| “ |
"Besties, assemble!" |
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| —Mei rounding up her friends | ||
Meilin "Mei" Lee is the protagonist of Disney-Pixar's 2022 animated feature film, Turning Red.
Physical appearance[]
Human[]
As a human, Mei is a Chinese-Canadian girl with fair skin, pink cheeks, light brown eyes, some small moles on her face, and neck-length red hair (formerly black). She wears thin silver glasses, a teal barrette on the right side of her hair and two magenta hairpins on the left, yellow star earrings (that are stickers), and, occasionally, a black choker. Her outfit consists of a cardigan with a light and dark red lacy-like design at the top, and pink buttons, without the cardigan she wears a light pink polo shirt with two buttons on it. She wears an indigo or denim-colored box pleated skirt with mauve ankle-length leggings, pink socks, and gray and pink sneakers. Some parts of her red panda form reveal in her human form at times. She has a rainbow friendship bracelet with a green and pink-red bracelet underneath on the right wrist and a pink watch with multiple buttons on the left.
When Mei was a little girl, she had her black hair in buns, with a red flower hair clip in her hair, smaller and slightly thicker, she wore a red short Chinese dress with flowers all over it, black and she wears red Mary Jane shoes.
When hiding the change in Mei's hair color, she is seen wearing a red tuque with light red stripes with maple leaves in between them.
Mei's pajamas consist of a white t-shirt that has a red maple leaf in the middle (the Canadian flag) with red lines on the collar and end of the sleeves and pink gym shorts. All of her head accessories are off, including her glasses.
During the Red Moon Ritual, Mei wears an outfit consisting of a plastic magenta flower with Mei's teal barrette underneath, a yellow dot at the top of her hair, and a velvet red hanfu (Chinese robe), which the front has a brown and white sash that switches palette when it ends with a thing that holds that sash, she wears a tan dress underneath and wears magenta Mary Janes.
Red Panda[]
As a red panda, Mei has a much larger physique and 8 feet tall. She has cat-shaped ears, human-like teeth, and she has a red tail striped with white, similar to a raccoon, as well as sharp claws that are mainly hidden.
Personality[]
Mei is a quirky, confident, and naive 13-year-old teenage girl who has a fantastic ability to transform into a red panda, with which her family has a deep connection. She will transform into her red panda self when she feels intense emotion (which often happens). Before she received her extraordinary magic power, she was a reckless, rebellious, and carefree girl with her close-knit group of friends. She didn't care what people thought of her and how they treated her until she got her power. When she was gifted with this magic after a vision from her ancestors in the night, she became more and more cautious, especially when people teased her when her mom was around. She can also be annoyed or angry such as when her mother refused to let her attend a concert, when Tyler insulted her and later in the film during the whole panda fight between Mei and her mother Ming, Mei explains to her mom that is was her idea to hustle the panda and her idea to go to Tyler's party. Mei is also shown to be brave when she stands up to her mother.
Relationships[]
Ming[]
Before Mei got her power, she was very close with her mother as they are seen working together to clean and pray in the temple. Ming also is proud of her child when she gets straight A's as she calls Mei "My perfect little Mei-Mei". She is overprotective that she watches Mei like a hawk and when she gets her powers, she spies on her, hoping to keep her safe so she won't turn into a panda. Unfortunately for Mei, Ming disapproves of 4★Town and so Mei must hide it from her to not disappoint her mother. Mei's mom also seems to dislike her friends as well for being a bad influence, but her friends have supported her and they have been friends since childhood. During the whole panda fight between Mei and her mom, Ming is shown to be enraged when Mei tells her the truth about why she lied about everything including going to Tyler's party and hustling the panda, declaring her that only one thing that stands against her overprotectiveness: her true anger. But during the whole panda fight, Mei knocks her mother out and with the help of her family, her friends, and 4★Town manage to sing Nobody Like U to help Mei's family and Ming get in the ancestral plane. In the ancestral plane, Mei meets with a younger version of her mom who had red hair like she did and her mom explains to her that she accidentally hurt her mother Wu and said she was never gonna be good enough for her or anyone. Mei tells her she knows how it feels, but it isn't true. After walking through the ancestral plane, Mei and her mom meet up with her aunts and grandmother and Ming and her mother make up. After Ming seals away of her panda, she urges Mei to come with her, but Mei refuses by saying she's changing and is keeping the panda. Ming happily accepts this and says she's proud of her and tells her the further she goes, the more prouder she will be. After everything returns to normal, Mei explains that people are still talking about the whole Pandapocalypse 2002 fight, but they call it growing pains and Mei also reveals that Mr. Gao had to put Ming's panda in her digital toy, Robaire Jr. As her punishment for her crimes, Ming has to pay a lot of money for the damage to the SkyDome and she lets Mei hang out with her friends.
