A YouTuber became the subject of online jokes and memes due to his review of Pixar’s “Turning Red,” in which he criticizes the animated film for not recognizing the cultural impact of the 9/11 attacks.
YouTuber TheMysteriousMrEnter, also known as Mr. Enter, uploaded his review titled “Turning Red is a mixed bag” on April 14. The video has over 77,000 views at the time of this writing.
Twitter user @CocoaFox023 then uploaded a clip of the review to Twitter the next day, which went viral and garnered over 8 million views, 5,500 retweets and more than 85,000 likes in four days. The user captioned the tweet, “Like seriously, what purpose does including 9/11 serve to the narrative of the Turning Red?”
“Turning Red,” set in the year 2002 in Toronto, follows the story of a 13-year-old Chinese Canadian girl, Meilin “Mei” Lee, as she goes through an awkward transformation into a giant red panda during puberty.
“This film takes place less than a year after the September 11 terrorist attacks. I bring this up because it radically altered the culture of the time in ways that make this movie feel exceptionally ignorant of the time,” Mr. Enter said in his video review. “Yes, this film takes place in Canada, not the United States, but all over the Western world: Canada, America, the UK, much of Europe – people were paranoid because 9/11 wasn’t the only terror attack that had happened! It was the major theme of the decade!”
“I mean I can understand not wanting everyone to be so fearful, as that goes against the tone the movie is trying to establish. But then you have very awkward moments if you actually were there and if you do actually remember the time period,” he added.
In a separate tweet addressing the review, @CocoaFox023 wrote, “So one of the latest criticisms of Turning Red is that 2002 should be depressing because 9/11 happened and that somehow takes people out of the film. A girl turning into a giant red panda is fine but a more happy 2002 is too unrealistic. Why the f*ck would you want a more depressing movie?”
Several other negative reviews of “Turning Red” have sparked outrage since the film’s release for their takes on the film’s relatability and appropriateness for children. As for Mr. Enter, his review quickly became the subject of online jokes and 9/11 memes.
Following the backlash, Mr. Enter, who is known to his fans for his gaming videos and critical reviews of animated shows and movies, tweeted in response to his critics, “Good to know that after a career of insulting people, getting things blatantly untrue, going into anti-mask rants – this is your moral line. This is the moment where you said ‘too far,’ when I thought that a mediocre movie didn’t properly represent its stated year.”
