Turning Red ending explained: Does Mei finally tame her Panda? 

Pixar's Turning Red, Domee Shi's latest direction, is a wonderful coming-of-age film, all about adolescence, transformation, and growing up. The film beautifully captures the struggles of the teenage years, portraying the relationship between a parent and a child at a crucial stage of life, as both learn to let go and accept their individual identities.

Turning Red revolves around the story of a 13-year-old Chinese-Canadian Mei and her wonderful 'curse' that finally liberates her and allows her to become her own person. The animated feature was released today on Disney+.

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What is Turning Red all about?

Turning Red opens by introducing viewers to Mei, a nerdy, high-achieving middle-schooler living in Toronto in the early 2000s. Her life is just like any other teenage girl. She has to juggle her social life while remaining faithful and true to her mother, Ming, whom she adores and fears.

Like a perfect daughter, she brings home the best results and devotes time to helping her mother manage their family business, running the oldest temple in Toronto. But that does not stop her from crushing on boys, fangirling over bands, and hanging out with her friends.

However, things start changing when Mei wakes up one day after a particularly turbulent nightmare, only to discover that she has transformed into a giant red panda. Mei tries to keep it a secret but fails miserably, creating an awkward and dangerous situation that affects the whole city.

It turns out that Mei's family carries a blessing/curse. Every woman in her family turns into pandas during their emotional high, and Mei is no exception. But there is a cure to the curse. On the red moon, a specific ritual needs to be performed that will capture the spirit of the panda, allowing Mei to live a normal life.

Meanwhile, Mei finds a lucrative way to operationalize her panda. She begins to see the panda not as a source of embarrassment but as an advantage, and with the help of her friends, she starts a business that brings them a small fortune that would allow them to go to the 4-Town concert.

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Turning Red ending explained

As the date of the ritual begins clashing with the concert date, Mei has a fallout with her friends. She goes back to being her mother's perfect daughter and agrees to undergo the ritual. But things started going horribly wrong. Amidst the ritual, Mei decides to turn around and defies her mother's words. This triggered her stern mother, who never expected her daughter's defiance, and her own inner panda is unleashed.

Ming's panda is a sight to behold. She is not simply big. She is gigantic, and she storms through the city in search of her daughter, destroying half of Toronto. Ming must be tamed before she wrecks more havoc, and the shaman is again called upon to perform the ritual so that she can be turned back.

Mei and the rest of the family team up to control the enraged panda, and eventually, Ming is transported into another portal where the transformation will take place. There, Mei finds her mother, broken down and crying as she apologizes to her daughter, accepting her faults. A brief family reunion takes place between the women of the family, and eventually, Ming is turned back while Mei decides to keep her panda.

In the final scene of Turning Red, Mei's panda reunites with her ancestor Sun Lee, who reassures her that her 'inner beast' was not something dangerous and to be kept imprisoned. It is all about learning to control the good and bad within oneself, which Mei has mastered.