![]() | ||
This villain was proposed but was rejected by the community for not being heinous enough or lacks what is necessary to be a Pure Evil villain. Therefore, this villain shall be added to our "Never Again List", where proposed villains rejected by the community shall be placed to prevent future proposals of the same evil-doer. They can be proposed again (with the permission of an administrator) if new elements appear in their series that can change their status as non-PE villains. Any act of adding this villain to the Pure Evil category without a proposal or creating a proposal for this villain without the permission of an administrator will result in a ban. |
|
“ | Chelsea: I've waited 15 years for this. 15 years waiting to get revenge on your mother... Ruby: What? Chelsea: Dethrone your grandmother, and lay waste to the kraken kingdom. Ruby: Chelsea? Nerissa: (chuckles evilly) Oh, there is no Chelsea. I am... Nerissa! Ruby: What's-what's happening to you? Nerissa: Surprised? "I'm a flipping mermaid!" (impales the Trident of Oceanus on Ruby to extract her powers) Ruby: AH! Aaahhh! Nerissa: And you're just a dumb teenager! (removes the trident on Ruby) Nerissa: All that ra-ra-ra was so that you could free this for me-me-me, my super sea girl bestie! Ruby: But I trusted you! Nerissa: (chuckles) You just got played, dum-dum! |
„ |
~ Chelsea revealing her true nature to Ruby as Queen Nerrisa. |
“ | I HATE high school! | „ |
~ Nerissa's most famous quote while attempting to kill the children from the prom, Ruby’s family, and everyone by launching a large wave. |
“ | Nerrisa: You'll never win, Ruby Gillman! You’re just a DUMB teenager! You know what's really pathetic? That you thought someone like me could ever be friends with a MONSTER like you! Ruby: I am not a monster! I’m a KRAKEN! |
„ |
~ Chelsea taunting and mocking Ruby while torturing her. |
Queen Nerissa, known by her human pseudonym name Chelsea Van Der Zee, is the main antagonist of DreamWorks' 44th full-length animated film Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken.
She is the newest & most popular student at Oceanside High School. Posing as a regular human, her true form is actually a mermaid. Feigning a friendship with Ruby Gillman, Chelsea manipulates her into giving her a mythical trident, which she plans to use to increase her power, avenge her kind, and kill all the krakens. She is also the arch-nemesis of the Gillman family, particularly Ruby herself.
She was voiced by Annie Murphy in her first villainous role.
Appearance[]
In her human disguise known as Chelsea, Nerissa has the appearance of a beautiful teenager with fair skin, wavy knee-length red hair, and pale blue eyes.
For clothing, she dawned a navy-blue zigzag choker around her neck, hoop earrings, a sleeveless, aquamarine blue ruffle crop-top, sparkling dark blue bell-bottom sport jeans, and a pair of white sneakers. She also has light blue nail polish.
In her base mermaid form, the only change physically is gaining a turquoise mermaid tail with dark orange spikes and fin tips.
However, Nerissa seems to have another mermaid form, possibly her original form, which is much larger than her human form and is around the size of a kraken. The sclera of her eyes in this form is bright blue and her iris is red; her hair is long and silvery-white and appears to be made of a watery texture, and her skin is dark red with blue patterns, and her tail has turquoise areas on her spikes and fin tips.
Personality[]
As the queen of the ruined Mermaid Kingdom, Nerissa's desires are to kill Ruby's mom, dethrone Ruby's grandmother, and lay waste to the kraken kingdom, as they did to hers, and is willing to manipulate, and hurt anybody, in order to accomplish her goal.
Due to Nerissa being a plot twist villain, determining the exact details of her personality is extremely difficult, and is made even more difficult due to the fact that, while normally, it can be assumed that her personality after the reveal is her actual one, due to her returning back to her Chelsea personality after being defeated, and staying in it, even after it became clear that it will not help her Escape, it may be possible that her Chelsea personality maybe her actual personality (although this is unlikely). Her voice as Chelsea sounds like an average teenager, while her voice as Nerissa sounds a little deeper like an adult.
According to Grandmamah, Agatha makes a unknowingly false statement that "Nerissa's daughter" is manipulating her, In response, Grandmamah is confused and replies agitatedly "Daughter?! Nerissa never had a daughter!" So sometimes, her mermaid physiology can sometimes confuse that of krakens.
She is a cruel, greedy, two-faced, vengeful, arrogant, power-hungry, manipulative, "will-do-anything-to-destroy-the-world" kind of a mermaid, and since the queen of the mermaids is the main antagonist, she would do anything to twist the backstory, and turn the table, like how she did by revealing Ruby's identity intentionally using social media.
