If you’re a fan of Pixar’s Turning Red you will know the film is packed full of memorable characters, wholesome moments, and outrageous hilarity. The Academy Award-nominated film that centers on teenager Meilin and her friends is among the finest efforts the Disney-owned studio has put out in the past few years.
The deceptively simple premise focuses on Meilin’s desire to see a boy band concert while her strict mother is discouraging such activities. However, there’s a supernatural twist, in that Mei’s family has a magical secret that gets passed down from one generation of girls to the next: Around puberty, they turn into giant Red Pandas during states of high emotion.
What ensues is an interesting mix of a coming-of-age comedy and a kaiju flick, like watching Godzilla survive those awkward high school years. So let’s dive into the world of Turning Red and take a look at the main characters of the film, ranked from least to most important.
Devon
It may seem strange to rank Devon, who serves as Mei’s crush at one point, at the very bottom of this list. However, the character has very little screen time and serves as nothing more than a plot device for a hilariously humiliating scene to take place at the store he works.
4*TOWN
4*TOWN, the fictional early 2000s boy band, ranks slightly higher than Devon for actually retaining the main character’s interest throughout the duration of the movie. With the concert serving as the main motivator for Mei, their appearance is memorable due to genuinely enjoyable pop tunes and exuding a type of corniness burned into the memories of millennials, due to bands like NSYNC and Backstreet Boys.
Tyler Nguyen-Baker
Though Tyler Nguyen-Baker is a bit of a minor character, he gets a slot above Devon and 4*TOWN by virtue of actually having an arc. Starting out as a bully targeting Mei and her friends, he ends up bonding with them due to their mutual love of 4*TOWN and he becomes their friend.
Jin Lee
Though Mei’s father, Jin Lee, appears to be a more passive character than her mother, he actually serves an important role in the movie. As a reassuring parental figure, Jin is able to offer himself as a person of comfort when Mei is going through her extraordinary change.
Grandma Wu
We rank Grandma Wu highly on our list since it is her strictness with Mei’s mother, Ming, that can truly be traced back as the source of the conflict in the movie. Due to a bad experience with the Red Panda curse, she tries to keep it a tightly kept secret in the family, which causes problems.
Abby, Priya, and Mairiam (Mei’s entourage)
Mei’s entourage earns a spot high on our list due to being a consistently supportive force for our main character. Abby, Priya, and Miriam not only highly value friendship, but they all share an equally passionate love of 4*TOWN. We love all of them equally, so that’s why they share this spot on our list.
Ming Lee
The fraught relationship between Mei and her mother, Ming, is at the very heart of this movie. However, Ming turns out to be a bit of a misunderstood figure once you know about the disciplinary upbringing she experienced from Grandma Wu.
Meilin Lee
Meilin Lee is the awkwardly-relatable teen who makes this movie work so well. As the perfectionist protagonist, her ups and downs with the humiliation and triumphs of teenagehood speak to a universal theme of the human experience.
In terms of what’s next for Turning Red, co-writer and director Domee Shi has said she’d be open to doing a sequel, according to Good Morning America.
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