Ursula(Disney Universe)

“I admit that in the past I've been a nasty... they weren't kidding when they called me, well, a witch.”

―Ursula^[src]

Ursula is the main antagonist of Disney's 1989 animated feature film The Little Mermaid. She is a villainous sea witch who strikes deals with unfortunate merfolk with the promise of making their dreams come true. Ursula's contracts, however, are covertly designed to advance her own ambitions and cause general misery. In the past, Ursula was a resident of King Triton's palace, before being banished and exiled by order of the king. Scorned, she has since vowed to exact vengeance by harnessing the power of the king's trident and installing herself as ruler of all the ocean.

Ursula is loosely based on the nameless sea witch from the original Hans Christian Andersen tale, while her characterization takes inspiration from the drag queen Divine. Ursula's fervent confidence and theatricality have been met with critical praise, and have influenced villains that followed. She has since featured prominently as a primary member of the Disney Villains line-up.

Background[]

Ursula belongs to a race of creatures known as Cecaelia, which are half-woman, half-octopus. She states through a monologue that she once lived in the royal palace of King Triton, the king of the underwater city of Atlantica. She boasts that her previous life was lavish and included such spoils as "fantastical feasts." Power-hungry and devilish, even in the past, Ursula garnered a disreputable reputation amongst underwater dwellers. She was widely known as the "Sea Witch", an alias she accepted in stride.

Ursula's greed and use of dark magic led to her banishment. By orders of the King, Ursula was exiled from Atlantica and made her home in the remains of a leviathan lined with a garden of writhing polyps. These polyps were merfolk who had previously gone to Ursula for help but found themselves unable to fulfill their side of the bargain, leading Ursula to claim them as her own and adding them to her collection. Ursula laments her distaste for her living conditions, despite having maintained all of her powerful black magic. From her secluded lair, she awaits the chance to get her revenge on Triton and become Queen of Atlantica by stealing the king's trident, an extremely powerful weapon that grants its user control over the seas and its foils. Ursula is aided by her two moray eels, Flotsam and Jetsam, whom she refers to as her "babies".

Development[]

Ursula[]

Ursula is based on the "sea witch" character in Hans Christian Andersen's story "The Little Mermaid". In the original story, the sea witch is a neutral enabler, but for Disney's animated adaptation, the character was modified into a full-fledged antagonist and plays a larger role in the overall story.

During pre-production, Ursula was not originally designed as a Cecaelia; a legendary hybrid of human and octopus. It was thought that she would be another species of sea creatures, such as a rockfish or lion fish, or would have a snake-like appearance, as revealed in The Disney Sketchbook. The production team then saw a documentary about octopi and decided that their multiple arms and imposing appearance would be perfect for the character they were creating. Ursula is only drawn with six tentacles, due to the studio's budget and difficulty in coordinating eight tentacles (though she has eight limbs if you include her arms). Pat Carroll has stated that this makes her a squid, though biologically she still resembles an octopus far more than any other sea-creature. Moreover, a squid has ten tentacles, not six. Although, unlike most Cecaelia, Ursula is very obese. The character has been compared to Madame Medusa from The Rescuers in terms of style, dramatics, and choice of minions.

Pat Carroll, Ursula's voice actress, envisioned the character as "part Shakespearean actress, with all the flair, flamboyance and theatricality, and part used-car salesman with a touch of con artist." Carroll, who is a contralto, deliberately deepened her voice for the role.

Vanessa[]

During development, Vanessa's story arc went through radical changes as revealed by a leaked script online. Originally, Vanessa's method of hypnotizing Eric was different; instead of suppressing his free will and eliminating his capability to display emotion, she let him have a broader range of emotion and gave him some free will. The point of this sort of hypnosis was to influence Eric in Vanessa's direction and accept her over Ariel as his own, emphasizing deception over the brute force from the final film.

After Vanessa hypnotizes Eric, he introduces Ariel to her on the morning of the third day, announcing that they will be married by sunset. This is vastly different from the final film, where Ariel eavesdrops on their announcement before running away, never getting a good idea of who Vanessa is until Scuttle tells her. To better conceal herself due to her being so close to Ariel, Vanessa wears a scarf in the original script as a way to hide her nautilus necklace and not arouse suspicion from Ariel. And when Ariel runs away, Eric is about to run after her, but Vanessa pulls him back and kisses him; using Eric's fake love for her as a way to intimidate him.