A possibility that is made even more likely due to statements made by the director of the film Kirk DeMicco, which were further supported by statements made by co-director Faryn Pearl, which essentially state that the backstory that Nerissa gave to Ruby was genuine and that she was genuinely relating to Ruby's plight, which, in turn, possibly means that all of her other reactions, such is the one where she appears to be confused, and possibly worrying about Ruby, after she ran off to the library, are genuine, a possibility that is further supported by the fact that many of set reactions occurred when nobody was looking or paying attention to her.
Additionally, the sequences in the movie in which Grandmamah talks about the mermaids and the Battle of the Trident, cannot be considered good sources of information about her, due to being too vague, and as a result of Grandmamah's clear hatred towards the mermaids, to the point where the movie basically confirms, that she either wants to, or is actively genociding the mermaids, clear bias.
With the same or similar problems existing with every statement about her made by every Kraken in the movie.
Due to this, the only sources of information that can be considered reliable, of her post-reveal personality are her own words and actions following her reveal, alongside any statements made about her by the creators of the film.
Perhaps spawning from the persecution from the Krakens (real or imagined), Chelsea revealed a victim complex when defeated; instead of acknowledging her defeat or the fact that her planned destruction ended up threatening people who had nothing to do with the Kraken-Mermaid war, she claimed that she was only attacked for being "pretty." Similarly, she fails to take responsibility for her actions, displaying no guilt at manipulating and betraying Ruby, even though the Kraken girl thought of her as a friend; thus, even if she did start with a righteous cause, the years and her hatred had twisted her into the monster the Krakens feared she was the whole time.
Powers and Abilities[]
Mermaid Abilities[]
- Land-Water Adaptability: While she is immersed in water, Nerissa is in her natural mermaid form, but is able to change into a human form once on land.
- Superhuman Swimming Speed: Nerissa, in her mermaid form, is able to swim in speeds most likely equivalent to those of other sea life equal to her in size, such as dolphins.
- Underwater Breathing: In her mermaid form, Nerissa can breathe underwater.
- Longevity/Possible Semi-immortality: Nerissa is likely as old as Ruby’s mother and possibly even as old as her Grandmamah, maybe older, but resembles someone about Ruby’s age, according to Nerissa, this is because quote: "Mermaids don't age," however, as there are no other sources of information that can confirm this to be true, alongside the fact that most of the depictions of mermaids that appear in the Kraken Kingdom appear to resemble adults instead of teenagers, makes the accuracy of that statement highly questionable.
- Hypnotic Charm: Nerissa is physically very beautiful and charming, a fact that she uses alongside a fake identity, and possible fake personality, to make herself not seem suspicious or dangerous, examples include: When she steals the credit for saving Connor. When Ruby, after being saved by her, does not expose her identity to her mother or grandmother, and goes to her for guidance after having a panic attack, despite being told repeatedly by her grandmother that all mermaids are evil and dangerous, and is later on tricked by her to get the trident under the flimsy excuse of using it as a symbol of peace between the mermaids and Krakens.
Trident Abilities[]
- Gigantification: Once empowered by the trident, Nerissa grows to a size equivalent to that of the Giant Krakens.
- Superhuman Strength: Nerissa in her Kaiju form gain strength equivalent to that of a Giant kraken. It is also possible that her strength is even greater than that of the Giant Krakens, however, as she is never depicted fighting more than one opponent at a time, this is currently impossible to confirm.
- Energy Absorption: Using the trident, Nerissa is able to absorb the energy that powers the Giant Krakens abilities, by stabbing them with it, this also allows her to block their energy based attacks by having the Trident absorb them.
Weaknesses[]
- Overpowering: Although she is very strong while using the trident, it does not mean that the weapon itself is capable of holding an unlimited amount of power, as shown when the krakens use their powers against it altogether, which not only destroyed the trident, but was enough for her to be reduced into a normal-sized mermaid.
Biography[]
Past[]
As Queen of the Mermaids, Nerissa, after finding the ancient weapon known as the Trident of Oceanus, led the mermaids in what would later on be known as the Battle of the Trident, in which she, with the power of the trident, would slay all but three of the giant Krakens, before being defeated by their greatest champion, the daughter of the Kraken Queen, Agatha Gillman.
