Elastigirl (The Incredibles)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Elastigirl | |
 Close-up of Elastigirl |
|
| Publication information | |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Dark Horse Comics/Pixar Animation Studios |
| First appearance | The Incredibles |
| Created by | Brad Bird |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Helen Parr (maiden surname Truax) |
| Team affiliations | Incredible Family National Supers Agency |
| Abilities | full-body elasticity, shapeshifting |
Helen Parr (superhero name Elastigirl) is a fictional character created by director Brad Bird for the 2004 animated film The Incredibles produced by Pixar. She is the wife of Mr. Incredible, also known as Bob Parr, and in one scene she is (almost) called "Mrs. Incredible" by Mirage. The character's voice is provided by actress Holly Hunter and E.G. Daily in the video game.
"The mother of three, Helen knows it takes superhuman skills to be a mom and hold the family together. The flexibility that made her famous in her crime-fighting glory years is put to the test in her suburban life with all its challenges and surprises." - Official Pixar Website
Contents |
The movie
Elastigirl gets introduced to the audience as a lithe superheroine (or "super") who is able to stretch herself in excess of 30 m (98 ft). In the beginning of the film she marries Mr. Incredible, taking his last name ‘Parr’ (her maiden name is Truax), and they have three children: Violet, Dash and Jack-Jack. After the supers are outlawed and go to ground, Elastigirl, as Helen Parr, becomes a homemaker, and tries to help the family adjust to a normal life. She does use her super powers in private to control her rowdy family.
Bob, however, does not adjust happily to civilian life, and Helen eventually discovers that he is sneaking out trying to fight crime with Frozone, using the cover story that they are going bowling, leading to conflict between Helen and Bob.
Bob, as Mr. Incredible, is lured by the supervillain Syndrome to his private island, Nomanisan Island, under the ruse of an assignment in which Incredible must disable a formidable weapon called the Omnidroid. Helen later finds a strand of platinum blond hair on his clothes, hears Bob talking on the phone to his contact, Mirage, and becomes suspicious. After Incredible is lured back to the island by Syndrome, who intends to kill him, Helen learns that Bob is in danger. She borrows a jet from a friend to journey to the island, but during her flight, finds Violet and Dash stowed away. The plane is destroyed by enemy fire, but Helen manages to parachute to safety with her children, and make it to shore. Before leaving the safety of a cave in order to save Bob, Helen tries to bolster Violet's confidence by telling her that she has more power than she realizes, but she also has to warn both Violet and Dash that their enemies are merciless killers, and tells them to use their powers to protect themselves at all costs. She then leaves the two in the cave and goes off to rescue Bob.
During Helen's journey, Syndrome's assistant, Mirage, who lured Mr. Incredible to the island as his contact, has a change of heart, and frees Incredible. Although Incredible was led to believe his wife and children are dead, Mirage tells him that they're alive, and when he hugs her gratitude, Helen walks in on them. After some initial awkwardness and tension, the couple escape. Meanwhile, Violet and Dash manage to acquit themselves well after they are attacked by Syndrome's security force.
Syndrome recaptures the entire family, and reveals that he intends to use his latest Omnidroid model to attack the city of Metroville, and then orchestrate a rescue in which he appears to defeat the immense weapon, which is in reality under his control. The Parrs escape again, and manage to journey back to Metroville, where they, along with Frozone, manage to destroy the Omnidroid.
Back at their house, they are confronted by Syndrome, who tries to kidnap Jack-Jack. Incredbile and Elastigirl manage to retrieve the infant, and subsequently, Syndrome is apparently killed when his cape is sucked into the turbine of his private jet.
Personality
In her younger days, Elastigirl is very adamant about breaking into the male-dominated world of supers. She also doesn’t feel her future lies in marriage, as she believes that marriage will cramp her style.
As a housewife, she cares for her family's well-being, but is concerned when members of her family are not as attentive to the need to conceal their status as supers. The movie reveals her to be an experienced jet pilot, demonstrated when she is flying a jet she borrowed from an old friend, and using flawless pilot's radio jargon. It is not revealed where she learned this skill. She tries to hide her 'mission' to save Bob from Violet and Dash, but they quickly discover the truth on their own. She is often more authoritative than Bob, who is often too distracted to be substantially authoritative.
