Funny / Turning Red

"AWOOGA!"

• Some of the things that Mei does during the title sequence is pretend to eat the "Disney Presents" credits, stumble a bit while twirling under the "A Pixar Animation Studios Film" credits, raise the roof with a stoic expression and leaning on the letters of the film's title... which fall over, along with her.
• How Mei's besties are introduced when she flings open the school's main doors ("Besties, assemble!"):
  • We're introduced to Miriam stuffing her face with chips, a bag of which she just keeps in her locker.
  • We're introduced to Priya who's reading an obvious spoof of The Twilight Saga called Nightfall.
  • We're introduced to Abby furiously yelling at three random students in Korean, presumably for not throwing away a wad of paper properly. Then when she notices her friends, her attitude does a complete one-eighty as she cheerfully greets Mei and strikes a cutesy pose.
  • When Mei has assembled her friends, she gets them pumped up for the day by asking if they're ready to change the world. Their responses:
    Miriam: (snaps her fingers) So ready!
    Priya: (completely deadpan) I was born to do this.
    Abby: LET'S BURN THIS PLACE TO THE GROUND!
• In fact, pretty much everything Abby does is funny due to her choleric nature.
• Tyler calls Mei an "overachieving dork-narc", and Mei snatches his basketball out of the air and proclaims that she'll wear his insult with pride. Then she shoots the hoop... and misses. The ball flies over the fence onto the street before it's flattened by a truck. Cue Tyler chasing after Mei yelling, "Oh, you're dead!"
• Mei listing off her reasons for liking the boys from 4*Town.
  "Jesse went to art school. Tae Young fosters injured doves. Robaire speaks French. And Aaron T and Aaron Z are, like, really talented too!"
• Combined as an Awesome moment; Mei and Ming catch three street rats trying to tag the walls of their shrine. They both come out swinging their brooms at them to scare them off, and Ming lets out a hilarious threat in true mom fashion:
  Ming: I'm telling your mothers!!
• The scene of Mei's dad dramatically preparing dinner is punctuated by him doing the Scary Shiny Glasses... then Jin realizes his glasses have fogged up, and he hastily wipes them off.
• Ming asking why the boyband group is named 4*Town if there are five members in it.
• Mei getting into the zone of drawing Devon in her notebook. Many artists online have made jokes about how relatable this scene is. Specifically, her drawing him as a merman, with merman AUs being a very popular trope for fanart and fanfiction.
  • Especially the hilariously perverted face and giggle she makes after making her first drawing.
  • There's also something darkly hilarious about Mei's nightmare of Devon as a merman flopping around without water like a dying fish.
  • Ming's reactions to the drawings, going from mildly stunned to full on low-voiced exclamations and gagging.
• Ming confronting Devon and demanding to know how old he was, believing he was thirty. The tired kid replies he's seventeen.
  Ming: Oh, see, see? This is what happens when you don't wear sunblock and do drugs all day!
• After her mother exposes her drawings to Devon, Mei forces a smile and says she's all good. Cut to her screaming her head off into her pillow.
  Mei: You sicko! What Were You Thinking?! Why would you draw those things?! Those horrible, awful, sexy things?!
  (cut to Mei now pacing with a panicked smile) It's fine. You'll move to another city, change your identity.
  (cut again, to Mei screaming under the bed and stamping her feet)