The scene inside the cabin is exactly the same as the film, but the wedding itself has noticeable differences. In the original, Vanessa was actually eager to marry Eric and was impatient about the wedding being done before sunset, suggesting some ulterior motive aside from just taking Ariel. In the original script, she also gets to actually say "I do" unlike in the final product.

Vanessa isn't able to kiss Eric again, though, as the ceremony is disrupted by an explosion off the side of the ship and Scuttle's small army shows up and begins to attack Vanessa. She fights back in the original version, much like in the film, but quickly stops when she realizes she is blowing her cover as a sweet, innocent girl. She then begs Eric to protect her, which he does. Since Scuttle can't get close to Vanessa, he intends to reveal her true form to Eric by bringing up the mirror from her cabin. He crashes into a pole and the mirror breaks, but Eric is able to see Vanessa for what she is, the reflection of the water the sea creatures brought on board the ship. This breaks the illusion and he rejects her for Ariel. At this point, Vanessa's voice returns to sounding like Ursula's, presumably because the spell has been broken, and Eric and Ariel are about to embrace. Much like in the final movie, the sun sets before they can kiss, and Vanessa turns back into Ursula, dragging Ariel back with her under the sea.

In this ending, Ariel does not get her voice back until the very end, which changes the dynamic of the scene entirely. No explanation was ever offered as to why this half of the ending was changed.

On a separate note, early storyboard concept art revealed that Vanessa and Eric would have originally been married at the castle instead of on a ship, with Ariel lurking above in observance. This change may have been made to add a sense of urgency for Ariel to stop the wedding by having it take place somewhere else. It also may have been done to create a better transition between the wedding scene and the final battle underwater.

Vanessa's role in the film is inspired by the original Andersen tale. In that story, after the prince has been rescued by the mermaid, he is found on the beach by a princess whom he believes to have saved him. Later on, after the mermaid becomes human, she discovers that the prince will be marrying the maiden. In the end, the maiden marries the prince while the mermaid (who chose not to kill the prince despite the urging of her sisters) dies and ascends to a spiritual rebirth. The maiden, like the Sea Witch, was also a neutral character rather than a villain.

In the book, the maiden does not speak and is presented as being sprightly and innocent. She is very much in love with the prince, though, snuggling up to him while not being possessive of him, as she did not object to his friendship with the mermaid. Vanessa's façade is based on imitating this behavior while snickering behind others' backs, eliminating the presence of anything innocent.

Personality[]

In tone, and by nature, Ursula was very dark, with a wicked sense of humor. After her banishment from Atlantica, the sea witch established herself as a beacon of hope for unfortunate merpeople, allowing them to strike deals and business propositions that would supposedly result in their happiness, should they successfully fulfill their end of the bargain. During such deals, she presumably spoke in a grandmotherly tone, as if her only concern was the satisfaction of her customers, just as she did with Ariel. This would have lulled her clients into a false sense of security, making her schemes easier to fall for. She would have pressured her victims into accepting her offer, portraying herself as their last resort at making their dreams come true, especially if her initial deal wasn't appealing alone. Also, if Ariel's deal is any indication, Ursula would sadistically ensure her customers fail at upholding their end of the deal, resulting in their souls being kept forever in her possession, their bodies becoming permanent members of her living garden as polyps. The motivation of such practices are never exclusively revealed, though it could be theorized she held a general contempt for merfolk as a result of her banishment. However, she reserved no sense of morality or remorse for those she tormented. In Ariel's case, her intentions are purely to use the young mermaid as a pawn to obtain power over the seas. On a separate note, Ursula is the only character seen eating in the film when she ingests a hapless shrimp during her opening scene.

