The story of a girl coming to terms with the power of the red panda,
Turning Red recently came out on Disney Plus. The movie follows Mei Lee as she tries to
balance her family and friends while figuring out how to control the gift passed down by her
ancestor. But Mei isn’t the only one to show an impressive display of strength during this film.
Of all the characters, who was shown to be the strongest? And who comes out as the weakest?
I’m Kyle with WickedBinge and this is Turning Red : Weak to Powerful.
As usual, we’ll be starting with the weakest ranking and moving up to the most powerful.
Taking our spot as the weakest of this cast is Tyler. Tyler was displayed
as one of the many regular kids that Mei and her friends were around. Like any kid their age,
Tyler was a victim of peer pressure and always sought to be cool. Or really,
to be noticed in any way. Which was why he often took to bullying Mei and her friends
whenever he found something they were insecure about. During his deal with Mei and his party,
we see more of the vulnerable side that Tyler tried hiding from the rest of his classmates.
Tyler had approached Mei to come to his birthday as the panda because he was convinced no one would
come otherwise. And when he thought he was losing the attention he craved, he lashed out at her.
During the end scenes, Tyler was able to be far more open. After his secret of enjoying
4-Town’s music and being accepted for it by Mei, Priya, Abby and Miriam, Tyler had decided to spend
the concert with them. When the girls stayed to help encourage Mei and power the circle, Tyler
stayed with them. He was able to show far more confidence and resolve by the end of the movie,
showing a surprising amount of growth considering he was initially written off as a mindless bully.
The next spot goes to Mei’s father Jin. Jin wasn’t allowed to say much for the majority of the film.
He was constantly cut off by Ming or Wu, and was given orders to carry out various tasks. However,
that didn’t mean Jin was incapable. He had been the one to press Ming to finally talk
about the family blessing. Jin was able to find the footage of his daughter being herself
and encourage her to keep her gift. Jin was able to use his quick thinking to fashion a
circle before Wu even gave the command to. He didn’t have a red panda or some other power,
but being silent so long meant he was able to observe what many others missed.
Our next spot is a tied placement going to Mei’s friends: Priya, Abby,
and Miriam. For average teenagers, these three were an unstoppable force of love and support.
It was because of their determination to be there for Mei in her time of need
that led to Mei learning how to control her powers. They were able to collaborate
quickly to find a way to get to the 4-Town concert. Even after they felt betrayed by Mei,
they still couldn’t turn their backs on her completely, with Miriam even taking care
of Mei’s Tomogochi. During the final conflict, Priya, Abby and Miriam were able to rally 4-Town
and get them to perform as a way of encouraging Mei, knowing that singing together always boosted
Mei’s confidence. Without their help, Ming may have never made it back to being human again.
Next e have 4-Town. Like many of the young teens in this movie,
the members of 4-Town were only interested in their image and reputation. After all,
they were celebrities. They were glamorized and placed on a pedestal by legions of fans.
While their music is a bit cheesy, there’s no denying that 4-Town did in fact sing from
the heart. They had been able to use their music to help power the circle around Ming,
and their stardom meant a ton of fans were in the wings ready to also help power the magic.
Following in our next spot is Mr Gao. The man in charge of the ritual, Mr Gao had a knack of
being knowledgeable of tradition and being able to improvise in a pinch. After Ming had made
her way to the superdome, Mr Gao worked fast to lead the ritual. He was able to find high ground
to lead her panda out and not only successfully resealed Ming’s panda but everyone else’s,
utilizing things he found last minute around him. Who else would look at a piece of 4-Town
merchandise or a Tomogochi and think it was a usable vessel for a mystic beast? Only Mr Gao!
The next ranking is another group spot, going to the Aunties: Chen, Ping, Helen and Lily. While
they were only in a few scenes, these women proved to be excellent role models. Sure, they
were a bit too affectionate, but they proved to be able to protect their family when it counted.
They dropped everything to help Mei seal away her panda. They quickly shattered their own
vessels in order to help Wu and Mei get Ming into the circle. When all was said and done,
though they didn’t fully understand it, they supported Mei keeping her panda.
Next up, we have Grandma Wu Lee. When Wu first made an appearance on screen, she made it clear
she liked to be in control, which was something she clearly passed down to her daughter Ming.
After seeing a news broadcast of a giant red panda on the news, Wu didn’t need much time to connect
the dots. She quickly rallied the rest of the women in their family as well as Mr Gao to help
lead the ritual. After they arrived at the temple, when Wu was having her heart to heart with Mei,
she revealed she already knew that Mei was allowing her panda to be out without
Ming and Jin knowing. Wu had the same flaw as Ming: she was too overbearing and was quick
to write off what was once a family blessing as a curse. Wu blamed Ming’s panda for being
the reason she and her daughter were no longer close rather than taking accountability that
she had a hand in creating that distance. It was obvious that even after all of those years apart,
Wu still didn’t approve of Jin, giving him various orders to keep him busy and out of
the way. When Wu saw Mei trying to get her mother back to the circle for the ritual,
Wu had finally made the call to place Ming first. She allowed herself to risk losing control of her
forms in order to help her own daughter and called for the aunties to do the same. Wu was not only
a strong woman but a commanding presence. Her actions didn’t always translate well,
but she did always have the best of intentions. In the end, she was able
to meet her daughter halfway and see the value in surrendering her hold on everything around her.
