Shorts Review: Tangled: Short Cuts “Make Me Smile”

Did the latest episode of Tangled: Short Cuts make us smile?

The focus is on Rapunzel for the first time in Tangled’s Short Cuts. Up to this point, the episodes have been showcases for minor characters, but now both she and Eugene make appearances. “Make Me Smile” is enjoyable, but doesn’t add as much to the Tangled world as the first two shorts. It’s already very well established that Rapunzel is eager to please and full of perseverance. This episode is mostly a rehash of that.

Rapunzel is concerned that one of the villagers (“Scowly Crowley”) never smiles and sets out to change that. Of course, she succeeds. With any more of a spotlight on Rapunzel’s good nature, she might start to become one-dimensional.

This short is also very similar to the full-length episode “Rapunzel’s Enemy” (though, in that case, Rapunzel actually doesn’t succeed). Rapunzel had spent the entire show trying to convince an old man to like her. It’s telling that almost the same story, but with an old woman, can be told in two and a half minutes. Even though Rapunzel is Tangled’s main character, her optimism alone doesn’t carry the show very far.

All in all, the episode was worth it, just for the image of Pascal willingly slipping on a banana peel.