Silent Reshaping: The Adaptation Strategies of Mythological Female Figures in Irish Folklore Trilogy

Abstract

Contemporary Chinese animated movies often feature subversive rewritings of traditional myths. However, they inevitably suffer from a significant disconnect between the contemporary works and the traditional values inherent in the original myths. This paper uses Irish Folklore Trilogy by Cartoon Saloon as a reference to explore the possibility of alternative expressions of mythological narrative in contemporary animated movies. Irish Folklore Trilogy draws heavily on the Celtic mythological tradition while employing a unique strategy of "preserving the original while nondisruptively innovating", allowing female characters to serve multiple functions and possess modern consciousness without deviating from the mythological archetype. It uses traditional mythological features such as metamorphosis to address issues of identity and cultural anxiety. This paper argues that the trilogy offers a flexible adaptation paradigm that integrates tradition and reality while avoiding structural rupture, thereby offering significant referential value for the creation of contemporary Chinese mythological movies.