Underworld goddesses, eight-eyed bats, and an adventurous pet pig who joins our heroine
on her quest were all chopped from the final version of Moana!
Yippee ki-yay movie lovers, it's Jan here, and in this video, I want to talk about some
of the fascinating deleted scenes, characters and rejected concepts that didn't make it
into the final film of Moana.
I've also got a second copy of this amazing Art of Moana hardback book by Abrams & Chronicle
to give away to a lucky winner on this video.
The book is chock-full of gorgeous concept art and info on Disney's animated feature,
and for a chance to win a copy, all you have to do is subscribe and leave a comment about
the deleted scenes or story changes on this video!
And don't forget that there are bonus ways to enter the giveaway via the Gleam link in
the video description below.
As you can imagine, I'll be discussing spoilers in this video, so if you're not ready for
those, grab the nearest canoe out of here by clicking the screen for my spoiler-free
review of Moana.
The beginning of the movie changed quite considerably over the course of Moana's development with
a number of scenes that featured a lengthier backstory for Moana being deleted.
So, let's start with toddler Moana who had one of the movie's most beautiful scenes when
she first discovered the ocean and the Heart of Te Fiti.
Originally, to balance that moment out, there was going to be a much darker scene included
in the film as well.
In that scene, a very young Moana walks out into the ocean during a storm, and tries to
control it.
But the ocean knocks her off a rock and Moana nearly drowns until her father Chief Tui rescues
her.
Although that scene was cut, in the final movie there is a similar moment of danger
when an older Moana is shipwrecked after trying to sail beyond the reef with Pua.
Another cut scene with a young Moana shows her on a boat together with her father.
In the scene, Moana questions why they only travel between the same three islands when
there is a whole ocean to explore.
Chief Tui claims that "past the horizon is the edge of nowhere" and that everything beyond
it was consumed by a land spirit called Te Po which, by the way, was the movie's original
name for the lava demon Te Ka.
During the deleted scene we also get to see a sweet moment between Moana and the piglet
Pua who she decides to adopt as her pet pig as he isn't feeding from his mother with the
rest of his litter.
In fact, in earlier scripts, that very cute and lovable Kunekune pig was going to join
Moana on her adventure, however, as the story developed, the filmmakers decided it would
be funnier and better for the story if Moana ended up stuck with a stupid rooster out on
the ocean rather than her lovable friend Pua.
Speaking of that dumb rooster Heihei, his character was actually almost scrapped from
the film entirely.
He was originally conceived as a type of watchdog who would keep an eye on Moana for Chief Tui,
in a role that was similar to how the crab Sebastian from The Little Mermaid kept watch
on Ariel for her father Triton.
However, Heihei just wasn't working in the story drafts and was in serious danger of
being cut completely when (Disney Chief Creative Officer) John Lasseter gave the scriptwriters
two days to find a new role for him.
In the end, Heihei was dumbed down massively, and turned into a rooster that liked to swallow
rocks.
And the scene where the Kakamora attack Moana and Maui to steal the Heart of Te Fiti was
rewritten to have Heihei complicate the situation further by swallowing the gem, making the
crazy rooster the centre of the action.
By the way, when John Lasseter decided that Heihei could remain in the movie, the team
celebrated with a special meal of fried chicken!
And there were quite a few other changes and deleted scenes that affected the set-up of
Moana's story.
One idea was that Moana would have to set sail in order to rescue her father who had
got lost at sea.
Although this storyline was rejected, an element of it remained in Chief Tui's backstory, in
particular the part about how he lost his friend at sea one day, which became the reason
why he wouldn't let Moana go beyond the reef.
And Chief Tui's fear of voyaging was further explored in a cut scene where he argued with
Gramma Tala about why Moana shouldn't risk her life by sailing beyond the reef.
In the final movie, this difference of opinion between Gramma Tala and her son Tui plays
out quite differently, only being touched upon briefly when he interrupts Gramma Tala
after her scary tale of Maui and Te Fiti at the start of the film.
In another version of the movie, Moana had six brothers and there was a scene cut where
she raced a group of them to prove to her father that she was the best sailor of them
all.
In the scene, Chief Tui isn't impressed, however, and refuses to take Moana on the journey he's
planning to Te Fiti as he says it's too dangerous.
Although it's a fun scene, with Moana performing lots of cool manoeuvres to outrace her siblings,
the movie feels better for leaving out her brothers and this storyline.
What's refreshing about the final film is that the story doesn't just trot out the well-worn
cliché of a girl or woman having to prove she's just as good as the boys or men around
her to be taken even semi-seriously.
In the final version of the movie, Moana automatically has respect from her father and her community
who naturally assume that, in time, she will become the chief of her island.
So by scrapping the brother characters, Moana didn't have to battle sexist attitudes to
succeed in her quest.
By the way, there was also an alternate ending to Moana where she didn't just have six brothers,
but nine brothers, all of whom she needed to rescue as they were being held hostage.
Another deleted scene of Moana sailing showed that she was already a very skilled sailor
before she embarked on her journey.
