The Little Mermaid definitely does not have a happy ending. Unlike Disney's sanitized version...
🦀 Ariel wants to marry a hunan so she can go to heaven because mermaids apparently don't have souls. When she strikes the deal with the sea witch, she says if she doesn't marry a human she will become sea foam.
🐡 Ariel does lose her voice but the witch also curses her with painful walking when she walks on land. Every step she takes feels like there's knives going up her leg. Also, the witch cuts off Ariel's tongue.
🐋 Eric and his family take her in and dress her and then... entertain themselves by watching female slaves dance. Ariel joins them and Eric becomes "interested" in her.
🐙 Ariel never marries Prince Eric.
🐠 Prince Eric (one of my top three favorite Disney princes 😻) is about to marry Ariel but instead marries another princess.
🐬 Ariel is devastated because Eric didn't marry her and she'll have to turn into sea foam. She receives a dagger from her sisters because they said if she stabs Eric and then let's the blood drip on her foot she'll turn back into a mermaid sand live for 300 years.
🐳 Instead, she kills herself and becomes a "Daughter of Air" - sort of an earth bound spirit, instead of sea foam.
🐚 Note: See no point to these gruesome originals? That's because a.) these books were meant for adults to read and b.) adults used them to teach kid lessons and morals. The moral to The Little Mermaid is to refrain from doing crazy things because you're in love. 💘