Throughout the film, Ursula is driven by vengeance and a lust for power. Her prolonged vendetta against King Triton fueled her desire to usurp him in revenge for her banishment from the palace. She quietly spies on the merfolk with the help of her minions, Flotsam and Jetsam, biding her time until she eventually finds an opportunity to concoct a scheme capable of placing her in power; this, of course, being Ariel falling in love with Eric. Ursula's insatiable hunger for revenge and power finally culminate at the film's climax, when she crowns herself ruler of the seas, her maniacal rage matched only by her increased size.

Despite Ursula's irredeemable traits, she had a softer side, as seen in her relationship with Flotsam and Jetsam, who Ursula lovingly referred to as her "babies" or "poopsies". They are the only creatures she treats with any true affection, despite barking at them at times when enraged. The only remorse she ever displayed was after accidentally killing them with Triton's trident, immediately redirecting her anguish and rage toward Ariel for causing it in the first place. In the TV series, however, she does abuse her minions for failure at times.

Ursula was classy, if not a bit flamboyant, and presents herself with confidence. She had an eye for high standards and decorum, as evidenced by her belief that lurking in doorways is rude. Though she was very obese, she appeared to suffer dysmorphia, claiming to be "wasted away to practically nothing" and "starving". Despite this, she exhibited vanity, regularly admiring herself and applying makeup and hair treatment. Though she had power to alter her appearance, she chose her naturally curvaceous figure, apparently content and even going so far as to flaunt it in a sultry manner. Most of her personal distaste derived from her demoted social status and lack of power.

Though Ursula was highly intelligent and calculating, she was extremely arrogant and egotistical, to the point of underestimating her opponents. For example, when she used the trident to transform herself into a giant, she disregarded Eric as a threat and did not consider that her size made her an easy target. She gleefully brought shipwrecks to the surface, inadvertently providing Eric the perfect means to retaliate, without realizing his strength and skill as a sailor. By the time her fatal mistake was realized, it was too late, and she was easily impaled by the broken bow of Eric's ship before she could react. It was these negative traits and mistakes that eventually led to Ursula's painful, yet justified, death.

Though it is ambiguous whether Ursula knew she was evil, she makes it clear (in song) to Ariel that she is aware of her infamous reputation among the merfolk and appears to agree with and embrace their assessment.

Physical appearance[]

Ursula is a morbidly obese octopod, classified as a cecaelia (half human, half octopus). She has light lavender skin, short white hair, and her body, from the waist down, is black with six tentacles dotted by violet suckers. The area around her eyes is a darker shade than the rest of her face. Her eyes are gray and she has a mole near the right side of her mouth. She is always seen wearing makeup; in particular, she has aqua blue eye shadow, deep red lipstick, and red nails. For jewelry, she wears purple coral shell earrings and a gold nautilus shell necklace.

Ursula's alter-ego, Vanessa, looks like what could be considered a "mean girl" version of a Disney Princess. In many respects, she resembles Ariel with her striking beauty, slim figure, and long hair. It is believed that this was deliberate, to match Eric's hazy recollection of the woman on the beach. However, it's not difficult to tell them apart. Vanessa has wavy, dark brown hair (black when wet) that is parted down the middle, higher cheekbones, and violet eyes which are accented by highly arched eyebrows. The latter feature gives Vanessa a more mischievous expression, especially when she's pleased with herself. Vanessa wears three outfits during her appearance on screen: the first is a sleeveless blue dress under a deeper blue corset. She wears this and black shoes on the beach when hypnotizing Eric, along with a long black cloak, but is later seen without the cloak. Her second outfit is simply the vanilla-colored slip she later wears under her wedding dress and black flats. Her final outfit is the aforementioned wedding dress, a long white affair with ruffles covering the front and a split skirt, revealing the slip underneath. This dress has large puffs at the sleeves, much like Ariel's. She also wears a long, opaque white veil on her head and a pair of white high heels. With all three outfits, she wears Ursula's golden nautilus pendant, which contains Ariel's voice. That is, until Scuttle destroys it at the end of the movie.