  (cut again, to Mei lying in bed, sorrowfully holding a framed picture of Ming) Mommy... I'm so sorry!
  (cut yet again, to Mei sitting in her desk chair, screaming into her pillow as it rolls across the room, only startled out of it once the chair hits the mirror)
  (cut once again, to Mei yelling at said mirror) You are her pride and joy, so act like it! (slaps herself) This will never happen again.
• Jin tries to eat a Timbit, but Ming slaps his hand with a spatula, snapping "No sugar!" When Mei then screams in the bathroom, Ming goes to the door, while Jin first eats a Timbit while Ming is away, then another while Ming is talking with Mei.
• When Mei discovers her initial transformation, Ming knocks on the bathroom door to see if her daughter's okay after hearing her scream.
  Ming: What's going on, honey? Are you sick? Is it a fever? Stomachache? Chills? Constipation?
  Mei: NO!
  Ming: Wait, is it... that? (Mei's father freezes in the hallway and slowly backs away) Did the... did the red peony bloom?
  Mei: No! ...Maybe?
  • The mix of metaphors continues as Ming tries to reassure Mei, without having found out about her early transformation:
    Ming: You are a woman now, and your body is starting to change. (the screen splits to show Mei as a giant red panda crammed behind the shower curtain)
    Mei: (muffled) Mmm-hmm!
  • There's something darkly funny about Ming's reactions throughout. Clearly this conversation is not going the way she expected...
• Mei tries to brush her fur to calm herself down and turn human again. It works... at first, but her excitement at getting it to work causes her to transform again, understandably much to her dismay.
• Mei trying to suppress the panda transformation by hiding any single hint of emotion — meaning that she goes about her day doing and saying things robotically. Examples include:
  • When her mom drops her off at school with herbal tea:
    Mei: (robotic and deadpan while staring off into the distance) Thank you for your concern, mother. I'll be fine.
  • She then gives an awkward thumbs up and smile before her mom drives off.
  • Then, in the hallway, Miriam asks why she's wearing a toque:
    Mei: Bad hair day.
  • After Abby notes that Mei smells, this leads Priya to give Mei deodorant. Mei quickly applies it, and then continues to apply it all over her face. Additionally, if you watch frame by frame, you see that Priya quite literally pulled the deodorant out of thin air.
• When Tyler mocks Mei about the incident with Devon at the Daisy Mart, Priya jumps to her friend's defense by waving her hands as though she's about to cast a spell on Tyler, and she can even be heard saying, "I banish you!"
• Miriam being quick to defend Mei against a snotty classmate:
  Classmate: What's with her?
  Miriam: What's with your face?!
• Miriam passes Mei a note, asking her if she's okay. When she assures her that she is okay, Miriam passes another note, which Mei ignores. Miriam taps on it to get her attention. Upon reading it, Mei learns, to her horror, that her mother is outside the school watching her through the window. As she tries to avoid having a freak out, things only escalate, as Mei's mother starts a fight with a security guard who attempted to escort her off the school grounds, getting everyone's attention as a result. Eventually, as her mother is being dragged away by the guard, she manages to slip in one last bit of humiliation that pushes Mei over the edge.
  Ming: (panicking) Mei-Mei, help! Mei-Mei! Tell him it's me! Tell him it's mommy! TELL HIM YOU FORGOT YOUR PADS!!!

