Penelope (Barbie)

Penelope is a supporting character from the 2002 direct-to-DVD animated Barbie film, Barbie as Rapunzel. She is Princess Rapunzel's dragon friend and sidekick.
She was voiced by , who also voiced Kim from The Care Bears Movie, Abigail Lincoln from Codename: Kids Next Door, Kitana from Mortal Kombat series, Kida Nedakh in Atlantis: The Lost Empire, Susie Carmichael from Rugrats, Penny Gadget in Inspector Gadget and Dulcy the Dragon in Sonic the Hedgehog.
==Personality==
Penelope is a nice, funny, and clumsy young dragon. She is very helpful and eager to prove her dragon abilities to her friends, her father and herself. Her father finds her lack of flying and fire-breathing skills disappointing as she is meant to be terrifying.
She is afraid of any insects, also snakes and spiders, and heights, though later she carries Rapunzel over the magic wall. Penelope feels as if her father is never happy around her, much to her dismay, and tells Hobie he never smiles around her. However, when her father says she is a real dragon, she becomes more confident in her abilities.
Penelope is polite and supportive of Rapunzel and her artwork, and she can think quickly when she and her friends are in trouble. She is also loyal to Rapunzel and tries to help her whenever she can, which contrasts Hobie, who is always more logical and reluctant. Penelope sometimes finds Hobie irritating due to him being sarcastic a lot of the time.
== Physical Appearance ==
Penelope is a young dragon, though she finds it hard to fit through human doorways and she is around Rapunzel's height. Penelope is much smaller than her father. 
She resembles him in that they are both purple, but the similarities end there; Penelope has much softer features than her father, and her scales are brighter. Penelope has large blue-green eyes and long eyelashes, and small white teeth. Her neck, chest, belly and the web of her wings are beige, and so are the horns from the top of her head to the end of her tail.
Penelope's tail is so large, she accidentally knocks things over with it from time to time. She has long arms and stumpy legs with big feet. She has three big toes on each foot, with sharp beige claws. The inside of her large ears and her palms are pink.
== History==
===Barbie as Rapunzel===
Penelope is first seen along with Hobie as Rapunzel starts painting. The rabbit soon hears Gothel coming and the two help her put away her art supplies before Gothel arrives. She and Hobie then witness Gothel's return and warn Rapunzel from the balcony that she has a paint stain on her cheek before the duo take to their heels when Otto and Gothel look towards them.
As Rapunzel prepares tea for Gothel, Penelope enthusiastically enters the room in an attempt to rekindle the fire under the kettle, only to result in a crummy flame to her despair. Rapunzel nevertheless congratulates Penelope for her effort but the dragon's enthusiasm causes her tail to waltz across the tea tray. She manages to grab a lemon while her friends grab the rest then Penelope notices the absence of the cup of tea which she grabs at the last second. Hobie is suddenly confused, causing Penelope to brag about her physical feats until the bunny tells her to turn around because a secret passage has accidentally opened up. Rapunzel enters but Penelope is reluctant because of her fear of spiders, beetles and snakes that may be inside, just to come while Hobie is giving a moral lesson that no one is listening to.
In a secret room, Penelope comes across a painting of Gothel and a man whose face was scratched off the painting, leading Penelope to think that Gothel is mad at someone and the female dragon wouldn't like to be that person. She almost sneezes after sniffing the dust that Rapunzel blows out of a box, only for the young woman to stop her sneezing here, limiting it to a throat cough. Penelope and Hobie are then dazzled by the beautiful hairbrush Rapunzel finds in the box from her parents, shortly before Hobie blows dust on Penelope and she sneezes fire on the hardwood floor. No sooner does Penelope apologize than she panics when she hears Gothel calling Rapunzel.
Later in the secret room, the trio tries to figure out the mystery behind Gothel's lies. Hobie smells deceit, only for Penelope to sarcastically respond to it, prompting Hobie to make her think there's a big hairy spider at her feet. Jumping in panic, Penelope pierces the floor with her left leg. A subterranean leading outside of the magic wall is discovered below and Rapunzel decides to go there as well as Penelope but the female is much too big to pass through the hole and briefly remains stuck until she frees her leg but falls on her butt, her tail falling on Hobie in the process. The bunny complains about his friend's clumsiness, so Penelope warns him that next time she'll run into him.
As Rapunzel wanders around the kingdom, Penelope grows paranoidly worried that she may never return, nearly shoving Hobie with her tail in her worry steps. In her panic, she asks Hobie if he can hear Gothel waking up with his acute hearing, only to hear nothing until Penelope perks up her right ear. Hobie then hears Hugo coming over here, causing Penelope to panic even more. Outside, Penelope greets her father, who isn't happy that his daughter has spent more time fooling around with Rapunzel than practicing her dragon skills and demands that she immediately show what she can do. Again, Penelope spits out a tiny fireball so Hugo wants her to fly past the magic wall, which she tries to escape for the afternoon but her father's glare forces her to begin the flight. Flapping her wings, Penelope tells herself not to look down as she closes her eyes, only for her to nearly crash to the ground in panic. Disappointed, Hugo leaves and Hobie asks Penelope if her father ever smiles, to which she replies that he never smiles when she's around.
Upon her return, Rapunzel tells her friends about her adventures today, noting her encounter with the prince Stefan, whose name a tender Penelope wants to hear but Rapunzel forgot to ask. Their good time disappears when Gothel arrives, warned by Otto of Rapunzel's whereabouts and begins to destroy her paintings and her painting materials when she refuses to believe that Rapunzel does not know the name of the young man she met, so Penelope dares to defend her only to belittle herself in front of her mistress. After Gothel nearly kills Hobie, Rapunzel asks her two friends to leave while she endures Gothel's wrath and finds herself locked in her own room turned into a tower with no stairs by the dastardly woman's magic.
