Moana is one of my top favorite Disney movies. The songs, action scenes, lessons, and setting just hit everything I desired in a Disney film. We get a princess with no prince mixed in. Frozen tried to do that, but still had a love interest.

Unlike a ton of Disney princess flicks, Moana is a story of self-discovery, not romantic love. We even get a princess with a realistic body: somebody short and not hour-glass shaped. Also don’t even get me started on Maui, my favorite character. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson voicing him was so perfect.

The study of Polynesian culture and the amount of work put into the special effects was a ton of work for Disney that resulted in a movie that gained a lot of respect for its diversity, realism, and animation.

To get the movie to its final product though, there were tons of makeovers. Plot, characters, and how people looked were definitely not the same as they were in previous drafts of Moana. Part of this list shows some of those unexpected ideas that thankfully did not make it to the final product.

Also this is Disney, and Disney loves its Easter Eggs. Moana is full of subtle homages to past Disney movies such as The Little Mermaid, Frozen, and even Wreck-it-Ralph. Of course those little discoveries are on this list as well!

25 Inspired by Stars

Maui's hook in the movie was partly inspired by a constellation, Scorpio. In Hawaii, they see the Scorpio constellation as Maui’s fishhook. It’s pretty neat to think about how different cultures looked at the sky and saw different shapes, which told different stories.

Did you know the fishhook has a name? It’s Manaiakalani!

Like how Maui described in his song, “You’re Welcome,” the actual Maui from Polynesian myth used his hook to lasso the sun to make days longer and bring up islands out of the sea for people to live on. Who can blame Maui for being full of himself when he’s done all that?

It’s due to the Greeks and Babylonians that the Maui’s fishhook his also known as Scorpio. I guess the scorpion’s stinger and fishhook would be the same stars in this case.

24 Maui Could’ve Been Bald

Demigod Maui rocks a fine head of curls in the movie, but did you know he almost didn’t? In fact, in previous drafts...he was bald! Moana directors Ron Clements and John Musker originally created a bald look for the character, just like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

However, when they showed a bald Maui concept to Disney’s Polynesian cultural advisors, they didn’t approve. "The advisers said, 'Maui isn’t bald. He has this long, rich hair that’s part of his mana (spiritual energy),” Clements said. “And we all said, OK, Maui will have hair.”

With hair being probably one of the more difficult aspects to animate, I guess the animation team and budget suddenly had more of a challenge. However they succeeded, giving Maui his beautiful curls that would even make “The Rock” envious.

23 Heihei was originally sassy

Princesses get animal sidekicks. It’s a Disney rule. Disney has given us Mushu from Mulan, Jacque and Gus from Cinderella, Meeko from Pocahontas, Sven from Frozen, Flounder from The Little Mermaid, Pascal and Maximus from Tangled, and Rajah and Abu from Aladdin, while Moana was gifted with a chicken.

Heihei the chicken stands out from these sidekicks due to being extraordinarily dumb.

However, that wasn’t the plan from the beginning. He was going to be a chicken with intellect and sass, but he was going to get cut due to being uninteresting. Team Moana saved the chicken by dumbing him down as far as they could. There was a rumor that Maui saying “The chicken lives!” at the end of the movie is an inside joke for the Disney team, as they had a lot of trouble getting the chicken to stay in the film.

22 Mini Maui

Maui’s tattoos detail the his achievements and backstory. Though one specific tattoo appears to have a mind of its own, a “Mini Maui.” Though it doesn’t talk (thank God), it does have a lot to say to Maui in Moana. Maui seems to understand Mini Maui through hand gestures and body language alone.

This Mini Maui appears to actually be a sort of conscience for Maui. Like Pinocchio’s Jiminy Cricket, Mini Maui tries to steer this demigod on the right path. This isn’t a coincidence, as the Moana team often compared Mini Maui to Jiminy Cricket during production.

I have a question though, what achievement did Maui have that gave him Mini Maui? That is the real secret I want to know. If all of this tattoos are earned, what earned him a conscious being running around on his skin?

21 From Hair to Sea

So much animation power went into the ocean in Moana. Since the sea is an actual character and most of the story takes place on the sea, the animation team had their work cut out for them. The splashing, the waving, and the rising and falling all seem like a hard time.

The last time an animation team had their work cut out for them was with Rapunzel’s long hair from Tangled.

Due to that commonality, the animation team for Moana took an in-depth study of how Rapunzel’s hair moves. I suppose it does have a flow to it that it sort of like water. If I was Rapunzel when she had long hair, I’d never want to visit the beach. Imagine what the wind would do to it!

