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G
- Gendered Insult: The entirety of "I'll Make A Man Out Of You", and in particular the line "Did they send me daughters when I asked for sons?" Of course, seeing as the by far most competent member of the unit is Sweet Polly Oliver Mulan, this is Played for Laughs.
- George Jetson Job Security: Subverted at the end when Mulan is offered the position of imperial councillor, which she respectfully declines so she can return home:The Emperor: Chi Fu.
Chi Fu: Your Excellency?
The Emperor: [Indicating Mulan] See to it that this woman is made a member of my council.
Chi Fu: A member of... what?! [Stutters] But there are no council positions open, Your Majesty.
The Emperor: Very well. [To Mulan] You can have his job.
Chi Fu: W-W-Wha?! My...?! (faints) - Girliness Upgrade: Mulan dresses like a warrior in the original Disney cartoon, but is dressed as a Chinese princess in the merchandising. Her usual costume in the Disney Parks is her matchmaker dress with her hair done up, but without her white makeup. The only aversion to this trope is her cameo in Sofia the First, wherein she appears with loose, short hair and wearing her armor, and in the Kingdom Hearts series, where her level features her during the war.
- Goofy Print Underwear: One of the soldiers is wearing anachronistic clothing and it falls on Mushu's face.
- Gory Discretion Shot:
- Shan Yu is shot with a massive rocket into a stockpile of fireworks, and this is carefully only seen from a great distance.
- One of the "messengers" Shan Yu sends to the emperor is killed by an archer.Shan Yu: How many men does it take to deliver a message?
Hun archer: [Readies bow] "One." - When Mulan gets slashed across the chest, she's clearly bleeding.
- GPS Evidence: Shan Yu's falcon brings him a doll from a village to which they are en route. The doll has evidence on it — pine tar, a white horsehair, and gunpowder — that tells him the Imperial Army is there.
- Grand Romantic Gesture: Downplayed. Mulan lost her father's helmet in the battle with the Huns. Shang found it and brings the helmet as a pretext to visit Mulan after she returns home. He starts stammering when explaining whose helmet it is and how he came to get it. Fa Zhou doesn't know the details, but he recognizes what it must mean and encourages Mulan to step forward.
- Grappling-Hook Pistol: Arrow variation; Yao uses a rope attached to an arrow to shoot at Mulan so she can use it to pull herself, Shang, and Khan (plus Mushu and Cri-Kee) to safety. Because Yao drops both the arrow and bow, Mulan has to use it going the other way, with the soldiers acting as the anchor.
- Grin of Audacity: Shan Yu is about to cut down Ping, but stops when the helpless soldier in front of him smirks at something behind him.
- Gym Class Rope Climb: One of the training exercises is a variation of this; you have to climb a pole and you have to do it with two heavyweights attached to your wrists.
H
- Hand Gagging: Mulan briefly silences Mushu this way during his "dishonor" rant.
- Hard-to-Light Fire: Mulan drops the flint and steel she needs to light the final cannon during the battle with the Huns thanks to Hayubasa striking her hand. She resorts to using Mushu to light the cannon.
- Hat Damage: Chi-Fu's hat is badly burned during the Training Montage when a misguided cannon (thanks to Ling kicking out Mulan's stand) hits his tent and he barely gets out in time.
- Hate Sink: Chi-Fu's main role in the story is to prove the Huns don't have a monopoly on awful people. He is the main voice of misogyny in the movie, while the movie's Big Bad Shan Yu doesn't seem to care about Mulan's gender.
- Have a Gay Old Time: The name Mulan uses while disguised as a boy is Fa Ping. The name is a pun in Chinese as well for a pretty flower vase, as in eye candy; something pretty and useless.
- Headgear Headstone: When the general—who also happens to be Shang's father—dies, Chien-po, who found the body, brings back the general's helmet. Having no time for a burial, he erects a memorial by driving his sword into the ground and placing his father's helmet on it. Mulan also places an abandoned doll she found in the village's ruins next to the sword.
- Heartbroken Badass: Shang after he finds his father slaughtered at the Tung Shao Pass village. He's obviously grieving, but know logically that he and his men are the only ones who can stop Shan Yu and the Huns. So he mounts his horse, gives a short Rousing Speech to the troops, and orders them to move out.
- Hellish Horse: The horses used by the Huns have red eyes and fangs.
- "Hell, Yes!" Moment:
- Ling, who's been the most suspicious bully towards "Ping," urges Mulan upward when she decides to try the arrow test and actually is close to the stop. He starts grinning and fist-pumping. When she makes it to the top, he's among the crowd cheering her.
- The capital citizens react this way when Chien-Po gets the Emperor to the safety of the ground, and Mulan cuts their Improvised Zipline. They start cheering as Shan Yu can only yell.