Taking the Bronze medal for most powerful character is Mei’s mother, Ming Lee. Ming fit
the profile of an overbearing mother perfectly. On the one hand, we get it. Seeing inappropriate
pictures your daughter has drawn of a boy clearly older than her would cause a parent to go into
overprotective mode. On the other hand, it wouldn’t have hurt Ming to give her daughter
more freedom or listen when Mei tries to talk her down from a rant. From the Dairy Mart scene alone,
we saw that Ming was a force to be reckoned with. As the movie progressed, we saw that Ming was
willing to break the law in order to be certain Mei was safe. After her pendant was shattered,
Ming’s panda form was freed, exposing her to have the most powerful panda form in all of her family.
The only other time it was implied someone else could grow that big in panda form
was when the story of Sun Yee was told and she was shown to chase away an entire army.
It would be very easy for Ming in her beast form to take out a massive army.
Taking the silver medal for most powerful character is the main protagonist herself,
Meilin “Mei” Lee. Yes, she was a chaotic mess for much of the movie. What thirteen year old wouldn’t
be? Even without the addition of a red panda lying dormant, ready to burst out at the slightest
outburst, being a teenager is rough and full of hard patches. Despite all that, Mei was able to
do something her family had considered impossible for generations: she controlled the red panda. Mei
was able to correlate her love for her friends to how she was able to calm down enough to become
human again. That wound up giving her the chance to use her panda to freely express herself and
find a way to get her and her friends to see their favorite band in concert. With the presence of the
panda, Mei became not only stronger as a person, but more physically capable. Her mother Ming’s
panda form far outmatched her own, and yet Mei was still able to avoid being crushed under Ming
and knock her mother unconscious. Not to mention this was all done with the ability to switch back
and forth for agility, a skill she didn’t realize she had until she was switching forms to rush
towards the superdome. While it isn’t really a superpower, we also have to mention Mei’s
drive to excel in everything she did. Mei never tolerated doing the bare minimum of anything.
Even when she was getting distracted in school and her grades dropped, she still was hitting
a B average, which said a lot for how well she grasped new concepts and used the information.
Mei displayed her skill to quickly adapt to new situations, even under pressure. There
were many times she could have been caught in her panda form before that moment in the bathroom,
but Mei had the sense enough to flee and try to stay out of sight as she retreated home.
Mei was also likely one of the strongest spiritual members of her family. While all the women in the
Lee family honored Sun Yee, Mei was the only one shown to directly communicate with the ancestor.
With all these powerful women in the family with this impressive ability, who could possibly
outrank them and steal the top spot on our list? Well, we decided to grant our gold medal of most
powerful to Mei’s ancestor, Sun Yee. There is no question as to why her descendants honored
her with so much dedication and reverence. In a time where the land was torn apart by war, Sun
Yee had not only managed to save herself and her children, but also her entire village from
complete destruction. While we don’t see Sun Yee’s red panda form in action, we can guess from Ming’s
capability of destruction that the beast was something to be reckoned with. It was implied
that like Mei, Sun Yee had total control over her forms and had been able to channel her emotions to
switch back and forth for whatever she needed. We also see in her interactions with Mei that Sun Yee
was also able to shrink her red panda form, with the one we see at the very end of the film closer
in size to Mei’s. This was a skill we didn’t see with any of the other members of the family. From
what Jin had told Mei about seeing Ming’s form, she didn’t know how to be anything but giant,
and that had been part of the reason she was so terrified of having the power. There is a
chance that Sun Yee’s direct descendants, like her daughters and granddaughters,
may have been able to master growing or shrinking in size depending on what challenge
they faced or how great the emotion they were feeling upon changing. There is also something
to be said for how powerful Sun Yee was before she was even granted the gift of the red panda. Ming
told the story of how Sun Yee had to ask for the power to protect her family and so had been given
the blessing from a divine power. For Sun Yee to pull off something that impressive, she would have
had a massive amount of spiritual ability. Even without being granted the shapeshifting blessing,
Sun Yee would have no doubt found some other way to protect her family and village. She was
clearly a woman who didn’t know the meaning of the word ‘quit’ and for that we tip our hats to her.
But let us know in the comment section if you agree with our ranking. And tell us what we should
cover next. Remember to hit that notification bell and binge our Weak to Powerful playlist.
Where we break down who the most powerful characters are in your favorite cartoons,
shows and movies. But most importantly, stay wicked.