She might be known as the “fairest one of all,” but Disney’s Snow White has a long history of making others look better than her by comparison.
The culprit is her character. She is someone who is gifted with natural beauty and charm; such traits have encouraged animals and dwarfs to befriend her; it also caused a jealous queen to poison her with a cursed apple and a wandering prince to wake her up with a rather questionable kiss. But, outside of those two characteristics, she doesn’t have other outstanding qualities. Next to her fellow Disney Princesses—from the bookish Belle to the protofeminist Merida—critics have said that she can come across as boring; a woman lacking of any real agency. Her characterization was such that Rachel Zegler, the actress cast to play her in the 2025 live action remake, criticized it as something that needed to be updated. Regardless of her supposed flaws however, Walt Disney did see something in her story and this led him to eventually present it on the big screen.
Inspired by the desire to expand animation as a medium of expression, Disney pushed for Snow White to be the first animated feature film in English and in Technicolor. He had detractors and impediments to this dream. His brother and business partner Roy discouraged him from making it. His wife Lillian also said that it might not be popular with adults. Meanwhile, the project’s expenses reached a level that compelled Disney to mortgage his own house just to continue financing the picture. His perseverance, however, paid off.
On December 21, 1937, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” premiered at Hollywood’s Carthay Circle Theater and was met with a standing ovation from a crowd of luminaries. The budget for the film was around $1.5 million and when it was released to the public come February the next year, it quickly made more than $8 million. It also received positive reviews from critics who lauded the film’s technical aspects and ambition.
Since the release of this film, Disney, the company, has produced numerous animated features whose protagonists were women. Some of the most successful ones (like films of the Frozen franchise,) earned billions. The idea of a Disney Princess–which Snow White launched–also evolved over the years. It can still use more diversity particularly concerning the body types of these characters but title is now carried by multiple princesses representing various cultures and characteristics. Some of them have even received praise for being vastly different from Snow White; they are put on pedestals lifted by criticisms of the fair one that started it all.
All opinions aside, however, certain facts remain unchanged and this is one of them: it was Snow White’s story which preceded the other popular woman-centric narratives of Disney. It was she who opened a door and women characters have been passing through it for years because, in spite of her supposed flaws, that door didn’t close when she walked through it.
