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This Article Contains Spoilers -
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Hello everyone, since the two weeks have passed it's time for the proposal, you have all been waiting for. Mother Gothel may have gotten rejected and for good reason but I think we have a Pure Evil from the franchise now. It's time to cover the evil demon Zhan Tiri.
What's The Work[]
Tangled: The Series later Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventure is the follow-up TV Show to critically acclaimed Disney movie Tangled
It stars Rapunzel, Eugene and Rapunzel's new best friend Cassandra as they go on wacky adventures and unlock the mysteries of the black rocks
Who Is She And What Has She Done/Moral Event Horizon[]
Zhan Tiri was once a regular human who was an ally and friend of Lord Demanitus. Before she became obsessed with the power of the Sundrop and Moonstone and betrayed Demanitus to get it for herself. Demanitus defeated her and imprisoned her in another realm but before Zhan Tiri was imprisoned she vowed revenge and Demanitus by destroying his beloved Kingdom.
Later she manipulates Demanitus’s three new pupils Sugracha, Tromus and Mother Gothel to turn on him and serve her instead. She succeeds at this and summons a storm that nearly wipes out all of Corona and takes over the great tree to wipe out entire armies. She is eventually defeated by Demanitus and is reimprisoned.
But being imprisoned didn’t stop her as she either creates or is the blizzard in “Queen For A Day” which endangers the lives of many people, including children like Varian, leads Quirin to be trapped in Amber and Varian’s fall to darkness making her indirectly responsible for everything he does.
Her next big crime doesn’t come from her but her minion Sugracha the Eternal but since this is all done on her orders it counts. Sugracha kidnaps and brainwashes six people, including Rapunzel, to bring Zhan Tiri back too Corona, she nearly succeeds in bringing Zhan Tiri back to Corona but is ultimately foiled.
Next, she has Tromus attempt to bring her back to Corona. Tromus subjects Rapunzel to psychological torture and manipulation and also nearly succeeds in bringing Zhan Tiri back.
But Zhan Tiri likely tired of her minion's constant failures moves on to her next plan. Disguised as a small ghost girl she manipulates Cassandra by showing her the information that Gothel was her mother which causes her to turn on Rapunzel and steal the moonstone, making Cassandra become a villain.
Throughout the third season, Zhan Tiri continues to manipulate Cassandra playing with her emotions to turn her against Rapunzel more and more. And even tells Cassandra to destroy (murder) Rapunzel so she can take the power that is hers, this is, of course, part of her manipulation. Also, it should be mentioned that due to Zhan Tiri’s manipulation anything Cassandra does is slightly on her shoulders as well.
Some of her worst crimes come in the episode “Cassandra’s Revenge” where she manipulates events that lead to Cassandra and Rapunzel that releases her from her prison. Psychologically torments and taunts Varian in his dream and subjects him to body horror, which is shown to make him legitimately terrified. And orders Cassandra to break Rapunzel’s spirit by making her watch as Cassandra murders Eugene. And takes sadistic pleasure in doing so making constant evil and sadistic smiles.
In the next episode “Race To The Spire” she doesn’t do much more except for continuing to manipulate Cassandra even more. Threatening to trap Calliope in limbo for 10,000 years if Rapunzel doesn’t give Cassandra the Mind-Trap, and this is shown not to be an empty threat as Zhan Tiri was in the middle of attempting to trap Calliope in limbo. and later taunting Rapunzel and threatening to turn Corona to dust.
In the next episode, she continues manipulating the situation presumably starting a rumour that Gothel is haunting Cassandra’s old cabin to lure Rapunzel and Casandra to it. Messes with one of Gothel’s old mirrors to take out a specific part of it and puts it in Rapunzel’s bag. So then when Rapunzel and Cassandra stumble across it, it contains a memory of Mother Gothel supposedly being nice to Cassandra, but Zhan Tiri took out the part that showed it was only to get Cassandra away from her. Which causes Cassandra and Rapunzel’s friendship to become even further strained. all that Zhan Tiri cared about is that her plans went ahead.
In “Once a Handmaiden” she continues to manipulate Cassandra and drive a wedge between Rapunzel and Cassandra not much else to say besides that.
In the finale comes by far Zhan Tiri’s worst crime where after patiently waiting for the eclipse to come. She snatches the Sundrop and Moonstone from Rapunzel and Cassandra respectively and transforms into her demon form. Corona’s citizens try to stand up to her but it's no use and Zhan Tiri sadistically plays with them and mocks them. Then when she is done she uses the Decay Incantation, which for those of you not familiar is an incantation that destroys everything it touches. And she uses the Incantation to attempt to murder everyone in Corona, and I should mention that it's not your cartoony everyone instantly turns to dust kind of death it is shown to slowly suck the life out of them making them weaker and weaker and causes them extreme pain, and it's likely she succeeds in killing a few of them until. Rapunzel and Cassandra are finally able to defeat her by clashing the Sundrop and Moonstone. But not before she kills Cassandra, Rapunzel is able to revive her and possibly some people in Corona but she still tries to kill everyone and succeeds in killing Cassandra it doesn't matter that they were later revived.
