Lilo calling the girls who all clearly hate her guts her "friends" because they're the only peers she has any association with is unfortunately a relatable sentiment. I didn't have any real "friends" in school but "people I hang around who tolerate my presence" was basically the same thing to me as a young autistic child

23:14 While undescribed, it was implied by Lilo that her parents died in a car accident during a rain storm. Which is how a lot of fans of the movie (myself included) have kind of accepted the head-canon that Lilo feeds Pudge the fish and is convinced he controls the weather. As long as she makes her peanut butter sandwich offering, no bad weather will come to the island. In the opening scene after she feeds him, you can actually see what looks like storm clouds receding in the background. We of course don't know when her parents died or when she started doing this, and if it coincides with a missed feeding of Pudge, but yeah. A sort of pattern recognition on Lilo's part which is a common trait of nuerodivergiant people as well. But yeah, just a little fandom fun fact lol.

"Oh cool a Lilo & Stitch video."
(First minute he talks about parents murdering their neurodivergent kids)
"Well that escalated quickly."

21:26 I love how you actually explained why neurodivergent enjoy animated films, rather than just saying is a child-like thing that neurodivergent people enjoy.

Naming animators alongside the voice actors? That's a subscribe.

The way I gasped when you pointed out Elvis is Lilo's hyperfixation. Like. It's so obvious but I'd never processed it before???

So the heart wrenching pain of abandonment I feel when I hear Aloha 'Oe is also based on a song that's contextually a generational Hawaiian anthem of heartbreak caused by imperialism... Cool, cool, fine, I'm not crying in the streets watching this

I watched this movie with my 5 year old neice after child services placed her with my mother, and she said “stitch wants to be good but he can’t.” She has had a lot of trouble at school. It was hard for me to hide my tears from her ngl.

This might make me cry. Lilo and stitch is such an important film to me and as a child I always related to lilo, I later realized I was neurodivergent and it made me hold this movie even dearer to my heart.

Anyways my special interest is language learning and roller coaster

The ugly duckling scene still sticks with me, Stitch when we hear Jumba’s explanation about how he was built to destroy and knows nothing else, and him slowly seeing the value of family. But at the same time is still lost and leaves thinking that he doesn’t deserve lilo, so he fallows the story and admits what he really is “I’m lost.”

I did never link Lilo & Stitch to autism myself (I am autistic), but looking back, it makes sense. Lilo acts different from the other kids and Stitch is an alien from another planet. And they start bonding, because they're both different.

And maybe we should ask ourselves: who else in history might have been autistic without us knowing?

As someone "diagnosed" in their 30s, I feel that last rant. I always knew something was wrong with me, but didn't know what. Hell, my parents KNEW something was different about me since before I was 2. They asked my pediatrician and he basically said "I wouldn't recommend going down that road. If his idiosyncrasies aren't negativity affecting him, and it's easy to work around them, there's no point of labeling him. That wouldn't be best for him".  Because remember, the late 80s-early 90s were still not kind to those with developmental disorders. Although it would've been nice to know this story before I was 33 and questioning everything about my life

29:11 Remember how in the remake, Nani gives Lilo over to be raised by another family to go to UCSD. Pepperidge Farm remembers

Chris Sanders is the king of "I am different and just want to belong" movies; Lilo and Stitch, How to Train Your Dragon, the Croods, and Wild Robot, just off the top of my head. I'm really glad he was given the chance with L&S, because the other three are near and dear to my heart, Wild Robot doubly so now that I'm going to be a mom.

This was the first proper movie I showed my kids when they were 3. When the aliens took Lilo away, they were absolutely terrified. They had no concept that in movies like this, she's going to end up fine. As far as they were concerned, she would never see her family again. We considered turning it off, but they couldn't not see her get back to her sister (which only takes a few minutes of run time).

It is, to this day, one of my daughters' favorite movie. She is probably going to write about it for a project she's working on now for high school.

I think part of why she loves it so much is that she struggles with ADHD and in many ways identifies with Stitch.

lilo calling her bullying peers her “friends” always hits me hard, because that was me at summer camp in the early 2010s.




it was a special camp for disabled kids (i’m t1d) and the girls in my cabin bullied me relentlessly for not being up to date on the latest trends (i didn’t have a phone or money to buy teen magazines), being into the wrong music (1d and 5sos are mid at best to kids who grew up on iron maiden) and reading too much (god forbid a bitch be an undiagnosed autistic). i still went back, though. twice. it was the only place i went where people understood the struggles of living day to day with a lifelong disability and i wouldn’t be excluded from group activities for being too hard to care for. it gave my mom a much-needed break from being my primary caregiver and the main person managing my insulin and blood sugar. i felt terrible when i had to leave halfway through my third year, because i knew my parents weren’t getting their money’s worth, but i had been harassed and ridiculed to the point where my only friend was one of the adult counselors, and then chased, sobbing, into a bathroom for reasons i can’t fully remember. i wasn’t allowed to close the door of the stall so i could take time for myself to decompress because that would apparently be a safety violation or something, and thus Could Not Calm Myself Down. i was still hysterical when my mom came in  to pick me up, and she was able to actually help me regulate, but i remember sneering when the camp’s director said i would still be welcome back the next year, because in my mind, i hadn’t even been welcome that year. the girls in my cabin made sure i knew that.

i never went back. when i came out as trans, i considered it for a hot second, but knew that the odds of the boys being nicer were slim to none. no swan-returnal-denouement for me, thank you very much.

RIP Daveigh Chase
This one’s for her and everything her characters stood for.

Speaking as someone in their 30s who was diagnosed with neurodivergence a few short years ago, after what's felt like a lifetime of being an outsider and not understanding why.
As of late, I've been stuck with chronic burnout cycle for weeks now. So believe me when I say, I really needed this today ❤

20:06 she feeds the fish that day is more of a trauma response.  on that day her parents died in car accident because of a storm. and she take a photo of tourists as a response of a tourist taking pictures of locals as they are part of attraction

As a person with autism, you last comment broke me. I have struggled with thoughts that would partially be classed as internalised ableism. I can’t exactly recall why I have them but I can take a guess or two. To express my emotions in a healthy way, I write poems and write my poems through metaphor and meaning. Last night was the first poem I had not finished. It was one I called “Normal” and I just went on an on about because the world and I were different .
Now when I heard your final comment, I had heard something I already knew but desperately needed to hear and I cried.

I am not broken. I am not wrong. I am good enough and I deserve to love and be loved. And anyone who thinks otherwise, they’re the one with no empathy. Not me or anyone like me or different than me.

To my fellow Autistic and other neurodivergent people. You are enough. You are trying your best and you make the best of the life you have. The world is crud at times and there’s just that one noise that’s too loud or perhaps that light that’s too bright or that smell that’s too pungent or maybe none or all at the same time because we are all different. That’s why it’s called “Autistic Spectrum Disorder” or the “Neurodivergent *Spectrum*.

You are beautiful, you are loved, and don’t let anyone else tell you otherwise.