King Triton is a central part of The Little Mermaid’s story, leading Disney’s live-action version to cast an established and well-known actor in the role. While Ariel’s interest in humans and the world beyond the oceans always existed, leading her to build an impressive collection of trinkets over the years in both the original The Little Mermaid and the longer live-action remake, it becomes a point of contention once King Triton discovers it, as he always forbade humans and merpeople from fraternizing with each other. Without King Triton, there’s no character for Ariel to row against, kickstarting her adventure in both the 1989 animated feature and its 2023 redo.
King Triton’s relationship with Ariel takes center stage in 2023’s The Little Mermaid, just like it did in the original, poignantly changing for the better as the film goes on, and leading to a perfect, hard-won ending. The Hollywood star playing King Triton perfectly embodies the character’s complexities exemplified by his love for Ariel, but also by the multiple control tendencies he has over her to protect her that eventually leads her away to fall into Ursula’s clutch. King Triton’s story is one of the things in the 2023 Little Mermaid remake different from the 1989 original, but his actor makes the character one of the few improvements.
Javier Bardem Plays King Triton In The Little Mermaid 2023
King Triton’s role in the live-action remake of The Little Mermaid went to Spanish actor Javier Bardem. He proved a wholly apt choice for King Triton, perfectly opposing Melissa McCarthy’s Ursula and bringing King Triton’s gravity to life. Known for various roles, Bardem won the prestigious Coppa Volpi at the Venice Film Festival for his protagonist part in The Sea Inside. He went on to co-star as the iconic villain Anton Chigurh in the Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men, which garnered him an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. He was also nominated for lead roles in Before Night Falls, Biutiful, and Being the Ricardos, where he portrayed Desi Arnaz.
On the more mainstream side of his filmography, Bardem played the intelligent Bond villain Raoul Silva in the 2012 blockbuster movie Skyfall and the vengeful Captain Armando Salazar in the Disney sequel Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales. More recently, he played the Freman leader Stilgar in the sci-fi epic Dune and continued to branch out into family films as the titular character’s owner in Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile.
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How The Little Mermaid 2023’s King Triton Is Different From The Animated Movie
Unlike the 1989 animated original, The Little Mermaid’s live-action remake managed to offer more background to King Triton’s fears, along with the motivation behind his total ban on merpeople meeting and interacting with humans. Indeed, having Ariel’s mother be killed by a human not only plays a bigger part in the live-action plot but also justifies King Triton’s distrust and hate of humans. Given the humans’ disregard for the ocean and one human’s violent act resulting in King Triton losing his wife, it makes sense for him to despise them and excessively worry that his daughters might suffer the same fate if they encountered and fraternized with humans.
Moreover, unlike the character in the 1989 Disney original, King Triton has a more direct connection to The Little Mermaid’s villain, Ursula, in the remake. Even if it didn’t thoroughly delve into the reasons behind Ursula’s animosity toward King Triton, making her his sister made Ursula’s revenge against Ariel personal, as Ursula and King Triton’s shared past must have included reasons that motivated her objective to take not just any throne, but King Triton’s own crown and trident. The Little Mermaid’s changes not only make sense within the universe already built by the 1989 Disney original, but they also enrich it, including those involving King Triton.
