Above the heteronormative narrative: performance and emergence of Disney’s villains

Abstract The article proposes a re-examination of the role and position of the so-called “Disney villains” within the narrative framework of animated films and popular culture as a whole. In the first part, the historical evolution in the representation of these villains will be explored according to the practice of “queer coding,” which involves attributing stereotypically queer traits to them without explicitly stating their gender and sexual identity. It will be observed how their non-conforming gender and sexuality, used to mark their moral deviance, challenge and defy dominant gender and narrative norms. It is precisely through their queer performance and camp aesthetic that “evil stepmothers,” “sissy-villains,” and “drag-queen-like” sea witches can emancipate themselves from their traditional roles as antagonists (narrative level) and as social outcasts (discursive level) to seize the spotlight through the screen (manifest surface). This study combines tools of Greimasian text analysis, including the canonical narrative schema and the generative trajectory of meaning, with Lotman’s theory and notion of “semiosphere,” to investigate the centrality and criticality of these “quillains” within the heteronormative narrative framework and the broader cultural context. To capture (or being captured by) the queer aspect of these characters and their stories, the invitation is to look at their visage not as a coded symbol of an underlying identity and truth, but as an image that exceeds any defined meaning thanks to its iconic power.