As a result, Nerissa, alongside the rest of her kind, were forced to flee their Homeland, in order to avoid being completely genocide by the Kraken Kingdom, a faith that they were only safe from ironically, due to the actions of the very same Kraken responsible for their current state of affairs, Agatha Gillman, who sometime after the events of the Battle of the Trident, would hide the Trident in the Well of Seas, before fleeing her Homeland with her husband and recently born child Ruby Gillman, which, as a result of the Krakens never finding the place in which she hid the trident, prevented them from eliminating the mermaids.
Sometime later, Nerissa, after learning of the actions of Agatha, attempted and succeeded at locating the trident, only to realize that only a giant Kraken can retrieve it from the Well of Seas, in response, Nerissa, refusing to go back into hiding, and accept the total humiliation of her failures, abandoned her people, and fled to the very same place her mortal enemy ended up fleeing to, Oceanside, where she would hide herself under the fake human identity of Chelsea Van Der Zee, and would begin to go to Oceanside High, where she would become the school's most popular student, on her first day, after stealing the credit for saving the teenager known as Connor, from the daughter of Agatha, Ruby Gillman, moments before encountering her in person.
Which she would later on attempt, and would succeed, after saving her life, and helping her to deal with some of her problems, befriending Ruby, in order to regain the trident.
Role[]
“ | It feels so good to be back! And this time, I'm getting rid of you for good! | „ |
~ Nerissa before attempting to kill Agatha and Grandmamah before Ruby comes to fight her. |
Nerissa takes on the identity of a human girl named Chelsea Van Der Zee, arriving at the school at the exact same time that Ruby saves her crush, Connor, which she steals the credit for, resulting in her getting heavily praised, stating that she was prompted to save him by a saying her mother told her in her youth, which, alongside her beauty, immediately skyrockets her to the top of the school's popularity poll.
Later, Chelsea saves Ruby from being killed by the Oceanside's tour guide Gordon Lighthouse, revealing her true identity as a mermaid in the process. The two later become closer friends when they ditch school together, spending their leisure hours relaxing in the ocean, where they then end up deciding to try to bring peace between their species, by getting the Trident and using it as a symbol of peace. Chelsea then tells Ruby that her mother was Nerissa, and that she died trying to retrieve the Trident from the Well of Seas.
On prom night, Ruby is elated to tell her mother, Agatha, about Chelsea. Due to her being a mermaid, Agatha questions Chelsea's true motives and forbids Ruby from seeing her grandmother out of disappointment. Frustrated, Ruby runs off with the trident and gives it to Chelsea. With the trident in her hand, she reveals that she is Nerissa and that her friendship with Ruby was a facade so she can get the trident to gain more power. She then grows to a monstrous size and goes off to attack the town. As a result of her friend's betrayal, Ruby is distraught; however, with some words of encouragement from her uncle, Brill, Ruby gains enough confidence to take on Nerissa.
Nerissa then arrives at Oceanside from underwater to search for Agatha as she knocked down the door of a house the latter sold to a couple. When Agatha asks where Ruby is, Nerissa explains that they have said their "goodbyes", while mocking Agatha for being a waste of time with Grandmamah defending her before they try to stop her, only to be overpowered.
Ruby then arrives and fights Nerissa while protecting her family and friends. Nerissa tries to stop Ruby by knocking out the children with a tidal wave. However, Ruby saves everyone from danger, with her friends and Connor seeing her in her giant form. Before they can say anything, Margo warns Ruby about Nerissa, who knocks the latter underwater.
Nerissa taunts Ruby telling her she'll never win and that she is just a dumb teenager, and continues to mock her for thinking that someone like her would ever be friends with a "monster". This has Ruby stand up to Nerissa while distracting her by using her laser-eyes to take the Trident out of her hand, while the latter goes to Agatha and Grandmamah about her plan, that the trident can be destroyed with enough power.
After Nerissa finds the Trident, Ruby tries to reason with her on redemption, and convincing her to give her the trident but the latter refuses, saying she'll never take it from her. However, Ruby, Agatha, and Grandmamah combine their laser eyes to shoot at the trident together, destroying it and defeating Nerissa, returning her to her normal size as she is then taken away on Captain Gordon Lighthouse's boat. Captured, Nerissa pleads to Gordon to let her go under the excuse that she is pretty and misunderstood and not evil to no avail, and while Grandmamah suggest cooking Nerissa for her actions, Ruby convinces her not to. Nerissa is last seen still caged while Gordon makes a livestream about how mermaids are the real monsters rather than krakens, leading Nerissa to ask if she's attracting more followers, possibly staying in the cage or being imprisoned somewhere else.