20 Moana Used to be a Secondary Character

Early concept ideas for the story of Moana actually wasn’t centered on her, but it was centered on the demigod Maui. Moana was going to just be a secondary character that was on a mission to save her love interest. Talk about a different story! It was going to be called “Mighty Maui.”

When Ron Clements and John Musker actually visited the Pacific Islands for story inspiration, their idea for Maui to be the main character changed. They were fascinated with the people’s connection to the ocean and respect for nature, so they changed nearly their entire story.

Thank goodness too! We have enough love stories in Disney, so we didn’t need Moana to be on a mission for love. It was refreshing for a princess to take on an adventure more for the world and her people.

19 Only "The Rock"

To any who wanted to audition to be the voice of Maui, they were out of luck. Disney didn't open up auditions for Maui — they only wanted Johnson, and reached out to him directly. “It wasn’t Dwayne right at the very beginning but very soon thereafter,” said John Musker. “(Maui was a) demi-god who was bigger than life, a charismatic figure who did these amazing deeds. And he was pan-Pacific; he wasn't any one culture.

“As we developed it, we knew that Dwayne Johnson was part-Samoan, and it just seemed (to fit) his charisma, and the fact that he's bigger than life too. Why not hire a real demi-god?”

Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton and Moana composer) apparently wrote “You’re Welcome,” specially with Dwayne in mind too!

18 Flounder in “You’re Welcome”

During the colorful and different style montage in Maui’s song, “You’re Welcome.” Flounder makes a quick appearance! The directors couldn’t help themselves of course, since they also worked on The Little Mermaid. I guess these directors really love the ocean huh?

Easter Eggs are innocent little cameo appearances and are only taken with a grain of salt. They aren’t serious or essential at all. In fact, isn’t The Little Mermaid on the other side of the ocean in the Atlantic? I guess Flounder is far from home.

Flounder does fit in with the rest of the fish though, doesn’t he? Someone who hasn’t seen The Little Mermaid wouldn't have known any better!

17 Weird Place for a Reindeer

Maui struggles with his shapeshifting once he gets his fishhook back, which leads to a lot of comedic transformation accidents. One such transformation is to the animal sidekick from Frozen, Sven. I’d be surprised if Maui even knew what a reindeer is! Being a demigod gives him a lot of excuses for this little hiccup though. We heard rumors that there's also an Olaf cameo, but no one can find him. Maybe he melted?

Unlike The Little Mermaid, Frozen has no commonality with Moana’s setting. Excep,t like Moana, it follows the current trend of less romance-centered Disney movies and focuses a little more on identity and clever twists. Other than that though, they are pretty much on the other side of the world.

16 Odd Tapa Cloth

Mostly recognized as a Polynesian craft, tapa cloth is a softened bark that are dyed with different designs. Disney’s cultural team worked hard to show Polynesians as historically accurate as possible, so seeing tapa cloths around Moana’s village was very cool to see.

In the credits of Moana, we get to see a tapa cloth that isn’t historically accurate, as it’s Wreck-it-Ralph! That’s him 2,000 years before his time! Did someone in the vision just have a vision of the future and dye his figure onto the cloth?

Another odd Easter Egg happened in the Wreck-it-Ralph 2 trailer, where you see a kid who looks exactly like baby Moana. It’s interesting because Moana and Wreck-it-Ralph cannot be further apart in terms of themes. There's a video game world on one end and the culture of the Pacific Islands on the other.

15 Kakamora Baymax

Secondary to Wreck-it-Ralph, I’d also put Big Hero 6 on the far opposite setting and story spectrum from Moana. However, if it’s Disney, it’s going to find its way into other Disney films as an Easter Egg. There Kakamoras were probably one of my favorite parts of Moana due to being cute, but also because how vicious they were.

You can see one of these little guys with face paint that is an exact replica of Baymax’s face from Big Hero 6. This guy blends in well with the rest, but is a little noticeable due to having far smaller eyes than everyone else. Maybe his personality is like Baymax and he’s the medic of the Kakamoras. Sounds like a busy job.

14 A Historic Mystery

It blew my mind to find out that Moana is written partly as an explanation for an actual historic mystery in Polynesian history. As you may have learned from the movie itself, the Polynesians were voyagers who sailed and colonized many islands. But one huge mystery, sometimes called “The Long Pause,” leaves a gaping hole in the voyaging timeline.

Historians found Western Polynesia was colonized around 3,500 years ago, while Central and Eastern Polynesia weren’t settled until about 1,500 to 500 years ago. That means the Polynesians have a 2,000 year gap before they voyaged again. Why?

Historians only have theories, but that's it. So in Moana, Disney saw a chance to create a reason, through the heart of Te Fiti getting stolen and creating chaos in the sea.

