Prince Hans

**Prince Hans of the Southern Isles** is the main antagonist of *Frozen*. He is the youngest of thirteen sons, burdened with the inability to ascend his family's throne in the Southern Isles. Desperate for power and recognition, his goal is to rule and become the king of Arendelle kingdom.

Prince Hans is loosely based on the Devil Troll Mirror and the Prince from the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale *The Snow Queen*.

## Background

Hans is the 13th prince from the Kingdom of the Southern Isles (a neighboring kingdom of Arendelle) and the youngest of the thirteen brothers born from the King and Queen of the desolate kingdom. Much of Hans' past was explored in the novel *A Frozen Heart*; throughout his early years, Hans received a concerning amount of emotional and physical abuse at the hands of his brothers, who treated him with minimal care due to being the youngest child of the clan. One brother, Lars, treated Hans with considerable difference and was apparently the only sibling in whom the thirteenth prince felt comfortable enough to trust and confide.

Hans' father, the commanding King of the Southern Isles, believed that the strong should pick on the weak, so in his eyes, his eldest sons bullying Hans was a show of strength. So while he admired his elder sons (especially the oldest) he thought little of Hans and viewed his youngest son with disgust and distrust. He was widely neglectful of Hans, going so much as to unabashedly acknowledge his lack of interest in his son's presence during family and diplomatic gatherings. Hans' mother, the Queen, was much more loving towards her son and would act as his only true motivation towards concealing his discomfort during family gatherings. Nevertheless, Hans grew to despise his family, specifically the majority of his brothers. He was still hopeful, however, of someday earning his father's respect; not only for the sake of being loved by his parent but to also be the appointed heir to the Southern Isles' throne. With such fantasies seeming impossible, especially due to being the thirteenth in line for the crown, Hans (with some influence by Lars) concocted a scheme to marry into monarchy elsewhere. Should such an ambition succeed, he could escape his abusive family and finally prove himself as someone worthy of being a king.

After receiving word that Princess Elsa was scheduled to be crowned queen, and with no betrothed suitors, Hans sets his sights on the neighboring kingdom of Arendelle. With Elsa turning out to be an antisocial recluse, however, Hans instead targeted her lonely, less mature younger sister, Princess Anna. After his marriage to Anna, as the plan would go, Hans would kill Elsa and be crowned king thereafter.

## *Frozen*

Hans meet Anna for the first time at the docks with his horse. He meets her again at the coronation party after keeping her from falling. While they dated around the castle, Hans "proposes" to Anna. However, Queen Elsa disapproved of the idea of their marriage due to the fact that they just met. After an argument, Elsa runs off and accidentally sets an eternal winter. When Anna goes off to find Elsa, she leaves Hans in charge. After briefly arguing with the Duke of Weselton, Anna's horse runs back to Arendelle, and this leads Hans to round up some volunteers to come with him to the North Mountains to rescue Anna. After a fierce battle with Elsa's colossal bodyguard, Marshmallow, Hans succeeds in capturing Elsa. In the castle dungeon, he convinces Elsa to stop the winter, but she tells him she can't. However, when Anna's heart is frozen and she is brought to Hans to receive a kiss from him, just before the kiss he pulls back and says, "Oh Anna. If only there was someone out there who loved you."

He then reveals his true motives: Hans wooed Anna for the purpose of marrying into a royal family and becoming king, because he has no chance of inheriting the throne of the Southern Isles as thirteenth in line. Instead of saving Anna's life, he deliberately leaves her to die. Hans sentences Elsa with a death charge, but Elsa's powers become strong enough for her to break out of the castle dungeon and escape. Later, when the two sisters are outside in an uncontrollable blizzard caused by Elsa, Hans confronts the queen. She asks him to take care of Anna, and Hans goes as far as to lie to her that Anna was killed by her magic. While Elsa is busy grieving her sister's death, Hans prepares to finish her by striking her with his sword when Anna leaps in front of Hans just before freezing solid to save Elsa. The recoil from hitting the frozen Anna was enough to shatter the sword and knock Hans unconscious. Anna's sacrifice also allowed Elsa to realize that it was love that could reverse her devastating ice powers and revive Anna. Hans awakens to find that the eternal winter has ended, and is shocked when he sees Anna alive and well, since he thought her heart had been frozen. Anna walks over to Hans, and, telling him that the only frozen heart was his and knocks him off the boat they're standing on. Afterwards, he is put in the brig on a ship and sent back to his own kingdom to face his brothers for his behavior in Arendelle.