Powers and abilities[]

Ursula's magical abilities, even without the Trident, were very potent. She was able to concoct various potions to create various spells, including mass-transfer (implied during the song "Poor Unfortunate Souls") as well as physically altering people's bodies, as evidenced by her transforming Ariel into a human, as well as her own transformation into Vanessa (although in the case of Vanessa, she needed Ariel's voice to disguise her own). However, she was incapable of altering her reflection, which is eventually how her enemies got the drop on her. It is also implied that she was capable of generating storms and may have electrokinetic abilities even prior to gaining the trident, since storm clouds were generated the very second the sunset on the third day, and she utilized lightning bolts from the storm clouds to transform back into her original form. When it comes to physical powers, Ursula possesses superhuman strength, though not as strong as Triton, yet strong enough to throw a mermaid towards a rock, as what she did to Ariel in the alternate ending of the movie. She was also able to implant voices into Flotsam and Jetsam's heads to relay orders to them, as indicated by her debut scene in the movie.

She was also capable of creating poisonous ink clouds, which could absorb the energy of the Trident and enhance Ursula's power. Her most dangerous ability, however, was her ability to turn people into polyps should they fail to fulfill their end of the bargain via contracts, having done so multiple times under unspecified circumstances, nearly did so with Ariel, and successfully did so with Triton. It's also implied that she absorbs their souls while transforming them into polyps, making herself more powerful in the process. Likewise, once the contract is made, it is indestructible even to someone as powerful as Triton.

Presumably, this arcane power is one-way, as she does not end up becoming a polyp for failing to fulfill her end of the contract. In fact, the only way to completely stop a contract short of fulfilling it is via her death, as evidenced when the polyps turned back into merpeople by the aftermath of her death at the hands of Prince Eric.

Appearances[]

The Little Mermaid[]

“Flotsam! Jetsam! I want you to keep an extra close watch on this pretty little daughter of his... She may be the key to Triton's undoing.”

―Ursula

When Ursula first appears in the film, she states through a monologue that she once lived in the royal palace of King Triton, the king of the underwater city of Atlantica. She was banished from Atlantica and made her home in the remains of a leviathan, where she waits the chance to get her revenge on Triton and become Queen of Atlantica. She currently resides in a leviathan home lined with a garden of writhing polyps which were merfolk who had previously gone to Ursula for help, but found themselves unable to fulfill their side of the bargain, leading Ursula to claim them as her own and added them to her collection. Though she remains powerful, Ursula laments her distaste for her living conditions, and secretly watches over King Triton's youngest daughter, Ariel, believing her to be "the key to Triton's undoing". With time, Ursula's assumptions are proven correct, as Ariel one day meets and falls in love with a human prince, named Eric, against Triton's explicit rules.

Ursula commands her minions, moray eels Flotsam and Jetsam, to lure Ariel to her lair, claiming that only she can help make the princess' dreams of living on the surface, beside her apparent true love, a reality. Little does Ariel realize that this is part of Ursula's scheme to take the kingdom. Through the song "Poor Unfortunate Souls", Ursula proposes an agreement where she will transform Ariel into a human for three days, during which Ariel must receive the "kiss of true love" from Eric. If Ariel succeeds, her transformation into a human will be permanent, but if she fails, she will turn back into a mermaid and be bound to Ursula for eternity. The price for the transformation is Ariel's voice (which Ursula will keep no matter what happens). Ariel agrees and signs a contract that Ursula has conjured. As Ursula orders Ariel to sing, the sea witch summons magical hands to rip out Ariel's voice, which is then magically pulled into Ursula's Nautilus shell necklace. She then laughs gleefully as her plans begin to unfold: Ariel's tail is split into legs. As she laughs, Ursula allows Sebastian and Flounder to take the human Ariel to the surface. During the time that Ariel is a human and must win a kiss of true love from Eric in order to remain human permanently, Ursula takes every measure to prevent the kiss from occurring, such as when Flotsam and Jetsam tip over the boat in which Ariel and Eric are sitting as the two are close to kissing.

