Netflix launches trailer for new Tim Burton, “Merlina” 0:57
(CNN) — Merlina Addams doesn’t do anything by mistake. The most stoic and considered member of the Addams Family, he rarely makes unnecessary movements, including smiling and blinking.
When the spirit of dance took hold of the typically moody teenager at her school dance in the new Netflix series that bears her name, it immediately caused a stir, both on and off screen.
The brief scene represents less than three minutes of the entire series, but has quickly become the most iconic moment of “Merlina” because our eccentric protagonist seems to feel so free. His eyes reveal a rare and macabre passion. Its limbs, usually glued to its side, move freely. The dance is without a doubt hers: many hard and forced movements and movements of past decades. Surely no one could mistake Merlina’s dance for the latest TikTok trend, right?
Something about that whimsical dance sparked something weird in all of us, and it started faster than a fire at Camp Chippewa. Clips of the choreography inspired viewers to check out the series, making it one of the most-watched shows on the streaming platform (“Stranger Things,” to stand aside). Its popularity online brought Lady Gaga’s “Bloody Mary” back up the charts more than a decade after the song’s release, and it only appeared on fan-made TikToks, not the show itself! “Merlina” star Jenna Ortega’s admission that she choreographed the choreography herself invited new fans, including celebrities, to try it out and even infuse the routine with moves from their own culture.
Merlina Addams would probably be mortified if she knew her moves have gone mainstream, but her dancing just won’t die, and she might like that. This gives the dance of “Merlina” its otherworldly endurance.
The scene has its own myth
The “Merlina” dance scene debuted just a month ago, but it already has a certain “mythology,” said Jenna Drenten, an associate professor of marketing at Loyola University Chicago, who studies how users of TikTok and other digital platforms express their feelings identities .
Most of the scene’s story took place off-screen. Ortega, who plays a teenage Merlina with her pitch-dark humor intact, has said she choreographed the routine herself. He was one of his influences to Bob Fosse, Siouxsie Sioux and the goth dance clubs of the 1980s (probably also some references to the 1960s TV series Addams Family).
The Cramps set Merlina’s dance to music in their eponymous Netflix series. (Credit: Peter Noble/Redferns/Getty Images)
Additionally, Ortega admitted that she’s not a trained dancer, which perhaps makes her routine even more appealing to non-dancers who found the routine on TikTok, Drenten said.
“I’m not a dancer and I’m sure that’s obvious,” Ortega told NME.
But Ortega’s involvement has also sparked outrage: she told NME she filmed part of the dance while awaiting the results of a Covid-19 test, which later came back positive. This prompted some to condemn the production for not following proper Covid-19 prevention protocols on set, but even so, “Merlina” continued to make waves.
Viral trends, which stay in the cultural conversation the longest, usually don’t just stay on their platform of origin, Drenten said. Check out the Corn Kid: He appeared on a YouTube series where he talked about the wonders of corn, then clips of his performance went viral on TikTok and he’s been working with him chipotleGreen Giant and the State of South Dakota promoting corn on other platforms.
“To have a longer lifespan, TikTok trends need to make that leap into a cultural trend beyond the confines of TikTok,” he said. “The ‘Merlina’ dance had an advantage in that regard because the dance and legacy of ‘The Addams Family’ has been outside of TikTok since its inception.”
The dance “Merlina” has become a common ritual
Another thing that the dance of “Merlina” has on its side: the human tendency to learn a dance for societal dissemination.
Think electric slide, macarena, cupid shuffle—common at bat mitzvahs and weddings, moves many of us know so well we can do them without thinking. Performing them en masse at such an event might seem like a Pavlovian response to a DJ’s song choices, but it’s also a shared ritual that fosters “a sense of solidarity and belonging,” Drenten said.
“Each gesture and movement inherently allows the person performing it to say, ‘I understand, I’m aware, we have this shared experience,'” Drenten said.
It’s one of the reasons dance routines, from Lizzo’s “Renegade” to “About Damn Time,” often dominate TikTok. But bucking those trends, the dance to “Merlina” wasn’t set to a popular song, though The Cramps’ punk anthem “Goo Goo Muck” has since garnered a new following. The movements are fairly easy to learn, said Drenten, “simple but unique”.
Lady Gaga put her own spin on the now-iconic “Merlina” dance, braids and all. (Source: @ladygaga/TikTok)
But it was Lady Gaga who took the “Merlina” dance to stratospheric levels. The version that went superviral on TikTok is a sort of “fancam,” or mash-up of clips appropriate to Gaga’s “Bloody Mary.” , a biblical ode to dancing without inhibitions. Even Mother Monster herself performed a version of the “Merlina” dance, complete with two long pigtails.
Since then, millions of users have put their own spin on Merlina’s school dance solo, and some users have incorporated Polynesian or Indian dance styles into their versions, or created their own Merlina looks (including Fingers (Thing), the hand! Bodyless!). .
Merlina gives us permission to be weird
Belonging, of course, is the opposite of Merlina’s spirit, which has never bothered to belong. She is perfectly at home on her own island, where the sun never shines and ancient tools of torture abound. That Merlina’s idiosyncratic moves have been copied so often might diminish her status as the patron saint of madmen, except that the style and attitude have been copied for decades.
Merlina Addams has been around in some form since the late 1930s: first as an unnamed comic book character, then as a tiny girl on a TV sitcom, then in her most famous iteration before the release of “Merlina” as Dead Eyes Christina Ricci. And Merlina fans have dressed up as her for decades, Drenten said, often inspired by Ricci’s interpretation. The Addams’ eldest daughter is no longer a secret for her biggest fans to hide from mainstream pop culture.
Since her debut, Merlina has been a quirky icon for loners and goths for her uncompromising commitment to the macabre. Still, she remains an “exceptional” among women and girls in fiction, wrote Emily Alford for Longreads, because she has never drawn to or softened with any particular story trope. She is what she is and she doesn’t change.
“She brought to screen a morbid self-acceptance that set her apart and became a crucial role model for a generation of girls who developed their own dark humor,” Alford wrote.
And now many of these girls and other users are on TikTok, where niche communities can thrive (or reach mainstream users). The app is a “space for people to find out who they are and, more importantly, to find other people who share the same interests,” Drenten said, even if those interests consist of presenting themselves as certain dispassionate teenagers to dress up.
“TikTok arguably encourages overplay, and users may feel pressure to act and look a certain way,” Drenten said. “But Merlina reminds people that finding yourself in this sea of equality is liberating.”