A few days later, Penelope and Hobie are picking from the berries, the dragon scolding the rabbit for eating too much. She briefly has the idea of getting Rapunzel out of the tower but since she doesn't have a real plan, she stomps on the walls to paint them for her best friend. Hugo suddenly shows up and scolds his daughter for not being a creepy dragon instead of frolicking and having fun. Penelope nervously replies that she doesn't know what she wants to be later because the natural cruelty of dragons does not attract her, further accentuating Hugo's exasperation who accuses his daughter of turning her back on the code of honor of the dragons, for which she shyly apologizes to her father before he leaves again.
The duo bring the berry paint to Rapunzel and soon discover that the hairbrush has become a magic paintbrush that can create wall portals to other places and Rapunzel doesn't hesitate to go through. Later, as Penelope misses Rapunzel, Hobie warns her that Gothel is coming back and Penelope panics at what Gothel will do to her father if she finds out that Rapunzel is no more, to which Hobie claims it would be nothing more than what Hugo deserves but Penelope fears it would be really bad. Hobie suddenly encourages Penelope to walk through the paint while he delays Gothel, which she isn't sure she can do due to her lack of confidence. It's only when Hobie urges her to do so that she passes.
Penelope arrives in the palace garden and pats herself on the back before Stefan points his sword at her but Rapunzel tells him that Penelope is her friend. Stefan is confused that Rapunzel is friends with a dragon, to which an offended Penelope clarifies that she has a name before begging Rapunzel to come home with her, revealing her fear of what her father is risking. The girls use the paintbrush to craft a portal back to the tower and hide the original portal behind the wardrobe shortly before Gothel enters the room. Right away, Gothel criticizes Penelope's sympathy towards Rapunzel, coldly saying that "a foolish scared little dragon is much to worry about!", making Hugo even more angry with his daughter. Once Gothel leaves, Penelope hugs Rapunzel for having saved her father but the young woman tells Penelope that she must convince her father to leave far from Gothel.
In the evening, Penelope admires Rapunzel making dresses with the paintbrush, offering her take on how two dresses looked overdone before they got it right. Unfortunately, a Gothel who learned from Otto that Rapunzel was going to the ball bursts into the tower and suddenly cuts off Rapunzel's long hair. Hobie dares to call Gothel a despicable person, making her allow Otto to eat the rabbit but the ferret misses its prey which jumps to safety into Penelope's hands. Gothel then discovers the portal, destroys it, and accuses Penelope and Hobie of complicity with Rapunzel before ordering them out. Penelope gets stuck in the window because of her too wide hips and a weary Gothel pushes her out with a magic bolt against her rump.
The brush destroyed, Rapunzel trapped in an unbreakable magic barrier and Hugo chained by Gothel, Penelope comes to see her father but Hugo rejects her for disappointing him and resents her and Rapunzel for his humiliating situation. Later, Penelope tells Hobie that her father refuses to listen to her, so the rabbit tells her that she shouldn't be stopped by this detail. Desperate, Penelope wants Rapunzel to be by her side and Hobie asks her what she would tell her and Penelope replies that Rapunzel would tell her she loves her. Recovering courage, Penelope tries again to speak to Hugo but the furious dragon does not want her to speak to him anymore. Daring to stand up this time, Penelope tells her father that she asked Rapunzel to come back to stop Gothel from killing him, making Hugo realize how tough he was. Despite Penelope's determination to help Rapunzel, Hugo warns her that Gothel's spells cannot be broken and that the Tower Curse imprisons those with a lying heart, allowing Penelope to realize that Rapunzel never lied.
Flying over the tower, Penelope tells Rapunzel about the possibility that the spell can't hold her and Rapunzel attempts to jump out of the tower and as the dragons thought, the spell has no effect and Rapunzel lands on Penelope's back. The trio now having to stop Gothel who went to the ball, Penelope is the only one now able to cross the wall but she is still afraid. Hugo encourages his daughter to overcome her vertigo, telling her that her courage and loyalty make her a mighty dragon. Once again, Penelope finds the courage to overcome her fears and manages to pass the magic veil by flying higher than she has ever done.
At the royal palace, the trio confront Gothel before she can kill Stefan, his father the king Frederick and the king Wilhelm, Rapunzel's father. Gothel is unimpressed with Penelope's newfound confidence, seeing only a "snivelling goose" but when Otto taunts the dragon and rabbit, Penelope breathes fire at the ferret, scaring him away with cowardice. Stefan's intervention prevents Gothel from killing the three friends who then escapes, a plan intended to be put into effect. Penelope and Rapunzel ultimately trap Gothel by leading her through the portal they had previously used to return to the tower, trapping Gothel with her own spell that even she cannot break, also freeing Hugo from his chain.
Penelope later attends Rapunzel and Stefan's wedding and subsequently moves in with her father and Hobie in the palace.
== Trivia ==
* Penelope is the second dragon voiced by Cree Summer.
* Gothel usually badmouths Penelope with fat bird names.
* A recurring running gag is that Penelope gets stuck in confined spaces because of her larger than human build, much like she accidentally knocks Hobie over with her tail repeatedly.
* It was unknown of where was Penelope's mother, possibly she's divorced from Hugo. She wasn't even seen or mentioned during the movie.
==Navigation==
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