Quotes[]
“ | The new girrll..!! | „ |
~ Chelsea introducing herself. |
“ | Thank you, thank you! | „ |
~ Chelsea appreciating the praise. |
“ | Picture this: me, stunning.. but approachable, on my first day of school! I'm lost.. confused! Struggling of where to find my first class.. but then.. *gasp* I spot Little Mister Skater Boy barely above water! (Connor: But I-I'm just..) Oh! Shh-shh! My story. Now, I'm not much of a swimmer, but that in that moment.. my mother always told me: You are gorgeous! Also, big risk, big reward. ALWAYS go big! And what is bigger.. than saving a life! | „ |
~ Chelsea twisting everyone's heads and taking credit of saving Connor, instead of revealing that Ruby was actually the one that saved him. |
“ | Love you too, rando! | „ |
~ Chelsea to a random girl. |
“ | Hey! We haven't met. I'm Chelsea. Chelsea Van Der Zee, it's Dutch, kusjes! and.. you are? | „ |
~ Chelsea meeting Ruby. |
“ | Okay, it's maybe the "dont-look-at-me" vibe.. but there's something different about you! I know your secret~! You're a kraken.. hiding as a human! And soon, everyone will know the truth. Kusjes! | „ |
~ Chelsea intentionally exposing Ruby's identity. |
“ | I am gorgeous! | „ |
~ Chelsea |
“ | Aww! You're sweet! | „ |
~ Chelsea to a random boy protecting her. |
“ | Okay, private talk time, eeeveryone out! | „ |
~ Chelsea sending everyone out to talk privately with Ruby. |
“ | So.. what's up? | „ |
~ Chelsea asking Ruby what's happening. |
“ | Ugh, boo! Where's the fun in that? Ruby, you're a giant kraken! Don't you think you could aim a little higher than normal teenager? | „ |
“ | Oh my cute little floppy, baby, guppy girl! You know what you need? (Ruby: Pretty hair and a mermaid tail?) No, but it would help. But what you need Ruby Gillman, is to see how great your life could be! You need.. a super seagirl ditch-day!!! (Ruby: Okay, let's do it!) Yay!! | „ |
“ | Oh my gosh, hey! (Ruby: Chelsea? H- How are you even down here?) Because I'm a mother-flipping mermaid! I'd figured that I owed you an underwater rescue since I kinda sorta got one hundred percent credit for yours. | „ |
~ Chelsea revealing herself as the mermaid to Ruby. |
“ | Oooh, we should get going, or like die. Your call. | „ |
~ Chelsea to Ruby before they nearly die. |
“ | I can't believe your mom hid all of this from you! | „ |
“ | Mottos are stupid! That's my motto. I hate hiding. | „ |
~ Cheslea's "motto". |
“ | No I don't, ever since The Battle of The Tridents, all us mermaids have been in hiding. I couldn't take it anymore, I felt trapped, so I ran away. But when I ended up at Oceanside High, I ended up alone. No one could see the real me, until I found you! My super seagirl bestie and now everything is right in the world. | „ |
~ Chelsea revealing her backstory to Ruby. |
“ | Oh sure yeah, but I mean.. two teenage girls can't fix history | „ |
“ | Well, there is one way… | „ |
“ | Hello, is Mrs. Gillman home? Knock Knock! | „ |
~ Nerissa while finding Agatha. |
“ | Oh, we've already said our goodbyes, but not before she gave me this! (cackles evilly) The greatest warrior of the sea hiding amongst humans, what a waste! | „ |
“ | Ruby Gillman? You should be dead! | „ |
~ Nerissa noticing that Ruby is alive. |
“ | Enough with these childish games!! | „ |
~ Nerissa while stopping Ruby from fighting her. |
“ | You'll never get this away from me! | „ |
~ Nerissa recklessly refusing to give the trident before it gets destroyed by Ruby, Agatha, and Grandmamah. |
“ | Huh... NO!!! | „ |
~ Nerissa once the trident is being overpowered by the krakens, right before she turned back into a small mermaid. |
“ | Please, please, please, please! I'm not evil, I'm just pretty... and misunderstood! [Is pinched in the nose by Davey the crab.] Ow! |
„ |
~ Nerissa's defeat as she foolishly tries to justify her actions before getting her nose pinched by Davey. |
“ | Nerissa: OMG, are you live streaming!? Ugh, my hair is terrible! Lighthouse: Now, t-. Nerissa: How many likes are we getting now? |
„ |
~ Nerissa's last words as she notices Lighthouse's live stream with followers watching. |
Trivia[]
- At one point in one of the trailers, she holds the trident while pointing it at Ruby with a stern battle face. However, this scene isn't in the movie.
