Turning Red is a film directed by Domee Shi—the first ever Asian woman to direct a feature-length Pixar film. It’s about a young Asian girl, Meilin Lee, and her struggles about coming of age, represented by her ability to turn into a giant red panda. While going through the struggles of puberty, Mei has to battle between her own desires to have fun and wanting to please her family—which proves to be difficult, as her mother is shown to be very protective of her.
Mei is shown struggling to navigate through her emotions, fighting not to turn into a red panda at every turn, a metaphor to the stark feeling of embarrassment many feel at this sometimes gross or alienating period in a young girl’s life. On top of this, she also crushes over one of the members of 4-TOWN, a boy band, and wishes to go to their concert. This concert conflicts not only with her mothers opinion—causing her to lie and hide away money—but also with a ritual that will seal the panda away. This results in Mei making a decision that breaks the norm of her relatives and her mother, disobeying what they think is right and carving her own path.
Many adults, primarily parents, have found issues with Turning Red. The movie is unforgiving about its depiction of puberty—periods are talked about openly, Mei’s crushes are shown, and the group of young girls use words like “hot” and “sexy”. They frown upon this characterization of teenage girls, calling it inappropriate and overly sexual. Alongside this problem, others find the movie’s target audience to be too specific and, as a result, completely unrelatable. While these are mere opinions, the intensity of the conversation around them has sunken this movie into internet controversy.