  If you watch carefully, you can see that Mei's entire class, including her middle-aged male teacher, flinch from the second-hand embarrassment as Ming holds up the box.

• A transformed Mei is hiding in a school restroom when a girl walks out of a bathroom stall. After staring at each other for a moment, the girl starts to let out a literal Big "OMG!", but is cut off by Mei silently placing her hand/paw over her face and slowly pushing her back into the stall.
• While running back home from school in her red panda form, Mei briefly stops by the Daisy Mart to ogle Devon, complete with thumping her foot before shouting "AWOOGA!!" before coming to her senses.
  • As Mei darts off, Devon just gives a tired but confused "Huh?" when he turns around but sees no one.
  • A select few of the film's foreign dubs make the scene funnier by altering the line. The Italian dub, for example, has Mei shout "OOH LA LA!!" and the Japanese dub has her instead scream out "SEXY!!"
• Ming's explanation about how the red panda curse came to be: "What seemed like a blessing became... an inconvenience." The awkward way Ming bites her lip really sells it.
• As soon as Miriam, Abby, and Priya see Mei's panda form, they all scream in shock, prompting Mei to pull them in through her bedroom window and muffle their screams in her fur, squirming helplessly as she tries to calm them down. When the panic dies down and Mei lets go of her friends, the following happens:
  Miriam: Mei...?
  (Beat)
  Priya: Are you a werewolf?
  Mei: No! What?!
  Abby: (excitedly) She is a red panda!
  Priya: Sick.
  Abby: You're so fluffy! (face-nuzzles in Mei's fur as her eyes sparkle) YOU'RE SO FLUFFY!
  Priya: (playing with Mei's tail) I always wanted a tail.
• When Mei turns back into a human, her friends are pretty happy about this... except for Abby, whose reassuring "yeah" seems more reluctant. When Mei says that she might transform back if she gets upset again, Abby pinches her cheek.
  • Mei asks Abby to hit her, specifically pointing at her arm. Without a word, Abby instead punches her in the face hard enough to knock her to the ground. Miriam is visibly wincing while Priya is nodding in exasperation. Meanwhile, Abby actually looks thrilled that she was able to knock Mei out so easily. Turns out, Abby punched her hoping Mei would go panda again, since Abby loves the panda so much, and is disappointed when Mei recovers unchanged. What's worth noting is that Abby looks at Mei's arm as she points to it and specifically decides to go for her face instead!
• Hearing her parents, Mei shoos out her friends, telling Miriam she also can't stay because Ming has made it clear that she doesn't like Miriam. This is apparently news to Miriam.
  Miriam: Wait, she doesn't?
• Mei's parents give her a trigger test to see if she can truly keep her panda powers under control. They first start with pictures of deforestation and a sad orangutan, then a photo of her pouting after coming in second place during a spelling bee. When she manages to get through those, her father walks out to bring a box in. The scene is played dramatically, until Mei opens the box to find a bunch of kittens inside. She nearly loses composure at how cute they are.
  Mei: (Gasp!) So cute! No! So fuzzy! (kittens crawling all over her head and shoulders while she groans) Must resist!
  • Later, when Mei's aunts and grandmother come to the temple to help with the panda-sealing ritual, Ming proudly boasts about Mei keeping her composure around "the kitten box", which impresses all her aunties.
• After Mei proves that she can keep her emotions under control, she seeks to ask Ming's permission to go to the 4*Town concert. Quick cut to a close-up Ming giving her a firm no, followed by a wide-shot of Mei having concluded an elaborate multimedia presentation about why she should see the concert, flaming sparklers still in hand.
  • The presentation, as we see in its final moments, includes the notion that 4*Town are the modern day answer to classic composers such as Beethoven, Mozart, Chopin and Haydn, one of her props being a bust of Beethoven wearing a backwards ball cap. Also, Mei has attempted to legitimize the presentation by wearing Ming's blazer and is notably panting at the end of the presentation. Jin has a 4*Town pamphlet in hand which he seems to be reading very thoroughly over the course of the scene, which gets even funnier after one sees The Stinger.
  • Unlike her daughter and husband, Ming isn't impressed by 4*Town:
    Ming: (points at Mei's presentation) Look at those glittery delinquents with their... (shudders) gyrations.
    [...]
    Ming: (after the presentation) $200? And for what? Who do they think they are? Céline Dion?! (does a hand gesture similar to Dion's)
  • When Ming asks Mei why she wants to go to the 4*Town concert so badly, Mei's Imagine Spot is so hilariously over-the-top!
    • To wit, she imagines herself with her besties partying with the 4*Town singers, chugging multiple cans of cola (with Abby letting out a huge burp next to her), getting proposed to by Robaire with a boy band-themed ring, being lifted into the air by the members of 4*Town, and finally taking a selfie with them on stage!
    • Even better after finishing the movie; Abby's antics are mostly relegated to screaming in the fantasy, meaning she was actually tamer in the fantasy than she was at the actual concert!
• After the argument over not letting Mei see 4*Town.
  Ming: Where does she get that from? Treating her own mother like that.
  Jin: (answering the phone) Hold on. Ming, it's your mother.
  Ming: I'm not here! (ducks down)
  • During the phone call, Ming has the exact same strained smile as Mei while she's talking to her mother.