- Hero of Another Story: Apparently, Fa Zhou has quite an impressive war record in his past service.
- Hero's Muse: The soldiers discuss their respective views on the ideal woman to marry in the song "A Girl Worth Fighting For".
- Heroic BSoD: Mulan has a mild one after her cover is blown and she is abandoned by the army.
- High-Class Fan: When Mulan is meeting with the Matchmaker (an Etiquette Nazi who judges a woman's value as a wife), she's asked to recite a final admonition, which she does while pulling a fan and hiding her face, under the pretense of making herself look more regal, but it's actually so the Matchmaker won't notice her reading the final admonition notes scribbled in her arm. It is implied that many young women write notes on the fan itself, as the Matchmaker immediately grabs and inspects it.
- Historical Fantasy: Downplayed: the only fantasy elements in a story otherwise about an Ancient Chinese war hero are the ancestral spirits and Mushu the dragon.
- Hit You So Hard, Your X Will Feel It!: Mushu tells Mulan that punching and butt-slapping are a form of friendly gesture among men. Mulan does this to Yao in the wrong way, and naturally, it causes a stir in Yao's rather short temper.Yao: I'm gonna hit you so hard, it'll make your ancestors dizzy!
- Hope Spot:
- When they come to the village in the Tung Shao Pass, Shang tells his men to find survivors. They all fan out, wanting to have done some good. Mulan finds a doll, and Chi Fu finds a battlefield of corpses.
- Shang actually overpowers Shan Yu and gets him in a painful hold while his men save the Emperor and escort him to safety. Shan Yu is so enraged about the Emperor getting away that he frees himself and takes down Shang with a well-placed headbutt.
- The Horde: The Huns pour into China from over the Great Wall to rampage and raze and generally bring out the end of the Chinese way of life. All of them look sinister.
- Human Ladder: The soldiers form one to try to find Mulan during the avalanche.
- Human Notepad: Mulan writes notes in her arm when she goes to meet the matchmaker.
- Human Traffic Jam: In the Training Montage, when the soldiers are jumping along some poles jutting upwards in a line, Chien Po falters and stops moving forward. Shang, coming behind him, defies the trope by stopping in a controlled manner before running into him, but that just makes the jam form behind him when everyone else fails to do the same.
- Hypocritical Humor:
- Chi Fu: "...And I do not squeal like a girl!" [Panda eats Chi Fu's slipper and he squeals like a girl]
- Mushu: "Dragon, dra-gon, not 'lizard'. I don't do that tongue thing." [Does the tongue thing]
I
- I Am Your Opponent: When Mulan reveals herself to Shan Yu. Impressively, he doesn't seem to care that she's a woman. He simply recognizes that she's the one who defeated him.Shan Yu: [Preparing to kill Shang] You! You took away my victory!
Mulan: [Throws a shoe at him] No! I did.
[Mulan pulls back her hair into a soldier's topknot]
Shan Yu: The soldier from the mountains... - I Have Just One Thing to Say: The emperor lists all the many things that Mulan has done that violate rules and tradition — and then bows to her for her having saved China.
- If Only You Knew: The song "I'll Make a Man Out of You" has the line, "Did they send me daughters when I asked for sons?" Shang thinks he's turning boys into men, but of course, with Mulan the starting point is a bit different. Though, ironically, she becomes an even more capable soldier than her male comrades-in-arms.
- Impairment Shot: After the avalanche, this occurs with Mulan when the wound that she received when Shan Yu slashed at her with his sword earlier finally catches up to her. Her vision blurs and darkens as she passes out due to blood loss.
- Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: Completely subverted on both sides. Shang's Training from Hell ensures that when his soldiers fire cannons, there's always an impact. Mulan's cannon in particular saves the entire army with her aim. The Huns in the meantime manage to hit Shang from a distance.
- Implied Love Interest: Mulan and Captain Li Shang. They blush around each other and Mulan asks the captain to stay for dinner, but no one outright says that they are a couple.
- Important Haircut: Part of Mulan's soldier transformation is to cut her long hair so that she can more easily pass for a man. Bonus points for using her father's sword to do it.
- Important Hair Accessory: Mulan is given a floral hair comb before her disastrous appointment with the matchmaker. When she decides to take her father's place in the army she takes his conscription notice and leaves the comb in its place.
- Improvised Zipline: Mulan uses a string of lanterns to zip down from the roof of the Imperial Palace.
- Indignant Slap: When Mushu claims that his eyes can see straight through Mulan's armor (looking straight at her chest), Mulan gives him an offended slap. This backfires, causing him to (impotently) start proclaiming dishonor on her and her whole family.
- Indy Ploy:
- Incoming Ham: Mushu's "IIIIIIIIIII LIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVEEEEEEE!!!!!!!"