Hans makes a brief appearance near the end of *Frozen Fever.* Part of his punishment is revealed to be working at the royal stables of the Southern Isles, shoveling manure.

When Elsa sneezes into an oversized bugle horn, a giant snowball is launched from Arendelle, all the way to the Southern Isles, where it nails Hans right into a cart of manure, burying and humiliating him as the horses take notice of this and laugh at him, much to his annoyance.

In *Frozen II,* Hans is mentioned and alluded to several times. His actions (more specifically, his crimes against Anna) are the subject of ridicule by the other characters. During a game of charades, Anna acts out the role of a villain, prompting Olaf to guess Hans. This leads to rounds of insults by Olaf, Elsa, and Kristoff at the prince's expense. Later, Anna recounts having to save Elsa from Hans while trying to convince Elsa not to go alone on the journey into the Enchanted Forest, in which she refers to him as her ex-boyfriend. Later, when meeting the Northuldra, Olaf introduces the group by recounting the events of the first *Frozen*, including the part where Hans betrays Anna. This comes as a great shock to Lieutenant Mattias. Finally, when Elsa is traversing Ahtohallan, snowy manifestations of figures from Elsa's life appear. Upon seeing Hans's depiction, Elsa gives a look of disgust and uses her powers to crumble the figure.

### Personality

Hans is a proud and extremely ambitious prince with a hunger for admiration and chivalrous honor. Despite his desirable appearance and seemingly opulent background, Hans is a victim of severe abuse at the hands of his brothers. This troubled upbringing developed Hans into a remorseless man, bent on bettering his life by acquiring power and the respect that comes along with it.

Hans is a physical representation of a silent killer. With a noble demeanor, he presents himself as someone others can trust and confide—a best friend, a significant other, or a reputable authority figure. By establishing himself as someone of virtue, Hans is able to observe his opponents and examine their deepest insecurities, which he would later use against them as a means of advancing his goals. These false impressions won over Anna, and the entirety of Arendelle, thus allowing Hans to seize the throne without giving any premonition of regicide.

Hans has several motivating factors to his schemes. Firstly, he has a selfish sense of entitlement, remorselessly believing it is his right to be king even if it means usurping someone else's throne. Secondly, he genuinely craves respect and recognition, having been denied both as a child. Lastly, Hans is power-hungry as he covets kingship and gets a twisted sense of pleasure from having someone's submission—as was the case with a vulnerable and deathly ill Anna.

Hans' most powerful asset is quite possibly his vast intelligence and incredible ability to lie, dissemble, and manipulate. He is proven to be quick-thinking, resourceful, and extremely diligent. However, unlike many Disney villains, Hans constantly has to change his plot accordingly with the shifting events that take place in the film without letting loose his villainous nature. This is indeed an interesting challenge for a Disney villain to tackle, thus adding to his level of intelligence, as he comes dangerously close to achieving his goal in spite of unstable circumstances.

Cold and cruel, Hans has a sympathetic origin, but lacks any characteristics one could call redeeming. Instead, he apathetically views others as mere stepping stones to his grand plans, and will callously lie, cheat, and kill his way into a position of sole power, regardless of the casualties made along the way.

## Trivia

* Hans is voiced by Santino Fontana.
* Hans shares similarities with Gaston from *Beauty and the Beast*, Turbo/King Candy from *Wreck-It Ralph*, and Lord Victor Quartermaine from *Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit* as they believe themselves to be heroes, and intend to kill their "ugly", "monstrous", "abusive", "mean", "cruel", "hateful", and "nasty" foes.
* Hans become Thomas and Twilight Sparkle's enemy in *Thomas and Twilight Sparkle Gets Frozen.*
* Hans will get revenge on Thomas, Twilight and their friends in Thomas and Twilight Sparkle's Adventures Series.

## Gallery

Hans with AnnaHans with ElsaHans with the Duke of WeseltonHans revealing his true colorsHans's defeatHans in Frozen FeverHans in Frozen 2