• While playing dodgeball during gym class the next day, the girls all complain that all of their parents said no to them going to the concert. Priya, engaging in some stiff Nonchalant Dodging, says her parents told her she could go when she turns 30. Miriam gripes about how her parents said she could go if she pays for her own tickets, but she doesn't have that much money. Abby, with a dodgeball in each hand, yells that her mom said 4*Town was "stripper music". "What's wrong with that?!" she snarls, before catching a third dodgeball in her teeth. Mei, meanwhile, lampshades the nature of the aforementioned multimedia presentation: "WITH PROPS! AND SPARKLERS!" Meanwhile, Abby is seen in the background stiffly moving and turning as if she was a Player Character in an First-Person Shooter.
  • While this can also be Nightmare Fuel, the part where Mei throws a dodgeball at Tyler and he just stands there shaking while his hairdo is messed up.
• While the girls ponder how to make money for the concert, Abby begs Mei to turn into a panda, needing "another hit" and moaning in ecstasy when she's hugging her as though her Cuteness Overload was heroin.
  • We also see from the mental image Mei invokes in order to transform (a merman form and likely-not-at-all-incidentally shirtless Robaire) the sort of happy place she uses to initiate rather than dampen down her transformations.
• When Stacy and her two friends surprise the transformed Mei and her friends in the girls' bathroom, Miriam, Abby, and Priya still try to claim that Stacy did imagine the red panda when she saw it before. Then the unnamed black girl asks "So she's, like, a magical bear?" Mei and her friends chorus "Red panda!" (with Mei peeking over the stall door), and all four realize simultaneously that they just blew any chance they had of keeping Mei's secret.
• The girls hustle in raising money to watch the 4*Town concert.
  • What starts this whole domino effect is how Stacy and her friends all squee at how cute the red panda is and offer payment to be able to pet her.
    "I'll give you my money!"
    "My kidney!"
    "My soul!"
  • Abby as the bouncer/lookout at the classroom door. Especially when she blocks Tyler from getting in by wordlessly pointing to a hand-drawn sign saying "No Tylers".
  • At one point, Ming comes down the hall with a tray of dumplings for Mei, prompting an Oh, Crap! from Abby who rapidly hides the money she was just counting and knocks on the door to signal the others. What follows is a rapid-fire process of them hiding every trace of their hustle and disgusing it as a Mathletes Meetup (the cover story Mei gave Ming for why she was staying after school). When Ming enters the room, Priya, Mei, and Miriam look at her with totally not suspicious grins. Ming looks at them suspiciously for a few seconds, before the guard comes up behind her, prompting her to drop the tray and leave with a look of annoyed defeat. The guard then eats one of the dumplings as Abby gives the all-clear, and everyone else sighs in relief that that worked.
  • When they make keychains during break, Abby complains that she's gonna black out, and does just that. Meanwhile, Priya grumbles that she's getting carpal tunnel as her wrists crick at odd angles.
• Mei trying to get Ming off her back as she attempts to sneak out to Tyler's party, thinking Mei is going to study with her friends and wants to join her:
  Mei: Wouldn't you rather hang out with Dad?
  (Ming looks back at Jin)
  Jin: (mouth full) Oh!
  Ming: (looks back at Mei after a beat) I'll get my flashcards!
  Jin: (mouth still full, more disappointed) Ohh.
• Priya dancing for the party in charades, with her friends not being able to interpret it. Then a goth girl comes up and says, "mortality". Priya acknowledges her and nods in approval.
  • "The Cha-Cha Slide" is playing and as people who grew up doing the dance noted, it is an unrealistic scene... as none of the partygoers are even dancing to it. Instead, they sit and impatiently wait for Mei to show up.
• When Priya dances with the goth girl, Mei, Miriam, and Abby excitedly cheer for her and then they all have cheeky grins on their faces while nudging one another.
• When Mei is about to leave when it looks like Miriam won't forgive her for throwing them under the bus, it's spoiled by a familiar beeping.
  Mei: (as Miriam groans) Robaire Junior?
  Priya: She's been taking care of him 24/7.
  Miriam: (clasps one hand over Priya's mouth) No!
  Abby: And singing him lullabies every night!
  Miriam: (covers Abby's mouth the same way; both Abby and Priya struggling) NO! No, I haven't! They're lying!
  (Mei's Tamagotchi beeps again; Miriam admits defeat)
• Devon can actually be spotted at the 4*Town concert, having a great time.
• When Ming's gigantic panda form appears at the Skydome, most of the audience think it's part of the show at first... but 4*Town, who know it definitely isn't, panic and flail in mid-air, with Tae Young and Jesse visibly moving like they're trying to swim away.
• Once the audience realizes it isn't part of the show and start running, one girl complains about wanting a refund while another asks "What's her problem?", both in a tone more annoyed than frightened. We later see that, even among those running in fear, some are still taking pictures of the Kaiju Red Panda.
• When Ming unleashes her kaiju-sized red panda form and attacks the 4*Town concert, Mei's dad, grandmother, and aunts arrive to help.
  Mei: Wh-what happened? She's huge!
  Jin: I told you she was big!
  Mei: THAT BIG?!
• Even as a gigantic red panda that is tearing up the SkyDome and grounding her daughter, Ming still finds the time to chastise all of the teens in attendance!
  Ming: EVERYONE, GO HOME! WHERE ARE YOUR PARENTS?! PUT SOME CLOTHES ON!