- Insistent Terminology: "Dragon, dra-gon, not 'lizard'! I don't do that tongue thing."
- Instantly Defeathered Bird: Shan Yu's falcon is intimidating... until Mushu sets fire to him and he instantly looks and sounds like a featherless chicken. He even appears headless for a moment, as he had tucked it into his neck. A few scenes later, Mushu is riding him.
- Interchangeable Asian Cultures: More than one example.
- Shan Yu's pet saker falcon is named Hayabusa, which is the Japanese word for peregrine falcon. Saker falcons do not even exist in Japan, so you cannot handwave the bird as an exotic import. The word for saker falcon in Mongolian (or an ancestor of it; this is hundreds of years ago, after all) is idleg shonkhor, which apparently does not roll off the tongue.
- The Huns themselves are this. They should properly be called the Xiongnu, and the Chinese dub does correctly refer to them as such. The confusion came about because the Huns were a nomadic confederation who invaded Europe at roughly the same time as the film's events and, like the Xiongnu, also hailed from somewhere in the Central Asian steppes.
- The costume and make-up Mulan wears for the Matchmaker is often thought to be this but actually isn't. The dress resembles a kimono but is actually a hanfu (a traditional Chinese dress). The geisha-like make-up is also traditionally Chinese. The kimono and make-up are Japanese things that were influenced by Chinese culture.
- But perhaps the most egregious example would be that in the hospital tent scene, one of the tents has a Japanese flag
◊ on the outside.
- I Owe You My Life:
- Shang to Mulan. This life-debt becomes immediately useful when Mulan is found out, and the punishment for a woman joining the army is death. Instead of killing her, Shang lets her go free. In the next scene, we're shown that he did leave her a good amount of provisions and her horse, which she promptly rides back into town after learning the Huns are alive.
- With the Emperor, he thanks Mulan for not just saving him, but all of China from falling. As thanks, he bows to her. When she turns down his council job, he gives her his crest and Shan Yu's sword, so that she is sufficiently rewarded.
- Ironic Echo: A reprise of "Make A Man Out Of You" plays with unabashed glee while Mulan's friends are getting tarted up in full concubine drag to infiltrate the palace. Later, all four of them use the combat moves they were shown learning during that musical number against the Huns... while still dressed as women.
J
- Jacob Marley Apparel: One of the Fa family ancestors was decapitated. His head reamained disconnected from his body even into spirit form.
- Jerkass: Chi Fu is a chauvinist prick who condemns Mulan with the death penalty once her gender is found out, despite the fact she saved them all from the Hun army in the mountains. He tries this again after she and the others save the emperor and all of China from the Huns, still insisting she will 'never be worth anything'. When the emperor demands Mulan be made a member of his council, Chi Fu appears to be lying when he says there aren't any council positions open, so apparently saving China still doesn't impress him. Some gratitude... It's noted that many viewers reserve more hatred for him than the Huns.
- Jerkass Has a Point:
- The Matchmaker is definitely not a nice lady, and her nitpickiness wins no points with Grandmother Fa, but Mulan didn't just fail the matchmaker exam but also set her on fire. All she had to do was pour tea and recite some memorized text, but Mulan couldn't do either. The Matchmaker is right to tell her off, even if she goes too far by saying Mulan will never bring honor to her family.
- Chi Fu points out that Shang is an academy student, who hasn't been in battle, and so someone with more experience should be captain instead of him. Indeed, when Shang fights Shan Yu, he is outclassed despite his training. Mulan's creativity saves him twice.
- Jerkass Realization: Ling has one after "Ping" starts excelling in the training regimen. They notice the kid is shying away from them while bathing in the lake, and is making excuses to leave. Ling apologizes, saying they were jerks before, and can they start over fresh? Mulan accepts reluctantly; the reason she was trying to leave is they'll see her naked and realize she's a woman.
- Just the Way You Are: When Mulan returns home with gifts of honor, Fa Zhou, who has been worried sick about his daughter getting killed and her running away after they had a big fight, envelops her in a hug and tells her that she is the greatest gift and honor.
- Juxtaposed Halves Shot: The home video covers show one half of Mulan's face hidden by a sword. The other half is reflected in the sword, but as her male soldier persona.
- Juxtaposed Reflection Poster: One promotional image, often used as the home video cover art, has Mulan in her civilian clothing looking straight at the camera, holding up a sword. Where the sword overlaps her face, it shows a reflection of her disguised as a male soldier.
K
- Karma Houdini: No one seems to notice (or possibly care) that Mushu accidentally killed the Great Stone Dragon, though it is possible that A. it was dead to begin with, B. it was the wrong statue, or C. the statue is just a vessel to incarnate in the mortal world—the dragon got stuck in the astral plane, but he is all right and the ancestors cut him some slack because he helped save China. note
- Keep the Reward: After she's offered a council position, Mulan turns it down because she wants to return home. The emperor then gives her his pendant and Shan Yu's sword so that her family will know how she has saved China.