Appearance
Helen has medium-length auburn hair, and brown eyes. In her glory days of superheroine, she had long hair and a more slim figure.
Character information
- Information is taken from the movie and the bonus material from the DVD.
Elastigirl's minimum thickness is stated as 1 mm, which would limit her stretch distance to 30 meters; however, the Operation Kronos database states that she can stretch up to 300 feet (91.44 m) and leap up to 80 feet (24.39 m).
As part of stretching, Elastigirl displays some amount of invulnerability. Forced stretching, even under several tons of load, appears to cause pain and discomfort but NO permanent or even temporary harm. A high degree of protection is also afforded by her super suit. Combined with flexibility, this should make her immune to bullets, though this is never demonstrated save when she is caught by doors while sneaking into Syndrome's compound and manages to have a ricochet of bullets deflected from hitting her leg by her boots. She can be knocked out by blunt force, however, as demonstrated by the destruction of a plane carrying her, Violet, and Dash on board, though she quickly regains consciousness. She can use her elasticity to throw objects with far more force than her slight stature would imply, as in one scene in which she supports the weight of a Winnebago suspended during plane during flight. She has also shown the ability to shapeshift with her elasticity. An example of this is when she transformed into a boat in the middle of the ocean to get her children, Violet and Dash, to shore.
Helen Parr is an accomplished pilot and is depicted as a capable operative, hand-to-hand combatant, and tactician.
The Operation Kronos database assigned Elastigirl a threat rating of 6.2 and termed her a "moderate threat". It listed her whereabouts as "unknown" and the date of her last appearance as 13.11.55 (i.e., November 13, 1955). If this corresponds to her wedding date, this would place the events of the film (which occur fifteen years later) in approximately 1970. The date of November 13, 1955 may be a homage to the film Back to the Future, it being the day after Marty McFly returned to 1985. The opening scenes of Back to the Future Part III take place on November 13, 1955.
Events after the movie
Rise of The Underminer
Helen, Violet, Dash, and Jack-Jack are told by Bob to evacuate Metroville after they are surrounded by The Underminer's robots, but the four return just in time to watch as Mr. Incredible and Frozone presumably slay the Underminer by crashing his machine onto a bigger machine, the Underminer's Corrupterator, which creates an explosion.
A Magic Kingdom Adventure
Elastigirl appears in the Disney on Ice production of A Magic Kingdom Adventure.
Actresses
- In addition to Holly Hunter, Helen Parr is voiced by the following voice actresses:
- Amy Kwok in the Cantonese version
- Katrin Fröhlich in the German version
- Smaragda Karyde in the Greek version
- Beatriz Berciano in the Castilian Spanish version
- Consuelo Duval in the Latin American Spanish version
- Juana Molina in the Argentine Spanish version
- Deborah Perret in the French version
- Gabi Gubás in the Hungarian version
- Laura Morante in the Italian version
- Hitomi Kuroki in the Japanese version
- Dorota Segda in the Polish version
- Márcia Coutinho in the Brazilian Portuguese version
- Sara Lindh in the Swedish version
- Rakshanda Khan in the Indian version
- In A Magic Kingdom Adventure, Helen is played by Dora Vikar.
Bonus content
According to the deleted scenes, Helen had a nightmare in which her husband was having an affair with many blond-haired women while she was being washed in the washing machine. There was also a deleted scene where Snug, her pilot friend, was the one piloting the plane and died when the plane was obliterated. In the alternate opening, she is seen protecting her child (presumably an infant Violet) by lecturing on how dangerous her pre-maternal job was. However, Bob unwittingly creates a distraction (by "chopping off" his fingers with a steak knife and using ketchup as blood) and the three drove away.
Her file in National Supers Agency records state that the NSA wanted her to lead a new superhero team: Heroes, Inc. However, Elastigirl, a heartbreaker at the time, turned down their offer, saying that she "preferred her freedom." In the audio file included, she can be heard complaining about the poor quality of her supersuits, which are eventually stretched out so badly that they make her "look like a house frau", and she says that she wants a good line of action wear that can completely recover from her constant stretching—in fact, she's been broke investing in stretching Super-Suits. Rick Dicker, a member of the NSA, tells her to turn to Edna Mode, the only person qualified to solve Elastigirl's wardrobe malfunction.
Notes
External links
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
