The Little Mermaid is one of Disney’s most beloved films. Because of this, you may have expected that a live version of the movie put on by a corporation with more money than god would have some good-looking fish in it. You, as becomes very clear when looking upon the trash heap version of Flounder that starred in last night’s The Little Mermaid Live! production, would be wrong.
Despite pulling together a cast that included Queen Latifah, John Stamos, and beloved thespian Shaggy, corners appear to have been cut when it came to designing fish costumes and puppets for a primarily underwater-set musical about singing, dancing, talking fish people. Nowhere is this clearer than in the character of Flounder, who’s represented by a collection of plastic and fabric that looks like it was collected from the sewage pipes of a local kindergarten.
Twitter has been harsh on the unfortunate creation, decrying its existence by calling it cheap garbage and using it as a prompt for some of the most popular meme formats.