Realizing Ariel is doing a much better job earning Eric's love that she thought she could do and thus, will definitely share a kiss before the deadline, Ursula decides to take matters into her own tentacles. With intent to sabotage Ariel's relationship with Eric, so she can continue with her evil plan, Ursula takes the form of a beautiful human female with Ariel's voice. Under the alias "Vanessa", Ursula hypnotizes Eric into forgetting all about Ariel and marrying her. However, Ariel's seagull companion, Scuttle, discovers Ursula's villainy and quickly alerts Ariel and King Triton's court composer, Sebastian, who rushes off to alert the king. Before she can completely misdirect Eric into marrying her, Scuttle and many other animals are able to stall the wedding for the time being and, in the chaos, destroy the Nautilus shell containing Ariel's voice, breaking Eric’s trance and returning Ariel's voice to its rightful owner. However, the sun sets before Ariel and Eric can kiss and Ariel transforms back into a mermaid. Ursula changes back to her true form, grabs Ariel and jumps back into the sea, where she is confronted by King Triton.

Ursula reveals her true goal and forces Triton to choose between his freedom and his daughter's. Triton agrees to take Ariel's place, and once Triton is transformed into a polyp, Ursula takes his crown and trident. Furious with Ursula's trickery, Ariel attacks the sea witch, who immediately retaliates and threatens to destroy the former with the power of the trident. Before she can, Ursula is attacked with a harpoon by Prince Eric. Flotsam and Jetsam are sent to capture the Prince and successfully do so while dragging him down into the sea before Sebastian and Flounder rush to the prince's aid. Ursula readies a killing shot for Eric, but Ariel grabs hold of her hair, thus redirecting the blast towards Flotsam and Jetsam—killing them. Saddened and enraged by the death of her minions, Ursula seeks vengeance on Ariel and magically alters herself to a massive size. With her new form, Ursula declares herself as ruler of the entire ocean and creates a powerful storm. Eric takes control of a surfaced ship while Ursula's attention is on Ariel. As Ursula wickedly taunts the idea of "true love" and prepares to kill Ariel using the power of the trident, Eric impales the sea witch by plunging his ship's splintered bow through her abdomen. Ursula screams in pain, and the bow catches lightning, brutally electrocuting her body. As Ursula loses her last ounces of life, she drops onto the ship and sinks into the sea as her dismembered body remains fall to the ocean floor.

After Ursula's fate is sealed, all the merfolk who were under her power, including Triton, are released from their bonds and return to their original forms. With Ursula and her minions gone for good, her contracts lose their validity, Ariel returns to her human form, and she and Eric are finally able to kiss for the very first time, marry, and live happily ever after.

The Little Mermaid: The Series[]

Ursula appears as the main villain of the Little Mermaid prequel television series, (which takes place one year prior to her death in the original film). The episodes she appears in are "Against the Tide", "Tail of Two Crabs", "Heroes", and "Ariel's Treasures". In all of these episodes, she executes various plans to antagonize King Triton and take over Atlantica. Contrary to the film canon where Ariel first meets Ursula during their deal, Ariel is shown to interact with Ursula more, usually foiling her schemes.

In "Against the Tide", Ursula has been experiencing failures in her most recent magic spells. She believes it to be the work of an odd sea creature that is said to cause bad luck whenever it's around. Ursula decides to destroy the creature, but Ariel rescues it, as she believes it to be harmless. Eventually, the creature's whereabouts have been located at Triton's palace, and Ursula invades the palace during King Triton's homecoming. She prepares to eliminate the beast by using the stolen magic of the trident, though Sebastian was clever enough to make a makeshift version of the creature, and trick Ursula into destroying it instead. With the beast supposedly gone, Ursula departs.

In "Tail of Two Crabs", Ursula takes advantage of Sebastian's jealousy towards his rival Zeus the Crab, by transforming into Sebastian's "Fairy God Crab". She offers him a wish if he can recover a rare artifact holding great power. Sebastian delivers, and Ursula is able to turn King Triton, Flounder, and Ariel into sea worms. Luckily, Zeus is able to subdue Ursula and revert her curse.

In "Heroes", Apollo, a legendary hero who once saved Atlantica from Ursula and her army of octopi, returns to Atlantica, just when Ursula decides to revive her old army in an attempt to dominate Atlantica once more. Like the previous battle, however, Apollo prevails with the help of the fire-breathing Sea Dragon. It is also implied in this episode that the reason behind her exile was because she tried to create copies of the Trident, referred to as dark tridents, for the aforementioned army against Atlantica.

