Artist TT Brett gender swaps some of world's best-loved Disney characters – and it's brilliant!
Let it go - Famous Disney characters swap gender for TT Brent's series
Art student TT Brent admittedly spends too much time on tumblr and not enough time trying to graduate. But perhaps this use of time isn't as unproductive as initially thought?
The illustration major has created a series of Disney characters dubbed "Genderbent Disney", and, yes, you guessed it, they've swapped genders.
While re-inventing Disney isn't a new concept, Brent is corrupting the squeeky clean, conservative universe and adding a touch of the 21st century.
Brent's blog, Let There Be Doodles, is a 'whole new world' – from Prince Jasmine to female Hercules, there are even gay Disney characters, creating a boy-on-boy kiss scene and a world in which sleeping beauty, Aurora, isn't awoken by a handsome prince, but a stunning princess.
TT's Hercules and Meg aren't exactly how we remember them
These new designs subvert the typical Disney norm – when swapped, the characters aren't the stereotypical opposite of their original state, but instead are a more realistic Disney character without the ridged masculine and feminine features.
For example, when switching Aladdin to a girl he maintains his characteristic nose (it's not swapped for a tiny button) and the shape of her new face isn't a heart-shape with giant eyes like most of Disney's heroines. And when Hercules' Meg is turned into a male, he is quite the opposite of a typical Disney hero.
Aladdin gets a quick makeover courtesey of TT Brent (and some very familiar Jasmin-styled eyes)
Brent has even extended this more accepting and LGBT-friendly Disney universe into a more racially diverse one, creating "race-bent" characters, like an Afro-American Princess Elsa and curvy princesses.
The images are photo-manipulated, with Brent illustrating over the top of the original character to change the overall appearance.
While each plays on stereotypes (as Disney already does) in order to create the changes, the results are fun and interesting but have had their fair share of controversy. What do you think?
Alice Pattillo is a freelance journalist with a passion for heavy metal, horror, science fiction, fantasy and comics. She has over seven years experience in magazines, formerly working as a staff writer at Creative Bloq, Imagine FX, Computer Arts and 3D World, as production editor for Guitar World and Guitar Player and online editor of Metal Hammer.