Something that should be mentioned is it is shown the Decay Incantation can instantly burn someone. So its likely Zhan Tiri did this on purpose because she is sadistic and wanted everyone in Corona to slowly suffer and watch as their Kingdom fell before dying. That's a whole new level for the franchise.
As for Moral Event Horizon, I mean look at everything she has done if Zhan Tiri didn’t cross it when she caused Varian and Cassandra's fall to evil, or manipulated events so she could be released or psychologically tortured many people it's definitely when she attempts to murder everyone in Corona.
Screen Time[]
Now some could argue Offscreen Villainy as a factor but I would disagree yes some of her crimes are offscreen like her first genocide of Corona and her deal with Sugracha, Tromus and Gothel to turn them against Demanitus. But with the first one it is shown she is clearly willing to do it again and almost succeeded in doing so and with the deal why else would they betray Demanitus and summon Zhan Tiri. it doesn’t matter anyway because all of her other crimes in the Who Is She And What Has She Done section and are more than enough.
Character's Traits/Moral Agency[]
Does Zhan Tiri have a personality you may ask? At first, no, she didn’t but now everything has changed she does she is a genocidal, sadistic, power-hungry, psychopathic and arrogant person who harbours a hatred for Corona and wants to destroy it and kill everyone inside, due to Demanitus defeating her and she loves being evil and enjoys it.
Now you may think moral agency may not hold up at first due to Zhan Tiri being a demon from another realm but when you look at Zhan Tiri closer it definitely does.
First of all, she is super sadistic taking delight in people’s suffering constantly giving sadistic smiles and enjoying hurting people. She has a clear understanding of what hurts people and what, doesn’t as she encourages Cassandra to break Rapunzel’s spirit knowing that it will mentally destroy her and takes advantage of psychological torment on numerous occasions knowing mental manipulation is just as effective as psychical. She also doesn’t only see evil in fact quite the opposite she clearly loves and takes delight in being evil as she doesn’t deny it when people call her evil and can distinguish between heroes and villains and also views traits like compassion as a weakness.
But the final nail in the coffin to the moral agency argument is that it's later revealed that Zhan Tiri was once human, so yeah no way she could be made of evil as it is also revealed she was once a friend to Lord Demanitus. Even if you weren’t to look at Zhan Tiri as not once being a human It doesn’t really matter.
Individuals[]
Zhan Tiri is a single person who does rely on her minions quite a bit, especially when she was much weaker. But she is clearly in charge of them especially Tromus and Sugracha who are completely loyal to her, but she has enough crimes on her own to balance it out like the on-screen attempted genocide.
Freudian Excuse[]
Her excuse is she blames Demanitus for turning his back on her and taking her destiny away. Not only is this a pretty weak one to begin with, but later proves to mean nothing as she is the one who betrayed him and sought the Sundrop and Moonstone for herself. So this is more of a case of Never My Fault as she blames Demanitus for something she did. And not only that she takes things way too far instead of just going after Demanitus she wants to kill everyone in Corona as an act of petty revenge and spite, and also she is madder at Demanitus more for imprisoning her for something she did rather than “betraying” her.
Redeeming Qualities/Mitigating Factors[]
Absolutely none any redeeming quality of migrating trait is ultimately subverted by the end.
Now at first it would seem like Zhan Tiri at least possessed some care for Cassandra. Nah of course not Zhan Tiri only uses this as a manipulation tactic and she even flat out admits this and as soon as Cassandra is no longer useful to her she immediately stops with her fake compassion.
In one scene Zhan Tiri honours Rapunzel’s deal by freeing Calliope after she gives Cassandra the Mind-trap. But she immediately follows this up by taunting Rapunzel for her compassion to other people, which means she uses this supposed “honourable” trait to taunt her enemies (similar to Morgana and Grimmel the Grisly). She actually does this a few times as well using her “honourable” traits to taunt people. And also another thing is she only displays these kinds of traits again to taunt her enemies and only when it's convenient to her, making it more pragmatic villainy.
It is revealed that in the past Zhan Tiri was once an ally and friend, possibly even more, to Lord Demanitus. But this doesn’t mean anything as she betrays Demanitus for her own selfish desires of getting the Sundrop and Moonstone. And she falls more under the category of a former friend who shed all genuine friendships once she became Pure Evil as when she betrays him she tries to kill him multiple times, which is a trait Pure Evils can have.