13 The Real Maui

Moana’s Maui and the real Maui from Polynesian myth of course have their differences. Mythology Maui actually has four brothers and he is known for some more violent and adult-level feats (which were obviously left out of a family film). Movie Maui also differs in backstory.

In the movie, he is abandoned by his parents as a child and raised by a god, but in mythology, he is commonly seen as the son of a God and mortal woman.

This physical appearance was very different as well. In myth, he was known to be slimmer and younger looking. Disney decided to make Maui look large and more wild looking to be a more physical match to his larger-than-life tales.

12 Fury Road on the Sea

The action packed chase and fight scene with the Kakamoras in Moana was inspired by the apocalyptic story of Fury Road. No wonder I loved that part so much! I can totally see how it was inspired too, especially with the drums.

The Kakamoras also just throw themselves at Moana and Maui with no regard for their own safety, much like the various characters in Fury Road. Also the epic size and build of the Kakamora boats are awesome. They all can combine into one giant boat too! Now all they need is a Kakamora rocking out to a guitar, some “blood bags,” and some chrome spray.

Now I just want a boat version of Fury Road. There is a lot of creative genius that could go into such a project.

11 A Frozen Monster Cameo

An early movie Easter Egg was the appearance of Elsa’s bodyguard, Marshmellow, from Frozen. You can see him on depicted on a tapa cloth in the beginning when Moana is a baby being told stories by her grandmother. He blends in with the movie pretty well, as he’s stylized to not stand out so much.

To any unknowing viewer, he could just look like a general monster an a tapa cloth.

Marshmellow isn’t exactly a memorable Disney monster, but in this tapa cloth he looks like he could be a sea monster (especially since there is no snow on these islands). Maybe he could be some sort of urchin monster since he has all those spikes?

10 After Credits Scene

Many people had no clue about this and did not stay to see this little scene after the credits when Moana was in theaters. The scenes features Tamatoa the crab in the underworld just as Maui and Moana left him. He’s stuck on his back and cannot turn over. He then speaks directly to the viewer, asking for a hand to help him up.

He then mentions Sebastian from The Little Mermaid, saying that if he was Sebastian and had a Jamaican accent, then someone would probably help him. It's kind of an odd scene, but I guess it was probably funny to the little kids. Of course we’d be more likely to help Sebastian, because Sebastian isn’t the size of a couple buses!

9 A Familiar Lamp

Tamatoa had a pretty shiny collection didn’t he? He had pearls, shells, weapons, and tons of gold stuff. One of the gold objects, however, is something most Disney fans are familiar with, genie’s lamp from Aladdin!

This Easter Egg could actually make sense since the Genie is an immortal being that could have existed for thousands of years.

Moana and Maui should’ve grabbed that lamp instead of the hook then! They could wish for the hook, the heart of Te Fiti, and then their last wish could be to return the heart to its original spot! That would’ve saved a lot of story. I bet Maui would want to wish for other things though, like a new power or better boat...

8 A Whole New World?

If you weren't convinced that Disney is obsessed with Easter Eggs in their films, then you should be now. This carpet is shown during the “Where You Are” song around the beginning of the movie. During the song, we get to see a lot of the village Moana grew up in and the culture they have.

This carpet fits in so well with the setting and the people that many had no idea it was a replica of the magic carpet from Aladdin.

So do all the magical artifacts of Aladdin have Oceanic origins? Obviously this is just a regular carpet, with no magic at all. But what made the magic carpet magic anyway? Is there a human soul trapped inside? We want origin stories for Genie and the carpet!

7 A Pig Left Behind

A lot of Moana fans noticed that they had a perfectly cute animal sidekick that got no attention, Pua the pig. Since the pig was left behind in Moana’s village while she went on an adventure, it’s a wonder why the pig even needed to exist in the story.

However, in early drafts of Moana, Pua the pig did go with her.

In the final product though, the directors decided they wanted Moana to be more isolated and stuck on her journey with fewer comforts, like a friendly pig. They preferred the idiot rooster. With that decision, there are apparently cute scenes we may never see that got cut from the project. It may disappoint fans of cute little animals, but the decision made sense story-wise.

6 “The Rock’s” Grandad

This little secret was actually discovered by a fan that tweeted a side-by-side comparison between Maui and Johnson’s grandad, who was High Chief Peter Maivia of Samoa. The character and the real man looked extraordinarily alike. Around that time, Johnson revealed that Maui’s character design was partly based on his grandfather.

Maivia was famous in his own right, having also been a professional wrestler and even had some Hollywood experience when he appeared as a henchmen in the James Bond film, You Only Live Twice.

Unfortunately he did not live to see the demi-god design he inspired, but Johnson put #grateful in his tweet about the similarities.