- During an interview, director Kirk DeMicco compared Chelsea to Regina George from Mean Girls.
- Chelsea Van Der Zee is often times compared to Ariel from Disney's The Little Mermaid due to her appearance (red hair, blue eyes, and fair skin), which created several Internet memes, such as the fan-nickname "Evil Ariel". The fact that Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken was released just one month after The Little Mermaid's live-action remake also helped significantly, as does the fact that Ruby and Chelsea are basically morally swapped Ariel and Ursula.
- Funnily enough, Captain Lighthouse once referred to Chelsea as a "little mermaid" after she was caged by him near the end of the movie.
- There was some foreshadowing that Chelsea was Nerissa all along:
- Linguistcally, her full name means "Chelsea of the Sea" in Dutch, which foreshadows her true nature as an unpredictable mermaid. On a side note, she also says "kusjes" in one scene, which is Dutch for "kisses", so she at least has some knowledge of Dutch culture.
- When she first sees Ruby in her giant form, she doesn't react as erratically as how any regular human would, nor any sea creature like a mermaid, which indicates that she found someone who could make her find the trident she had used for her vengeful plans.
- This is further proven when she prevented Gordon Lighthouse from capturing Ruby, while the latter's in her giant form.
- Despite her friendly acts towards Ruby, Chelsea never actually shows any true concern for Ruby the way that a real friend would. When Ruby is violently pushed out of the current while trying to get the trident, Chelsea asks "So, can you get it?" instead of "Are you okay?", not to mention showing little concern about asking Ruby to be the one to get the trident in the first place. She also notices Ruby decline a call from Connor, but because she doesn't actually care about Ruby or how she's growing more distant from her other friends, she neither says anything about the declined call nor offers any encouragement.
- When first explaining to Ruby where the trident is and how to get to it, she seems to know a surprising amount about it considering that her mother, who supposedly died trying to reach it, would have done so when Chelsea was too young to remember this info. The reason why Chelsea knows the information is because she actually is Nerissa, so she has personally tried to get the trident back.
- She also expresses nervousness about meeting Agatha when Ruby plans to introduce them, and when she actually tries to, Chelsea is mysteriously gone. Ruby doesn't call her out on this when they next meet up, but we soon learn there's a good reason for it: Agatha would have instantly recognized her as Nerissa (and so would Grandmamah, which is why Chelsea never meets her, either) so, until she gets what she wants, she avoids them and only directly interacts with Ruby, who doesn't know what Nerissa actually looks like.
- It's never explained what happened to the rest of her kind, whether they died or went their separate ways. However, a group of mermaids was seen on a poster for the movie. Interestingly, when Ruby and Nerissa planned to use the trident as a peaceful symbolic gesture, she said that the mermaids can stop hiding. But given her manipulative nature, she could have been lying.
- In a deleted scene, Chelsea and Nerissa were two different characters and that Agatha was the one who killed Nerissa, who was her mother in this case. This was debunked in the final version, however, with Chelsea posing as Nerissa’s daughter, but Grandmamah mentions that Nerissa never had a daughter, confirming that "Chelsea" is not who she says she is.
- Unlike most mermaids, she isn't shown singing. In folklore, evil mermaids would sing to lure their victims into drowning.
- Although it is not said in the film, the film's director Kirk DeMicco confirmed in a tweet that Nerissa was in love with a human named Frapi with whom she had a relationship, this was not presented in the film because that love relationship did not fit with the story.
- The combined first two syllables of her real name is "Siren" in reverse, alluding to her particular species, which is known as "sirena" in Spanish.
- If spelled backwards, her name is "Assiren", alluding that she is "a siren".
- She could be considered a dark side to both Agatha and Grandmamah, symbolizing what they might become if they hadn't learned to reconcile with each other.
- She also serves as a dark reflection to Ruby. Both aquatic creatures have experienced their respective double lives as human beings on the surface world, while at the same time, they each get to use their powers especially at sea. However, while Ruby was initially hesitant about her kraken heritage due to its unpredictable nature, she later started to get used to it indirectly thanks to Nerissa, and is conscious enough to know how to properly use such heritage of hers. On the other hand, Nerissa is more experienced in confidently using her own powers as a mermaid, but being a long-lost mermaid herself, she normally uses them for her own reckless purposes, including vengeance. Nerissa demonstrates the type of sea creature Ruby would've become if she never learned how to handle her own powers with much responsibility.
- She share similitudes with Gwen Grayson/ Royal Pain from Sky High, both are friends of the protagonist at the beginning,both betrays the protagonist and showing what are enemies from their parents and both ending imprisoned.