The Changing Importance Of The Polaroid Photo - Tumblr Posts

Amphibia - The Shifting Symbolism of the Polaroid

I love how the photo of the three girls is important even now and how it means something completely different to each of them. It’s outgrown the meaning it once had. The first time the audience sees that photo is in the opening where it’s stuck in a branch in the rain while lightning strikes. It’s the first hint that we get that Anne’s friendships back home weren’t as sunshine and rainbows as it initially seemed. The dynamic of the people in that photo wasn’t the healthiest despite the genuine care they clearly had for each other. That first sighting and these last ones show their respective growth.

When Sasha sees the photo in this episode she deflates. Looking at it reminds her of the old her and she’s not proud of who she was. It also reminds her of the doubt she has that she’s actually changed. It’s no longer the tether for her that it was at the beginning. She doesn’t carry it around like she used to because she is no longer dead set on returning to the way things were. She knows that can’t happen and doesn’t want it to. She wants to be better, different.

For Anne this photo is a reminder of how far they have all come. That who they were isn’t what matters but who they are now and that is punctuated by her leaving the photo inside her locker. It is always where she can find it just like the memories that they have made but they have all outgrown that old dynamic and left it behind.

For Marcy that photo is a tether. A light in the dark. She now knows that she can’t keep holding onto the past and Sasha and Anne but that doesn’t mean that what they had can’t help her through the dark times. She may leave them behind to move when she goes back to reality but those memories will always be with her. That love and care will never leave.