Also, it should probably be mentioned that this is only one way to interpret it as the show isn’t completely clear on what Zhan Tiri is. Another way to look at it is Zhan Tiri was a demon who was manipulating Demanitus and always wanted the Sundrop and Moonstone. But even if we are looking at the version that gives Zhan Tiri the possible migrating factor it still doesn’t hold up.
She was trapped in the nether realm for over 1000 years. Which when looking at the heroes in it causes many weird and painful mutations. Angry even comments that she could probably go insane too if she were trapped in it. But this doesn’t hold up when you look at Zhan Tiri we see what she was like just before she got imprisoned and she was already just as psychopathic, genocidal and power-hungry as she is now. And her personality hasn’t changed at all. it doesn’t matter because she still retains her moral agency and this is never played for sympathy.
Heinous Standards[]
General Standard[]
Zhan Tiri’s rap sheet consists of sending a blizzard to Corona that endangers many people's lives and leads to Varian's fall to evil, emotionally and psychologically manipulates Cassandra so she turns on Rapunzel, subjects Varian to psychological torment in his nightmare and taunts him, and attempts to murder everyone in Corona not once not twice but three times, all of which go far beyond the actions of a typical kids film baddie. And that's only listing her worst if you want an idea of her many crimes look at her crimes section on her page and my previous Who Is She And What Has She Done section.
In-Story Standard[]
Zhan Tiri makes every other villain in the franchise look like Jesus Christ. Most other villains steal some stuff, capture and threaten the protagonists and maybe attempt to kill or succeed in killing them, before they are later revived. But Zhan Tiri as already mentioned has attempted to murder everyone in Corona three times manipulates many people and is found of psychological torture and has turned many people evil and had them as her minion. The only villain that even gets close is Andrew who also attempts to murder everyone in Corona, but that at the absolute worse makes her tie with Andrew in terms of heinousness but not really, since Andrew only tries once, and also Andrew has migrating factors while Zhan Tiri has none, and also Zhan Tiri technically did it first in the past and in a flashback before Andrew. And also Zhan Tiri does way more than enough to stand out compared to Andrew even the way she does the genocide is very unique as she is focused more and having everyone hurt and slowly suffer while with Andrew he would have just instantly blown up Corona. Another thing that should be mentioned is much like The Major she is responsible both directly and indirectly for many characters turns to villainy and atrocities including but not limited to (Mother Gothel, Tromus, Sugracha, Varian and Cassandra) and she is responsible for the existence of the franchise and by extension its heinous villains. Without Zhan Tiri the franchise would have much less heinous villains.
System Standard[]
Another easy one as everyone in Corona hates Zhan Tiri and her actions are treated with disgust and horror. As shown by the fact that literally everyone in Corona rises up to try and defeat Zhan Tiri.
Individual Capability[]
Zhan Tiri starts off the series extremely weak but is still able to instigate Cassandra’s betrayal manipulates events to get her freed psychologically, torments Varian in his dreams and uses her minions Sugracha, Tromus and Cassandra to commit many more crimes. When Zhan Tiri regains her powers, she uses it to her full advantage attempting to destroy Corona and kill everyone inside using the decay incantation.
No Sympathy[]
Nope, Zhan Tiri is not even close to sympathetic. Her backstory is never played for sympathy, not even Zhan Tiri uses it to garner sympathy. She is treated as just evil and loves being evil and wants power and is sadistic, as already mentioned. There is never any point in the series where Zhan Tiri is presented as sympathetic.
If you want an idea Rapunzel who is willing to forgive pretty much anyone who is even a little bit sympathetic, even she knows how evil Zhan Tiri is and doesn’t even try to redeem her. Because Zhan Tiri is completely irredeemable and doesn’t want to be redeemed. So Rapunzel moves straight to killing her.
Another thing is Zhan Tiri is written to be hateable, the opposite of sympathetic as well.
Story Type[]
The reason I bring this up is that Tangled: The Series is supposedly a light-hearted show for kids. But when you look at the show that's not really the case, it did start out more lighthearted but as the show has gone on it has become progressively darker and darker. Zhan Tiri’s actions are played completely seriously and she is presented as a real serious threat in-universe that must be stopped at all costs. and some of her crimes are outright horrific especially for what supposed to be a kids show. There is never any moment where any of Zhan Tiri’s actions are played for laughs, She has a few laughably evil moments but that’s about it.
Explicit[]
Now I thought I would bring this up because well this was probably not in question this was a huge point of controversy in my previous Proposal on Runeard another Disney villain funnily. But Zhan Tiri’s attempted genocide of Corona is super explicit not only does she attempt to do it on-screen but she flat out says the Corona and everyone in it will die.
Verdict[]
I would say she is an easy and permanent keeper considering that the series is over, and she is dead never to return again.
It almost feels like the writers made this character specifically to qualify for the category. It's probably not the case but it sometimes feels like it is.