But wait, there’s more! The “Evil Queen is Mother Gothel” theory is a good one, and the TikTok video has resonated with Disney fans to the tune of three million likes and over 10,000 comments. Interestingly, though, a good number of those comments counteract the theory with another popular one: Mother Gothel is actually Meg from “Hercules.”
Another TikTok video (this one racking up over seven million views) by @super_carlin_brothers lays out the equally popular theory that there is a clear through-line between the ancient Greek Herculean love interest Meg and Rapunzel’s wicked captor.
The theory starts by highlighting the significant time gap between the ancient and medieval stories (a matter of a couple of thousand years). This is easily dispensed with via the golden magical flower granting Mother “Meg” Gothel immortality over the centuries.
From there, the theory returns to geography, pointing out that the spot on earth where baby Hercules arrives from heaven looks similar, once again, to the spot where Mother Gothel finds her youth-giving botanical.
As far as the heroic (though morally gray) Meg becoming such an evil character, the theory elaborates that if Hercules died first after giving up his immortality, out of desperation, Meg would have searched out the spot where he arrived on Earth. There, she would have found the flower and sung her song — which includes lines like “Make the clock reverse” and “bring back what once was mine.” That same song also references the capital “F” Fates, who are a key element of “Hercules.” The theorist even connects Rapunzel’s sacrifice for Flynn with Meg’s selling her soul to Hades to save Hercule’s life. Oh yeah, and both Gothel and Meg use the phrase, “Ya big lug.”
