The Disney film “Encanto” is all about family and the relationships found within it - whether these
relationships are strong and loving or need a bit of work. Looking at the Madrigals, which
familial relationships from it are the healthiest and which are bordering on potentially toxic?
I’m Caleb with WickedBinge, and this is Encanto Family Relationships: Healthy to Healthiest.
Because Mirabel is the main character and is implied to be the next head of the
Madrigal household, we’re going to primarily be focusing on her relationships with her relatives.
Additionally, because there aren’t any truly toxic relationships within the Casita,
we’re instead going to start with the least healthy relationships and work
our way up to the strongest and healthiest ones.
As such, the first familial relationship on our list is Mirabel and Abuela Alma. Honestly,
if Alma was more purposefully malicious towards Mirabel, this relationship would have easily been
classified as emotionally toxic. However, we are going to cut Abuela just a bit of slack,
even if we still have to put this relationship at the bottom of our list. While yes, Alma still
cares about Mirabel and doesn’t necessarily WANT to hurt her, she does tend to unintentionally
see her as a sort of scapegoat when it comes to any adversity that the Madrigal family faces.
By the climax of the film, Alma essentially calls Mirabel the problem child to her face, claiming
that Mirabel is trying to hurt their family on purpose. Simply put, when it comes to Mirabel,
Alma for the most part is dismissive and quick to blame. Unfortunately, Mirabel doesn’t help matters
in that instead of talking to her and sharing her feelings or concerns, Mirabel would rather
take it upon herself to try and prove herself to her grandmother. Because she bottles up her
emotions when it comes to her grandmother, this eventually leads to Mirabel blowing up at Alma.
Thankfully, the two are able to work it out, with Alma acknowledging her mistakes and being willing
to do better while Mirabel is willing to forgive her and help her fix their family. The love found
at the core of the relationship is real, it’s just that both characters were so blinded by their own
issues and goals (with Alma focusing so much on her home and Mirabel wanting to prove her worth)
that this love sort of fell to the wayside. We’re just glad that this love came through in the end.
Right above them, we have Mirabel and Isabela. Sister relationships can be pretty complex,
and Mirabel and Isabela are no different. Taking influence from her grandmother,
Isabela mostly just saw Mirabel as being in the way - and as someone who WANTED to mess with her.
At the same time, Isabela was also more than a little jealous of her youngest sister and her
freedom from not having to be so perfect all the time. Of course, jealousy goes both ways, with
Mirabel brushing Isabela off as having an easy life and referring to her as a spoiled princess.
So yeah, tensions between these two are fairly high. However,
once Isabela is honest with her sister and Mirabel sees how much pressure Isa is under,
the two are able to find common ground. Once it’s all said and done, the two of them seem
more willing to support one another instead of just passing judgements against each other.
Next up is Mirabel and her tia, Pepa. For the few interactions that they have,
Mirabel almost seems to be on eggshells around her aunt - though, we can’t really blame her for that.
You definitely don’t want to anger the relative who can create thunderstorms with her emotions.
On Pepa’s side, she seems to be almost as bad as Alma and Isabela when it comes to blaming Mirabel
for things. She also seems to be easily aggravated with Mirabel, as seen at the breakfast table when
Mirabel took her seat and in the nursery when she heard Mirabel talking about Bruno.
Simply put, these two don’t have a close aunt and niece relationship. However, we were willing to
put this relationship above the others because, along with the lack of interaction, Pepa doesn’t
seem to go out of her way to tell Mirabel to stay out of the way like Alma and Isabela do.
Following them, we have Mirabel and Camilo. Another relationship with
very few interactions, unfortunately. You would think these two cousins would be close,
given that they’re the same age. But no, Camilo for the most part is just doing his own thing.
The only major interaction they have is during “We Don’t Talk About Bruno”,
when Camilo is playfully trying to freak Mirabel out with his Bruno impression. Not too malicious,
since he is just a teen, but not exactly a bonding moment either. Still, we can’t
say that there’s any bad blood between them, so we’ll still give this relationship a decent spot.
Next up is Mirabel and her tio, Felix. Yet another relationship where we don’t really see how close
(or not close) they are. However, the interactions they do have tend to lean more on the positive
side. After all, Felix was the only one who was willing to be completely honest with Mirabel when
she started asking about Bruno, unlike his wife, Pepa, who didn’t want to say anything.
Given that Felix is another powerless member of the Madrigal family, he also
doesn’t seem to see Mirabel as a burden like some other members of the family do.
Mirabel, in turn, seems to respect her uncle and doesn’t seem to have any real conflict with him.
Coincidentally enough, Mirabel and Dolores have a similar relationship.
Dolores doesn’t mind telling Mirabel about what she’s heard regarding the magic,
and during “We Don’t Talk About Bruno”, she hints at Bruno not being quite
as bad as the rest of her family is claiming. They don’t interact too much more outside of that,
but Mirabel does call Dolores her “favorite older cousin”. Unlike her and Isabela,
Mirabel and Dolores don’t have any jealousy or aggravation between them, and Mirabel even helps
set her up with Mariano at the end of the film. The only point of contention was when Dolores
shared Bruno’s vision - but we’ll acknowledge that was more because Dolores was genuinely
freaking out about it, not because she wanted to get back at Mirabel or anything like that.
