We've seen our favorite Disney princesses done up in historically accurate period costumes, in scary makeup, on Instagram, and more. But it seems the internet's artists have merely scratched the surface of how those lovely ladies can be reinterpreted. The latest is another startling reality check on our childhood: What would the princesses look like as older women?
Artist Isaque Arêas estimated the princesses' ages at the time of their respective films' releases. He then calculated how old they'd be today and posted his versions of how they'd look today on his Facebook page.
"I was looking at the older Hollywood actresses and thought it would be like the princesses were also aging over time. I decided to draw them based on their ages stated by Disney in the year of release of the films," Areas told Marie Claire Globo (which we've translated roughly from Portuguese).
What's almost as startling as their appearance as "women of a certain age," however, is how old these princesses presumably were during their romantic story lines. (Which seems okay if we're also saying these women were living in the era of their fairy tales, when women routinely married at 15 — so, okay, reality and math really have no say in this thing.) He assumes, for example, that Sleeping Beauty's Aurora was 16 in her movie (1959), and is 72 today. He estimates that Ariel was 16 in The Little Mermaid (1989) and, thus, is a very attractive 42 today. Snow White (17 and 92) and Cinderella (19 and 84) have aged the most, of course, since their respective 1937 and 1950 films.
How well has Areas aged these ladies? Well, the lines around their mouths and eyes, shorter hair, and a few more prominent cheekbones do add years to them. It's good to see even the 30-something heroines like Jasmine and Pocahontas with a hint of under-eye creases. Some of the older princesses, however, look like they may have dipped into their royal coffers to pay for some very good plastic surgeons and makeup artists.
Show us some sunspots, sagging chins, and dark circles and we'll agree they aged naturally.