"My Past Is Not Today" Is NOT "Let It Go" (Rant) · 5:33pm Sep 24th, 2015
I've been seeing this since the song came out and it's starting to bug me. So pardon me while I go into rant mode about Let It Go. And for the record - it's a great song, and I loved Frozen. But people don't "get" that song, and for it, I now have to bitch about them. Also, bad language in this post, not out of rage but because of a certain video linked further down.
"Let It Go," hell, who hasn't heard that song? I think even the Amish know the lyrics by heart at this point. And then of course, "My Past Is Not Today," awesome song. However, the similarities between the two songs is superfluous - when you actually bother to analyze them - what the lyrics are about, who's singing them, why, etc. - the two songs are very different, to the point of being polar opposites. Nevermind Elsa and Sunset are color inversions of each other in design, or the whole fire/ice parallels. Hm, there's a crackfic in this somewhere. For now, ranting.
My Past Is Not Today, My Past for ease of typing, is a song sung by a reformed villain. She was evil and alone, but she found light and friendship and was given a new chance. She has a new path, a better path. "Like a phoenix burning bright," Sunset is rising from the ashes of her destroyed and ruined past to reach for a bright new future.
Let It Go is a song sung by Elsa after she's fled her kingdom. Having lived her life alone and afraid of hurting others, she enjoys just being able to express herself and use her powers without fear. She sings about leaving her life behind, not caring if her powers have hurt anyone because she's just fine, and revelling in her new freedom.
So on the surface, yeah, these songs seem very similar... when taken at face value. The problem with Let It Go and its obsessive fandom is that it isn't meant to be taken at face value, because when you actually take a second look at it, you realize what the song is really about. Let It Go is not a song of empowerment, overcoming fear, or letting go of your past.
Elsa has run from her kingdom and her family after accidentally freezing her kingdom in an eternal winter... and she doesn't care! It's in the chorus, "Let the storm rage on / the cold never bothered me anyway" and also "I'm never going back / the past is in the past." She's doomed her kingdom and has basically decided "fuck 'em" because she can finally enjoy her powers and doesn't want to stop doing it. And overcoming her past? To the contrary, Elsa is running from her past, and from her fears. She runs away from everything not caring about the state she left it in, and decides she's perfectly content to live in isolation on the top of a mountain for the rest of her life.
When Anna finds her and Elsa accidentally attacks her, she banishes her sister from the castle and summons a monster to attack Anna and Kristoff to force them to leave. Again, this shows Elsa's mindset - she wants to be alone and when faced with a problem she caused, she ignores it and pushes it away. What she does to Anna is a microcosm of her actions towards Arendelle as a whole. Elsa is enjoying her powers regardless of who gets hurt because of it, because she's cast off her responsibilities and doesn't care about her subjects or even her own family.
Frankly, this version of Let It Go shows a better understanding of the song than most fans.
Imagine if you were watching the Lion King, and "Hakuna Matata" was a song about Timon and Pumbaa singing "so your dad died and you were exiled from home, so what, we'll raise you and you have a new home here," and Simba joined in singing he doesn't care about Mufasa's death or Scar seizing the kingdom, he's got a new life and it's just fine. You'd think Simba is in denial at best and an uncaring bastard at worst, especially when he's confronted with what's happened to the kingdom without him and doesn't care. Guess what - the same thing happens with Elsa! And while Simba realizes his responsibilities and goes back to save the day, Elsa doesn't return to Arendelle on her own power, she's captured and imprisoned there.
My Past Is Not Today and Let It Go are polar opposites. Sunset has faced her past and overcome it by redeeming herself and atoning for her misdeeds; Elsa has abandoned her past because she doesn't care about taking responsibility for what she did. Sunset has found acceptance and friendship; Elsa is isolated and alone and wants it that way. Sunset was a villain who went mad with power and has now found redemption; Elsa was a heroine who has embraced her powers and begun a descent into apathetic villainy. Yeah, don't forget that earlier drafts of Frozen had Elsa as a straightforward antagonist, ironically it was "Let It Go" that convinced the writers to make her a more complex and sympathetic character.
Also, a quote Jennifer Lee, director who also had a big hand in the writing:
And this concept of letting out who she is that she’s kept to herself for so long and she’s alone and free, but then the sadness of the fact that the last moment is she’s alone.
I'm pretty much done with this rant. To sum up, again - My Past Is Not Today is nothing like Let It Go once you bother to actually analyze the songs and understand what they and their singer are really about.
RIP
3416633
I'll have to take your word for it.
I haven't seen Frozen.
And have only heard the song once.
Well said.
Thank you for pointing out those differences - I never really got it until you did. Enjoyed both songs but did not put in the intellectual effort to see the differences, even though my gut felt them. And a very good point on the switch of Elsa from planned classic Disney villain to what she ended up being written as, her song makes much more sense with that in mind.
Thanks!
3416658
Someone's gotta watch out for your mistakes
3416771 I don't make mistakes. I'm perfect.
3416799
You tell the best jokes.
3417181 Duh.
Both songs are definitely different. Although, my interpretation of "Let it Go" is a bit different. Not because of the lyrics or even the song, but the expression used in the animated segment. I felt it told a different story about her growing out of her self-hatred and accepting herself for what and who she was. Conveniently enough she isn't fully aware of the damage she is doing by this point of the film.