Getting into the healthiest relationships that Mirabel has with her family, we have Mirabel and
her mother, Julieta When it comes to Mirabel, Julieta seems to take the opposite approach of
Alma’s, in that she’s always being encouraging and letting Mirabel know how special she is.
Julieta may worry about her daughter, but she never sees her as a burden. Unfortunately, it
could be said that Julieta is slightly dismissive of Mirabel, in that she didn’t completely
believe her about the cracks. Because of this, Mirabel tends to be a bit dismissive in return,
occasionally brushing off her mom’s love and support out of slight frustration.
But even with this bit of conflict, the love between these two is pretty evident in that
Mirabel is able to be honest with her mother while Julieta always has her daughter’s back,
frequently pointing out whenever Alma is being too hard on her.
It may not be a perfect mother-daughter relationship, but it’s pretty close!
We’re going to rank the relationship between Mirabel and Luisa next. Being the middle
and youngest sisters respectively, Luisa and Mirabel seem to have a pretty good relationship.
While yes, it took Luisa a bit to be honest with Mirabel, that wasn’t because she didn’t trust her,
but because Luisa wanted to keep up an image of strength. Once Luisa’s true stress was revealed,
however, Mirabel took the time to try and help her feel better. What’s great about
this relationship is how much they’re able to support each other. We see throughout “Surface
Pressure” how focused Luisa is on physically protecting her little sis while Mirabel is all
about that emotional support, letting her know that it’s okay to not carry so much weight.
She also seems to care deeply about helping Luisa the most when it seems like she’s losing her gift.
For this, we felt that we had to rank this relationship pretty high.
Just outside the top three, we have a unique relationship: Mirabel and Casita.
The Madrigal home is practically a character in its own right - with some even theorizing that
its magic is actually Abuelo Pedro’s spirit - and its connection to Mirabel seems to be
the strongest. Whether it’s doing what it can to help Mirabel on her journey,
encouraging her, or even trying to protect her as it’s falling apart,
Casita cares deeply about Mirabel. In turn, Mirabel sees Casita as more than just a home.
Out of all the family members, she’s seen speaking to Casita the most, truly treating
it as not just a person, but as family. Even the small things like her waving goodbye to Casita in
the morning add up a lot when she’s the only one doing it. With how strong this relationship is,
it’s really no wonder that Mirabel ends up being the one who brings the magic back in the end.
Our Bronze Medal of Healthiness is going to go to the relationship between Mirabel and her father,
Augustin. Disney dads don’t get the best reputation. They’re either somewhat clueless,
aggressively overprotective, or- well… dead. Thankfully, Augustin easily ranks
as one of the best, as he and Mirabel seem incredibly close. Being powerless himself,
Augustin is able to relate to Mirabel and tries to talk to her about her feelings.
As for Mirabel, though she may roll her eyes at how accident prone he is,
the affection and admiration she has for her father is clear. What ranks this relationship
so high up is how supportive Augustin is of his daughter, being willing to hide Bruno’s
vision to protect her and then standing up for Mirabel after the disastrous proposal dinner.
But while these two have a healthy father-daughter relationship, it’s not our top relationship.
Earning our Silver Medal of Healthiness is Mirabel and her estranged tio, Bruno. Despite not seeing
him for a decade, these two quickly formed a bond. Once Mirabel learned what Bruno did for her,
she wanted to ‘bring him home’ so that he wouldn’t have to live in the walls anymore.
Additionally, even while she pushed him to use his powers for her sake,
it was clear that Mirabel still cared about Bruno as a person. She encouraged and emotionally
supported him instead of just seeing him as a source for visions like many others did.
Of course, we all know how much Bruno went beyond the call of duty for an uncle,
being willing to leave his family in order to hide his vision and protect his niece.
Additionally, even if his vision was unclear, Bruno never once saw Mirabel as someone who
could bring disaster and even encouraged her efforts in saving the miracle, something not
even Mirabel’s parents did. These two really are the gold standard for how strong and loving a
relationship between family can be - or at least they would, if not for one final relationship.
Finally, getting our Gold Medal of Healthiness is Mirabel and Antonio. Out of all the relationships
Mirabel has with her relatives, the one she has with Antonio is the only one that’s completely
free of any sort of conflict or drama. Neither Mirabel nor Antonio ever seem to dismiss each
other, and the two of them are 100 percent supportive of one another. We see Mirabel
comforting Antonio before and during his gift ceremony, and after he gets his gift, she never
lets him know how hurt she is about not having a gift. But Antonio doesn’t just leave Mirabel
behind - he volunteers to help her and Bruno have another vision by offering up space in his room,
and much like Bruno, he never sees Mirabel’s efforts to save the miracle as a possible threat,
nor does he ever see his older cousin as a burden. Heck, in their first scene with each other, we see
Antonio wishing that Mirabel had a door too - not because he thinks she needs a gift, but because
he doesn’t want her to be lonely and sad. These two may be cousins, but we’re sure that not too
many would disagree with the claim that Mirabel and Antonio are close enough to practically be
siblings. As such, they easily have the healthiest familial relationship within the Madrigal family.
But let us know in the comment section if you agree with our ranking,
and tell us what we should cover next! Remember to hit that notification bell
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