  Doubly funny since in her panda form, technically she's the one that doesn't have clothing on. Plus, rather than the expected Godzilla-like roar of a kaiju, instead, we are treated to a giant kaiju scolding teenagers.

• When Mei gives her I Am What I Am speech and stands up to her mother, one of the things she passionately confesses is that she likes "gyrating", complete with a gyrating dance move.
• Ming, after Mei confesses to everything, stomps after her daughter, scolding her, with her hands on her hips. It just looks plain silly for a giant red panda to do that. Also, Mei twerking just to get a rise out of her kaiju-sized mother.
  Ming: (angrily) Get back here!!
  Mei: Make me!
  Ming: You think you're so mature?! Lying to me?! Blaming me?! How could you be so... so... CRASS?!!
  Mei: Oh, that's nothing! You wanna see crass?! (starts gyrating)
  Ming: (disgusted) What are you doing?! Stop moving like that!
  Mei: (smirks) What's wrong? Is this bothering you? (continues gyrating)
  Ming: (horrified) Stop it! STOP IT!!
  • Some bonus points to Mei for her expression: that special little-kid variant of the Cheshire Cat Grin that says, "Any other time I'd catch hell for this, but this time it's okay, and I'm gonna enjoy it!"
  • And then Miriam and Abby both encourage Mei to continue: "Shake that money maker!" and "Destroy her with your big butt!", while Tyler strikes a Hadoken pose.
  • Mei takes her act further by smacking her ass while going "Take it!", and then putting her head in between her knees and bouncing.
  • As an added bonus, a siren goes off to signal Mei gyrating — the same type of siren heard in hip-hop songs.
  • The fact that Mei does all of her dirty dancing in her red panda form, swishing her tail to make it even more provocative.
• Ming having a mild Cuteness Proximity reaction when feeding her Panda Tamagotchi after her panda spirit was sealed in it. There's also something ironically funny about her affectionately calling it "Little One" when we all know that couldn't be further from the truth.
• All the women in the family (minus Mei) separate themselves from their red panda spirits, but they broke their charms during the climactic confrontation, so Mr. Gao has to improvise with what's available. Ming's new charm is Mei's Tamagotchi, while Grandma Lee's is a 4*Town necklace. She is not amused, especially when it causes her to lose at cards against her friends, but she knows that she cannot discard it for good reasons.
  Grandma: So unlucky.

  Also if you look closely at her cards, she has four of a kind, four 4s and one ace, which is especially unlucky because there are only two other hands out of ten that can beat such a combination.

• Ming (with the help from the family) opens up a charity drive in the temple to raise money and fix the Skydome to avoid a prison sentence. After the latest batch of sales, she uses a red marker to fill in the $10,000 mark, and then the camera pans way up to reveal she has $99,990,000 to go. All she can do is smile sheepishly.
• In the photo that Mei took with 4*Town plus her friends and family, Abby can be seen jumping onto Tae Young's back, while Tae has a glorious "WTF?" facial expression.
• The Stinger showing that Jin is a closet fan of 4*Town, as he jams out to one of their songs in the basement. Looks like Tyler's not the only closet 4*Townie after all...

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