Why Mushu's Songs Didn't End Up In Mulan
One of the best things about Disney's animated "Mulan" is its phenomenal soundtrack. Whether you're crooning to the inspiring "Reflection, or belting it out to the empowering (if also slightly insulting) "I'll Make a Man Out of You," the songs in "Mulan" have it all. And truly, nothing really brings a room together more than a sing-a-long in which everyone is belting at the top of their lungs, "You must be swift as a coursing river! With all the force of a great typhoon!" It is truly one of my greatest disappointments that the live-action "Mulan" decided to forgo the singing for a slightly more serious take on the story of Hua Mulan, but such is life, I suppose.
While the songs in the original animated version of the story are nothing but killer, there are two that never made it into the film, and both songs were supposed to be sung by everyone's favorite mischievous dragon, Mushu.
Mushu says, 'No!'
That's right, Mushu was set to sing two songs in the film, but they had to be cut simply because Eddie Murphy, who voiced the feisty dragon, did not want to sing them. One of the songs that was eventually cut from the film was titled, "Keep 'Em Guessing." It featured a spirited Mushu giving Mulan advice on how to make sure no one guessed that she was actually a woman disguised as a male soldier. According to Cinema Blend, one of the lyricists for "Mulan," David Zippel, described the process of writing this song saying, "We wrote three different versions of it. But that's because we didn't understand at that point that it wasn't that [Eddie Murphy] wasn't liking our songs, he just didn't want to sing in the film."
I'm guessing this was fairly maddening for the musicians working to make the soundtrack for "Mulan," but if Eddie Murphey didn't want to sing, he wasn't going to sing! Which honestly, is totally cool. Mushu is still a great addition to the film! But, the fact that Mushu doesn't sing throughout the entirety of "Mulan" is a little strange when you consider most Disney films that feature some kind of animal sidekick — I'm thinking Zazu in "The Lion King" or Sebastian in "The Little Mermaid" — typically give them their moment in the spotlight to really belt one out. While it's unfortunate that Murphy could not be swayed into lending his pipes to the "Mulan" soundtrack, thankfully the film still has plenty of other great tunes to commit to memory.