The scene was cut because the filmmakers decided that if Moana had to learn to sail from Maui,
it would provide more opportunities for humour and development between the pair.
By the way, this deleted scene also offers a little peek at Heihei acting more like the
jerk he was in his early incarnation, rather than the dumb rooster his character was later
reworked to be.
The Realm of Monsters, aka Lalotai or the underworld, featured numerous scenes, stories
and characters that, sadly, didn't make it into the final film.
In one early version, Maui had to enter Lalotai in disguise as he had enemies that lived in
the underworld.
There's actually a little nod to this idea in the final movie, when Moana dresses up
as bait to distract Tamatoa while Maui recovers his fishhook.
There was also a deleted character called Hina who guarded the entrance to Lalotai.
Hina would have been Maui's grandmother in the movie, and in Polynesian mythology, she
is a heroic goddess and companion to Maui.
Mini Maui is a great comedic character in Moana, but initially he was going to feature
a lot less in the story.
However, it was actually a scene that ended up being deleted from the movie that was crucial
to Mini Maui getting more screen time in the final film.
In the deleted scene, Maui jumps down into the underworld and gets hit by a large rock;
then when he checks on Mini Maui, he discovers that the little living tattoo is unconscious.
Maui tries to wake him up with mouth-to-mouth resuscitation which leads to Mini Maui springing
back to life, spluttering and disgusted.
When the scene was tested internally at Disney it had such a good response that it led to
Mini Maui getting a lot more scenes in the movie, even though that particular moment
ended up on the cutting room floor.
Also removed from the underworld scenes was an encounter Moana had with her ancestors,
who helped her with the emotional struggles she was having on her journey.
A different version of this rejected scene appears in the final film when Moana has a
crisis of confidence after she and Maui initially fail to restore the heart to Te Ka and Maui
abandons her.
The spirit of Gramma Tala and her seafaring forebears then appear to Moana, singing the
song of the ancestors, which gives strength to our heroine who finishes the scene with
her powerful rendition of 'I am Moana'.
There's also a scene that was cut for time where Moana and Maui have to get past an eight-eyed
bat called Walloo the Wicked on their way to reach Tamatoa.
The duo use a pair of conch shells to distract and confuse the creature while they get past.
It looks like there might have been an easter egg to The Little Mermaid's Sebastian in this
scene as Maui pulls out a little red crab from the shell he's been using!
By the way, the eight-eyed bat creature in Moana originates from Polynesian legends of
Maui killing a giant eight-eyed bat that tried to steal Maui's wife Kumu-lama.
Concept art and storyboards for Lalotai also reveal a type of "Yellow Brick Road" that
Maui and Moana would have followed on their journey to Tamatoa's Lair.
And just before Moana and Maui meet Tamatoa, there was a deleted song they would have performed
called "Warrior Face".
In the song, Maui and Moana psyche themselves up for their confrontation with the villainous
giant crab.
The song was written by Lin-Manuel Miranda and was based on the Polynesian traditional
Haka dance.
It didn't make it into the final film as the directors felt it showed that Maui and Moana
were bonding "too early".
The storyboarded scene shows that if the song had been included it would have been an opportunity
for a fantastic montage of many other more strange and wonderful creatures than we already
saw in the movie's final version of the underworld.
But that wasn't the only song deleted from the film; there was another cut song about
the legend of Maui.
It was called 'Unstoppable' and combined elements of Gramma Tala's opening story and Maui's
song 'You're Welcome.'
By the way, before the shiny, collecting-obsessed crab Tamatoa became part of the film, earlier
scripts featured a headless warrior character who collected things and was based on an Oceanic
myth.
However, of course, the headless warrior didn't speak, so the filmmakers decided to combine
his character with a giant crab character that, again in earlier scripts, was going
to attack Moana and Maui at sea.
And that's how, Tamatoa, as we know him today in all his blingy-ness, was born.
Initially, the Kakamora weren't as aggressive as they turned out to be in the final film,
and they weren't little coconut villains either.
Instead, they were originally based on Oceanic legends of the Kakamora who are short, hairy
and mischievous Hobbit-like beings and, according to head of story David Pimentel, the Kakamora
in Moana "were going to be little party animals."
However, because the filmmakers wanted them to pose a real threat to Moana, they made
them much scarier, and inspiration for their design came from the War Boys in the movie
Mad Max: Fury Road.
Perhaps the craziest concept that was rejected by the movie's team was a story about a time-travelling
Moana.
Moana, as we know it, is actually set around 2000 years ago, but in the time-travelling
version of the movie, Moana was a modern girl who travelled back in time and met her ancestors.
So, what do you think about the deleted scenes and characters?
Are there any you would love to have seen in the movie?
Make sure you comment and subscribe for your chance to win this amazing hardback book The
Art of Moana.
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Click or tap below to watch more Disney deleted scenes or more of my Moana videos including
how Maui's story almost ruined Moana.
Thanks for watching and see you next time!
Yippee ki-yay movie lovers!