Personally, it weirded me out to see a kid do it. Sorry. It’s different for an adult. Generally they know what it means.

Which is frustrating in itself, not just because it’s the best Pixar film in years dealing with perfectly normal adolescence, but because there is some criticism to be made in good faith on some of that. But now it can’t be made without seeming like you agree with a Fox News Troll.

I didn’t like how it was okay for Mei to buy into the capitalist sexualizing of other children (the boy band) without any sort of questioning of that paradigm, but only celebration. Especially when the other half of the film is so critical of institutions exploiting and repressing children for its own benefit. I also didn’t like a child twerking being shown as a heroic act.

But the rest of the film is incredibly well made, and there’s so much more to discuss than just that. It was targeted just as much for being about Chinese-Canadians as it was for being about tween girls.