Did Hans really love Anna?

Hans and Anna from Disney's Frozen

I was sure after repeated watchings of Frozen that Hans genuinely liked Anna.

If you've seen the film, you'll recall the scene in which Hans reappears from under the overturned boat with a broad, smitten smile.

Hans smiles from under a boat after he
meets Anna in Disney's Frozen

A friend and I analyzed this relationship a bit, after I mentioned that Disney scored a miss by not hinting at Hans's true motives, but he said he thought he detected this in "Love is an Open Door" when Anna says "sandwiches" where we would expect her to say "sentences," and Hans replies "That's what I was going to say!"  (ie, she's falling in love and he's pretending to).


Love is an Open Door

That's possible, but I'm not so sure. I interpreted this as sort of a to-may-to/to-mah-to reference, ie, the Disney version of "I Remember It Well" from Gigi.

Gigi, "I Remember It Well"

My son Charlie said he pegged Hans for the bad guy right off the bat, but that may be because every Disney film has a bad guy (or gal) and we're trained to look for them.

At any rate, I haven't detected any unambiguous clues that Hans was using Anna to gain the throne, which just *might* be an intentional (if subtle) metaphor for "love is blind" or "you can't judge a book by it's cover" (Hans is the handsome one, Kristoff the more rugged and simple one).

I just cannot see sword-wielding murderous Hans in that guy under the boat.

[2014-05-23]

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