Lastly in "Ariel's Treasures", Ursula enchants the human items in Ariel's grotto, in an attempt to wreak havoc on Atlantica.

The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea[]

Although Ursula doesn't make a physical appearance in the 2000 direct-to-video sequel, she makes a cameo and is mentioned various times, mostly by her younger sister Morgana, also a Cecelia, but with eight tentacles instead of six.

Ursula, herself, can be seen in a picture within Morgana's lair. Interestingly, she serves as the driving force for Morgana's story arc, though not exactly in the sense of revenge. Rather, Morgana feels eliminating Triton and stealing the throne would prove her superiority over her sister, as the former spent most of her life in Ursula's shadow.

In the deleted scene, yet fully animated song "Gonna Get My Wish", a younger Ursula makes a brief appearance in the form of a flashback, alongside Morgana and their mother. The scene also gives a visual representation of Ursula's past and relationship with Morgana. In their youth, Ursula wears a purple bow tied to her hair.

At the end of the film, after Morgana is imprisoned frozen in an iceberg and forced to sink to the darkest depths of the sea, the framed picture of Ursula makes one last appearance, sinking alongside her.

House of Mouse[]

Despite her death in the film, Ursula made numerous cameos in the series House of Mouse, often seen alone or with Ariel.

In "Ask Von Drake", she was seen popping out of Ariel's giant shell during Ludwig Von Drake's song.

In "Pete's House of Villains", she replaced Daisy at her desk after Pete took over.

In "Jiminy Cricket", Jiminy gives Ariel advice, resulting into taking her voice back from Ursula. Her mode of transportation was seen as a wave vehicle.

At the end of "Max's Embarrassing Date", Ursula is seen in an advertisement attempting to steal the voice of Max Goof's girlfriend Roxanne.

In "Mickey and Minnie's Big Vacation", Ursula was one of the many guests to be annoyed when the Pink Elephants are briefly released.

She was also part of the all-female guest list in the episode "Ladies' Night".

In the episode "House of Crime", Goofy interrogates Vanessa, asking if she has seen any disguised villains. She silently shakes her head and then transforms back into Ursula when Goofy leaves her table.

In "Donald and the Aracuan Bird" when Donald is served to Ursula, she claims that she did not order him.

Ursula was also one of the lead villains in Mickey's House of Villains and was seen in Mickey's Magical Christmas, telling Mickey that she wants his voice for Christmas.

The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse[]

Ursula appears in the episode "Keep on Rollin'", as Pete's date and a member of his gang, alongside the Beagle Boys. When Ursula is first introduced as Pete’s date, she takes the guise of her human alter-ego, Vanessa, before immediately transforming into her cecaelia form.

They crash Yen Sid's roller rink, where Ursula uses her strength and tentacles to torment the roller rink's patrons. She and Pete then kick out Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald, and Daisy, declaring that “disco is dead”. After a series of misadventures, Mickey and his friends return to the roller rink to win back the night. Ursula, Pete and the Beagle Boys take on the heroes, but Ursula is personally foiled by Goofy. Mickey and Minnie eventually use their magic to imbue Ursula, Pete and the Beagle Boys with disco clothes and rhythm, horrifying the villains to the point of fleeing the roller rink.

Other appearances[]

Ursula appears in the Hercules: The Animated Series episode "Hercules and the Bacchanal" as she tries to sell perfume to Hercules and Hermes.

Ursula also made a brief speaking appearance in Once Upon a Studio, her dialogue being provided through an archival recording by Carroll from the first film. In the short, Ursula finds herself being followed by Splat from Strange World, who appeared to have a lovestruck crush on her. Ursula can also be seen amongst the distance shot of the Disney characters singing the short's rendition of "When You Wish Upon a Star" before the group photo is taken.

