Big Theory About “Turning Red” Unravels Pixar Mystery

By Adrienne Tyler

There’s a widely known theory about all Pixar movies living in the same universe and being connected through characters and events, and one fan theory connects Soul and Turning Red, solving a mystery of the former in the process. Pixar continues to be a powerhouse in the world of animation, and it has built a unique narrative and animation style that makes its movies stand out. In recent years, however, Pixar has been changing these formulas a little bit with projects like Soul, Luca, and Turning Red, exploring deeper and more complex topics and experimenting with different visual styles.

Pixar’s latest project, Turning Red, has been a success with critics and viewers but it has also been divisive, as it deals with topics that aren’t usually seen in Pixar movies. Turning Red introduced viewers to Meilin “Mei” Lee (Rosalie Chiang), a dorky, 13-year-old Chinese-Canadian student who one day discovers that, whenever she gets too excited or stressed, she turns into a giant red panda, but she can turn back if she becomes calm and controls her emotions. This turns out to be a curse linked to her ancestors, who have a shared history with the species, but it can be contained by performing a special ritual on one specific night. Unfortunately for Mei, that night coincides with a concert of her favorite boy band, 4*Town, and to further complicate everything, she also has to deal with her overbearing mother, Ming (Sandra Oh).

Of course, Turning Red has a bunch of Pixar Easter eggs and references, and fans have already tried to place it within the Pixar Universe Theory, but others have found a way to explain a Pixar mystery through Turning Red. A fan theory suggests there’s a strong link between Turning Red and Soul thanks to 22 (voiced by Tina Fey) and Mei, as they could be one and the same, thus solving the mystery of 22’s fate.

What Happened To 22 In Soul

Pixar has many traditions, including releasing at least one movie per year, and 2020 saw two very different stories: Onward and Soul. The latter was the first Pixar project to be sent directly to Disney+ due to the coronavirus pandemic, and while that impacted its box office performance, it was a critical success. Soul tells the story of Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx), a music teacher who dreams of being a jazz musician and auditions to become part of Dorothea Williams’ (Angela Bassett) quartet. Joe is hired, but on his way home, he falls down a manhole and goes down the sewers, and when he wakes up, he finds himself as his soul heading into the “Great Beyond”. There he meets 22, a young soul in training who’s avoiding Earth and thus hasn’t completed her badge, which grants souls passage to Earth once it’s completely filled out with personality traits.

With Joe in a coma in the physical world, 22 agrees to let him help her find her “spark” to complete her badge and he can use it to go back to Earth. Together, Joe and 22 learn that the “spark” is not a soul’s purpose, as they had thought all along, but each soul’s intention to live. After a brief time on Earth through Joe’s body, 22 finds that spark and intention to live, completing her badge, so Joe rescues her as she had become a lost soul and escorts her out of the Great Before for her big jump to Earth. The last time viewers see 22, she jumps to Earth with Joe (though he can’t accompany her all the way) at the end of Soul and she lands somewhere in Asia.

Turning Red’s Mei & Soul’s 22 Have Similar Journeys

When the audience met 22 in Soul, she had spent thousands of years at The You Seminar and had met every requirement to go to Earth except one, as she couldn’t find her “spark”, no matter how many mentors (some of them famous ones) she had had, and as a result, she had no interest in life on Earth. It wasn’t until she spent time on Earth in Joe’s body that she realized life on Earth wasn’t boring and there were a lot of fun activities, interesting people, and little things to enjoy everywhere, which gave her her “spark” or intention to live. After being rescued by Joe from being a Lost Soul, 22 regained her confidence and finally made the jump to Earth. Now, Mei’s journey in Turning Red is similar to 22’s in Soul.

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When viewers meet Mei in Turning Red, she’s a confident and dorky 13-year-old who loves a number of things: math, pizza, cute animals, dumplings, music (especially the boyband 4*Town), her friends, and more. However, her overprotective and strict mother, Ming, holds her back from being herself and finding her own path in life. Mei’s transformation into a giant red panda is a metaphor for puberty and the crazy changes that come with it, and it’s also the beginning of Mei’s journey to find herself, what she truly wants to do, and pretty much live her life under her own terms rather than living under her mother’s shadow and living to make her proud all the time. Both Mei and 22 were looking for their purpose (though on different levels and in different scenarios), which has made some fans believe they had already met Mei before Turning Red was released.

Theory: 22 Is Mei’s Soul

A theory shared by Game of Theories on YouTube suggests 22 landed on Earth to become Turning Red’s Mei’s soul. The author begins by pointing out similarities such as 22’s fascination with music and Mei excelling in it by playing the flute and their mutual love for pizza before diving into the #1 piece of “evidence”: where 22 seems to be heading to at the end of Soul. According to the author, 22 most likely landed in China near Tibet, which is a “very spiritual area” and so it fits with Mei’s family curse. Now, Turning Red is set in Toronto, but it could be possible that Mei and her family moved to Canada when she was a baby, making it possible for 22 to be her soul. Another parallel pointed out in the video is that between “The Zone” in Soul, where souls go through meditation and other states of euphoric trance, and the realm the women in Mei’s family go to during the ritual to separate themselves from their red pandas. The author also finds 22’s transformation into a lost soul after she becomes depressed near the end of Soul similar to Mei’s transformation into a red panda as they’re both provoked by their emotions.

Mei’s outgoing personality and excitement and awe of what becoming a woman is like are also similar to 22’s excitement after her time on Earth. 22’s wonder and awe of the world and the little things in life was what ultimately gave her the push to finally go to Earth, so it would make sense that that excitement and joy to live continued when she landed on a body.

The Problems With 22 Being Mei’s Soul

While this Pixar theory would answer the big question of what happened to 22 when she finally jumped to Earth (which fans have already tried to solve by suggesting she became Inside Out’s Riley), the biggest point against it is time. Although it’s unclear when exactly Soul is set, it’s generally accepted it’s set in 2019/2020 as Joe uses a smartphone, while Turning Red took the audience back to 2002. The author of the theory tries to solve this by pointing out it’s unknown how time works in the Great Beyond, so it would be somewhat possible for 22 to jump to Earth at any point in time, though that still seems unlikely, mostly as Joe was able to jump back to his body without any time issues. Fans on Reddit have suggested the only way the theory could work is if Mei dies sometime after the events of Turning Red and becomes 22 rather than the other way around, but that’s a very depressing (and it’s a bit complicated) perspective.

There’s also the fact that it’s not clear whether Mei was born in China or not, but as her extended family seems to be not too far from Toronto, it’s most likely that Mei was born in Canada, and carries on with her family’s Chinese traditions. That would completely debunk the theory as 22 was on her way to land on the other side of the world, so she couldn’t have become Mei. Although it’s heartwarming to think of Mei as the continuation of 22’s journey, there are small yet important details that play against this idea, but until director Domee Shi confirms or denies it, it’s up to viewers to decide if Mei and 22 are the same or not.

Source: https://screenrant.com/turning-red-pixar-soul-mei-22-theory-explained/