Miriam, Priya, and Abby[]
Mei loves her best friends Miriam, Priya, and Abby deeply and they are very supportive of her. When Mei is sad about her red panda form, they sing Nobody Like U to her to calm her down and transform her back. During school, Mei and her friends come up with an idea to raise money to see 4★Town by taking pictures of Mei's panda and distracting her mother Ming from finding out. She and her friends then get invited to Tyler's party and they have an awesome time. While on the rooftop of Tyler's house and celebrating about going to the concert, they are shocked when they hear that 4★Town is coming on May 25th which is the same day as the ritual. On the day of the concert, Mei leaps into the concert and apologizes to her friends for not standing up to them when Mei's mother had accused them, but Mei tells her friends that she had been obsessed with her mother's approval for so long and she couldn't lose them. Both girls end up making up when Priya and Abby tell Mei that Miriam had been taking care of Mei's digital toy. They also welcome Tyler into their group after finding out that he is a 4*Townie like them.
Tyler[]
Tyler is the school bully who targets Mei. He embarrasses her and makes fun of her. After the whole Daisy Mart situation, he puts posters of Mei and her crush Devon all over the entire school. He then makes fun of Mei during gym class when her mom Ming spies on her and calls her "a little mama's girl," which provokes an angry Mei to throw a dodgeball at him and the ball hits his hair and breaks a school window. He then makes a deal with Mei that she'll come to his birthday party or he will tell her mom Ming about her flaunting the red panda at school. He says he is doing her a favor by keeping his mouth shut and expects the same in return. Mei agrees to come to his party and he agrees to pay her $200. Things start to go smoothly at Tyler's birthday party, but Mei later attacks him when he demanded more rides and insulted her family and left him traumatized and wounded. However, Mei and Tyler later became friends after the girls find out he was a huge fan of 4★Town and welcome him into the sisterhood. Tyler no longer bullies them and he even has a friendship bracelet like they do.
4★Town[]
Like her friends, Mei loves and adores 4★Town. Her favorite member is Robaire because he speaks French. During the concert, she moves up on some fans to touch Robaire's hand, but the moment is ruined when Mei's mom, as a giant red panda titan, comes to ruin the concert while searching for her. At the end of the movie, Mei is seen in the group picture smiling and holding Robaire in her red panda form.
Trivia[]
- Mei's red panda form is 8 feet tall according to the Pixar official website.
- Mei is not only the third Pixar protagonist who wears glasses, but the first (Pixar) female protagonist to do so.
- Mei is the second Disney female protagonist to wear glasses, the first being Mirabel from Encanto.
- Mei is the fifth female protagonist in a Pixar feature film, succeeding after Merida from Brave, Joy from Inside Out, Dory from Finding Dory, and Elastigirl from Incredibles 2.
- In addition to being Pixar's first female glasses-wearing protagonist, Mei is also the second Asian protagonist for Pixar (Including Up).
- Mei can turn into her red panda form not only when excited, but also situations that heightens her adrenaline (Also, Mei can switch to her red panda form just as easily as she can change to her human form).
- Before Mei's hair was red, it was black. Her red panda form seems to have the same fur color as her human form’s hair.
- With the film being set in early 2002 (specifically between April and May), and is established Mei is 13 years old, this would mean that she was born around late April in 1989.
- As seen in the trailer, Mei wore her red tuque to hide the change of color in her hair.
- According to an article dedicated to Domee Shi, Mei is going through puberty throughout this film, despite the red panda transforming.[1]
- Mei can easily get upset, sad, or excited when she changes into a red panda. However, she is easily calmed down when her mom or her friends calm her down and change back into human.
- Mei finds out that the reason Ming was so overprotective of her because she accidentally hurt her mother Wu when she was young.
- Mei has a rivalry with her bully Tyler. However, she later becomes friends with him after seeing him at the 4★Town concert and finds out that he is a 4*Townie.
- Mei finds out from her dad Jin before he met and married Ming, Ming's mom didn't approve of him, just like Ming doesn't approve of Mei's friends.
- Mei finally had the courage to stand up to her mother when she refused to get rid of her red panda.
- During the Pandapocalypse fight, Mei finally confesses to her mom that she lied about everything including her hustling the panda, her idea of going to Tyler's birthday party and says that she is thirteen and she needs to get over it.
- After Mei had failed to convince her mother to let her see 4★Town, Mei lets out a scoff and rolls her eyes before she heads to room.
- Despite being friends with Miriam, Abby and Priya, Ming seems to have a distaste against Miriam because she thinks that she is a bad influence on her daughter, but Mei and her friends have been best friends since childhood.
Gallery[]
Promotional[]
Concept Art[]
Screenshots[]
References[]
| v - eCharacters | ||
|---|---|---|
| Main Characters | Meilin Lee • Ming Lee | |
| Supporting Characters | Jin Lee • Abby Park • Miriam Mendelsohn • Priya Mangal | |
| Minor Characters | 4★Town: Robaire, Tae Young, Jesse, Aaron T. & Aaron Z. • Tyler Nguyen-Baker • Devon • Mr. Kieslowski • Sun Yee • Wu • Helen • Ping • Lily • Chen • Mr. Gao • Carter Murphy-Mayhew • Goth Girl• Stacy Frick • Lauren • Malik | |