Trivia[]

Ursula's species is a cecaelia (a half-person (usual woman)/half-octopus).
- In the TV show, however, her species was referred to as Octopid.
As her death scene reveals, Ursula actually appears to have a skeleton, despite having a lower body of an octopus (as octopuses are cephalopods and do not have bones).
In the original story, Ursula (simply known as "the Sea Witch") was not malevolent, but rather neutral. She was also a minor character, only appearing once. In the film, she never met Ariel's sisters but in the original story, she did.
"Ursula" is a Latin word meaning "little female bear".
Despite being half-octopus, Ursula only has six tentacles. However, if her arms are counted as limbs as well, then she actually does have eight limbs altogether.
Saleen, a villainess from the Aladdin TV series, had her design based on Ursula's old concept art.
Ursula's blood's color is dark blue like cephalopods, as shown briefly when Eric's Harpoon scratches her arm but appears black due to how dark it was.
In the film when Ursula grows into a giant, her voice sounds low. However, in the Kingdom Hearts series when she grows into a giant, her voice remains the same as her normal size.
The final battle with Ursula was intended to play out very differently than in the final film. First, Ariel initially succeeds in getting herself out of Ursula's grip, only for Flotsam and Jetsam to retrieve her. Also, she was to have accidentally killed Flotsam and Jetsam without any feelings of remorse or horror at what she had done, and her manner of death involved being impaled with the Trident by Eric before he passes out. The reason for the change was because Jeffrey Katzenberg had seen the Bruce Willis action thriller film Die Hard during the film's development, and advised that they "make the ending more like Die Hard." On a related note, Ariel's voice was to be released to her after Ursula was killed.
- The idea of Eric using the Trident to impale Ursula would later be reused for Kingdom Hearts II, though Eric would remain stable instead of passing out.
The animators created the character of Ursula for Bea Arthur, who declined as she was occupied with The Golden Girls. Jennifer Saunders then auditioned for the role of Ursula, but was turned down. Then Nancy Marchand, Nancy Wilson, Roseanne Barr, Charlotte Rae and Elaine Stritch were all then considered. Then Stritch was cast in the part, but her style clashed with that of lyricist Howard Ashman, so Pat Carroll got the part.
As mentioned several times in this article, an original draft of the film was actually going to make Ursula as King Triton's younger sister, which would have made her Ariel's paternal aunt, as well as predate Scar as being the first Disney villain to be related to the protagonist biologically had it been kept. Whether it was kept as canon in the main franchise is debatable, although both the TV series and Return to the Sea strongly imply otherwise, where they made an entire race based on Ursula's design, and she had a sister and a mother who were not merpeople, respectively.
- Despite this, the aspect of Ursula and Triton's relation was kept in the Broadway musical, along with more of Ursula's backstory and in the live action film.
Ursula has three different siblings in three different universes. In The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea, Ursula has a sister named Morgana. In the Broadway musical and the live action film, Ursula is King Triton's younger sister. In the upcoming movie Descendants: The Rise of Red, Ursula has a sister named Ulyana.
In the book Disney Villains: The Top Secret Files, it's revealed that Ursula was originally more slender in her youth and got to the size she's seen within the film due to overindulging on the gourmet meals at the palace. The musical also makes it clear that the lavish meals are what she misses most about her old life.
In one of the Little Mermaid stories, "Reflections of Arsulu", Ursula disguises herself as Arsulu (an anagram of her original name), a beautiful blonde mermaid with a red tail and magenta shells. She does this in order to gain entry to Atlantica, where she causes a great deal of discord. Ariel finds out about her whole plan and uses a mirror and a flock of goldfish to foil Ursula's plan by showing her family Arsulu's real reflection.
Ursula's body gestures are modeled after Norma Desmond from Sunset Boulevard.
For less than a second in the original film, when Ursula is transforming into Vanessa, one can hear Jodi Benson's voice imitating Pat Carroll's low-key laugh.
With Ursula's brief stint as Vanessa, she is one of the few villains to share a voice actress (Jodi Benson) with the film's heroine.
"Vanessa" is a type of butterfly, which was one of the ingredients Ursula used to turn herself into Vanessa.
In the Japan dubs of The Little Mermaid and the Kingdom Hearts series, Ursula is voiced by Kujira. Incidentally, Kujira's nickname means "whale" in Japanese, fitting in with the aquatic theme.
Ursula is the only female main villain to come from the Disney Renaissance and also, the only female main villain to come from the 1980s.