracies. if you're from mainland SEA, pls let me know if there's anything that i missed!

so one caveat that i have to add is that SEA is a VERY diverse region. in one country alone (indonesia), you already have a whopping 600+ languages. don't get me started on the other countries with their hill tribes, original settlers, creole peoples. yes, it's a wonderful mess

i actually disagree with disney's decision to mash it up altogether to create a generically SEAsian culture because like what some critics said, it does feel half-assed and also erases the voices of many other underrepresented SEA peoples. but from the trailer, i see that they -

are trying to create a monolithic SEA culture for the fictional world by taking elements that tie SEA history and culture together: namely indianisation and austronesian culture. SEA is diverse but indianisation is a trait shared by most of the region minus parts of indonesia

and the philippines where animism was prominent. vietnam had indianisation through the cham people. i think making raya into a franchise would have been a much safer choice IMO, where she ventures into different worlds based on SEA's various cultures but i digress

SO ONTO THE TRAILER PROPER!!

getting some halong bay and raja ampat vibes from this screencap. the vocalisation sounds familiar but i'm not sure which part of SEA it's native to (didn't study music, gomen!) but it's common to hear it in some tamil films!

MOM I LOVE HER ALREADY. but this feels more ninja-like rather than SEA warrior like. the warrior woman is actually VERY COMMON in SEA history. trung sisters of vietnam. lady chan and lady mook of phuket. Keumalahayati of aceh. look up @herstoryseapod to find out more about them!

getting thai and burmese buddhist temple vibes in the architecture. the tunnel vaguely reminds me of angkor wat and borobudur's wall carvings

aaaaand the adorable disney animal sidekick returns. his name is tuktuk, which in thailand, refers to those cute little open-air taxis. and he's a mode of transportation for raya. quite a clever detail IMO. also, he's based off our native pangolins <3

seeing the topeng in a disney movie is so surreal. yeah, it's simplified but it's nice to see this nod to SEA's hindu influences pre-colonisation

now i regret not taking that module on SEAsian martial arts back in uni. according to Filipino SNS users, she's using their traditional weapons and martial art, so that was really nice to see! i hope we can see some muay thai and silat too!

so these screencaps had been the source of controversy for MANY. yeah, we SEAsians LOVE patterns. songket. batik. ikat. the beautiful woven patterns in the hills. where are they? why is the supposedly malay-inspired tribe using sickles?

https://twitter.com/lesmisquerade/status/1318917839709896704

purple is a VERY rare colour in SEA. it only started becoming more prominent in the 20th century. (and for us bugis, it means a divorced person lol). also that beard though. wuuut. at least i can recognise the headgear somewhat. but the emblem looks very generic

is this tribe supposed to represent an asian version of the vikings with the attire and horn emblems? presenting the bugis people for badass seafarers (who dress NOTHING like this). are you trying to reprsent those living in colder climates like mountains? look up hill tribes

they definitely don't dress like asianised vikings/inuits from what i know. also, why do these girls have undercuts? (also, female rulers in SEA is a common thing for maritime SEA). where are the patterns? nice to see war elephants being acknowledged though

they may be background characters with just 3-5 speaking lines but i feel that it's still important to pay nod to the SEA cultures that they were inspired from, rather than lumping them into 4 monolithic entities. i can only vaguely identify where some clothing elements were from

it would be more accurate to call this 'raya and the last naga' tbh because that's what we call our so-called 'dragons'. (though dragons are a big part of vietnamese mythology). i guess they have to make it more 'sellable' to a bigger audience though

MOM I LOOOOVE HER. actually...we do have a desert landscape in SEA (albeit now it's become a commodified tourist spot lol). it's in Mui Ne, Vietnam. i think the desert landscape in the trailer is based off Mui Ne's landscape in general. here are some of my pics (don't steal pls)

THE NAGA (yes, i don't give a fuck about terminology) IS ACTUALLY UNDERWATER. YES.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

is this 'perfect' SEA representation: far from it. but with the sheer diversity of the region, it'd be difficult to produce that perfect representation. you'd need an entire fucking franchise to do it. SEA can NEVER be presented as a monolith

even if there are some common elements. By focusing on Indianisation, you're bound to leave behind Confucian-influenced Vietnam and animist east Indonesia and Philippines. but i do think it's a good baby step, considering how long little girls like myself had been waiting to see

ourselves in the animated realm beyond tuptim from the king and i. i think the best way to get better SEA rep is for us SEAsians to step up as artists and make our voices heard. for that reason, i'm writing my own novel with SEA leads and i'm happy to see many others stepping up

it's just so freaking hard to find SEAsian reprsentation in children-oriented media, so really. in that aspect, i think #DisneyRaya is groundbreaking. if you're interested in other SEA-based media for kids, i LOVE this book. Mingfong Ho is another amazing author to look up

ALSO ANOTHER EDIT: i feel like raya would have been the perfect opportunity for disney to insert some LGBT+ rep as well, considering pre-colonisation SEA's very liberal views on gender. (the idea of five genders? mak yong plays? babaylans?)

so #DisneyRaya may not be the most ideal form of SEA representation. and admittedly, past kids-media focused on SEA set the bar PRETTY LOW (see below images). but i will still be supporting it and paying money because companies NEED to know that SEAsians want to be heard and seen