- Kick the Dog: Shan-Yu captures a pair of Chinese scouts (and mockingly congratulates them on finding his army), then lets them go to tell their Emperor he is coming. As they flee, he turns to one of his henchmen, an archer:Shan-Yu: How many men does it take to deliver a message?Archer Henchman: [nocks arrow] "One."
- Kicked Upstairs: It's strongly suggested that General Li gave Shang his own division because the general wanted his son to stay well away from the real fighting — not for incompetence, just a bit too much protective instinct.
- Kneel Before Frodo: The emperor and then all of China bow to Mulan in the end.
- Kneel Before Zod: Shan Yu attempts to invoke this, but the Emperor refuses. Shan Yu decides to kill him instead.
- Knight of Cerebus: Shan Yu and the Huns. They are treated with a colossal degree of seriousness and, seeing as they managed to invade China's borders and slaughter the emperor's best armies, there's a very good reason why everyone (except the emperor, himself) fears them. The moment the protagonists directly confront their work, the movie literally ceases to be a musical.
- Kung-Shui: Shan Yu's pursuit of Mulan breaks many walls and ceilings of the Emperor's palace.
L
- Lame Pun Reaction: The recruits on the first day of training.Chi Fu: Order! People, order!
Recruit 1: I'd like a pan-fried noodle!
Chien-Po: Ooh, ooh, sweet and pungent shrimp.
Recruit 2: Moo goo gai pan.
Chi Fu: [amid laughter] That's not funny. - Lampshade Hanging: Yao asks, "Is she allowed to do that?" when Mulan hugs the Emperor at the end. Strictly speaking, no, she is absolutely not. The Emperor of feudal China was seen as a semi-divine personage, and touching him without permission was punishable by death.
- Large Ham: Mushu. "I LIIIIIIIIIVVVVEEEE!!!!!!"
- Last Stand: Never outright stated, but this is pretty much what Shan Yu and his elite soldiers decide to do after most of their army is wiped out by the avalanche. Instead of returning home in dishonor, they choose to make one last attempt to get the Emperor. At that point, they probably know they can't take over China even if they kill the Emperor, but they still want to get the win.
- Last Villain Stand: After his army gets wiped out by an avalanche and his generals have been captured, Shan Yu still tries to kill the one who stole his victory.
- Laugh of Love: Invoked and exploited when Yao, Ling, and Chien-Po disguise themselves as concubines and giggle while approaching Shan Yu's guards in order to take them out.
- Leave No Survivors: The Huns destroyed General Li's army (and the village they were stationed at) so thoroughly that there were literally no survivors left to even send a message of their imperiled fate. In fact, it was only through a forged message from Mushu that Shang's division even found out of the massacre.
- Le Parkour: Shan Yu uses this to chase Mulan in the climax.
- Letting the Air out of the Band:
- An awful, jarring, highly effective twist on this trope occurs at the end of "A Girl Worth Fighting For":Ling: Wish that I had...
Crew: A girl worth fighting—
[All catch sight of blood-red sky and village burned to the ground; music echoes, then dies.] - A smaller example occurs in the middle of the song, when Mulan suggests that a girl worth fighting for is one "who's got a brain, who always speaks her mind". Her fellow soldiers don't see the appeal, and apparently neither does the BGM.
- An awful, jarring, highly effective twist on this trope occurs at the end of "A Girl Worth Fighting For":
- Lipstick-and-Load Montage:
- Used when the soldiers are applying drag to infiltrate Shan Yu's guard in the royal palace (set to a brief reprise of "I'll Make A Man Out Of You", no less!).
- Mulan getting dressed up during "You'll Bring Honor to Us All" is treated with the seriousness of preparing for battle. This would be her "battlefield" after all.
- Literal Metaphor: Shang tells his recruits that they'll need "Discipline" and "Strength" (two heavy weights on ropes) to retrieve the arrow from the top of the pole. The secret is to loop them together around the pole like a belt.
- Lock-and-Load Montage: Mulan dons her father's armor, dons his weapons, and cuts her hair in this fashion.
- Longing Look: What totally gives away Mulan's crush on Shang to Mushu is one of these. She does it a second time after he points it out.
- Love Makes You Dumb: Shang is an incredibly competent and professional soldier, not even letting his father's death distract him from the task at hand. Then he falls all over himself trying to speak to Mulan while she's a girl, but by that point he doesn't really need to be focused on the Huns.
- Lyrical Dissonance: "I'll Make a Man Out of You" gets more pessimistic, even defeatist, the further it goes while still being a chest-thumping anthem of masculinity.You're unsuited for, the rage of war
So pack up, go home, you're through
How could I make a man out of you?
