So one of the message of the film is "Forgive Toxic family members"

No, the message is "don't let your overbearing grandmother ruin your life because she ruined her own"

Mirabelle healed the family that was broken, if she let her grandmother turn her into a toxic familiy member then her grandomother would have won, because her grandmother always saw Mirabelle as the problem.

Emotional healing is a good thing, if you only harbor hate for your family then you become the toxic family member.

It wouldn't be very Disney at all, but kind of refreshing if it was that cynical.

This was very much the message of the film. Her super power was overcoming family toxicity...somehow...even though one of her grandma's own kids was literally locked in a tower for years and kept apart from the rest of the family for no good reason. Also being friends with a living house cause, um, yay to being friends with the house you were treated like garbage in your whole life and not actual people - except for children who don't understand family trauma yet and just think, oh cool a magical house!

I definitely think it would have been a much more satisfying ending if Mirabel left and then either established an amazing life on her own merit, or else discovered her actual power, and her family came to visit her to see her doing well in life without them. Like, does no one realize this is a grown woman living with her family, whose only friends are children - almost none of whom are in her own family? The fact that everything about her that's magical is just her being a nurturer and putting up with bs is kinda sad.

Actually, the message of the movie was "It's so HARD to be part of the elite!".

I'm not joking, that was the story at the heart of the film. That being part of the elite that has powers the rest of the villagers do not means responsibility and no chance to be yourself, and that the worst thing that can happen is that a couple of family members don't measure and are excluded. And at the "happy ending" the elites let the non-elites rebuild their house and get their powers back, and concluded that from now on, they'd concentrate on making themselves happy and worry less about their responsibilities to the non-elites.

This movie is beautiful, it had great animation, a likable heroine, and a unique colorful look, but I hated it it. It should have ended with the loss of powers and being accepted as equals by the community, but the dirtbag Hollywood suits who make these decisions seem to think that happiness is being elite and selfish.

I know I am a few years late here, but I got around to finally watch "Coco" with my niece.
Obviously, it is very easy to make comparisons to "Encanto" as they tell notably similar Latin American stories.
And I started to think about how much they both focus on "la familia".
And I don't mean just parents and siblings here, but it's the grandparents, uncles, aunts and cousins as well.
To a person from an Occidental country, this might feel over the top or even alien.
As I happen to come from Sweden and belong to a culture with smaller less tight-knit family units, I do get that.
But I started to think about this thread and how nobody has brought up this aspect:
People from a less family-based culture might sneer at this story and say something like "la familia, my *ss".
But obviously, that is not what a sweet Colombian girl like Mirabel would do even if her grandmother is wrong.
Even if she has to give Abuela an angry speech, she has to mention her love for her family in the same breath.
It is only natural I guess to act that way when you grow up in a big extended family household.
It makes you feel a duty to protect everybody in the house.
And obviously, leaving the family simply never is an option for Mirabel.
She's now fully aware of how Bruno was smeared and knows that it didn't lead to anything good.
Even after she disappears over the night, she returns the next day and helps the family rebuild their home.

It is kind of the same thing, that we can see in "Coco".
Miguel grows up in a tight-knit Latin American extended family household too.
But he got angry enough to say that he didn't care about the ofrenda and didn't want to be a part of his family.
Which made his whole family gasp in horror just to show us how taboo this must be in Mexico.
And still, Miguel is later on prepared to (try to) give up his dreams of becoming a musician to return to his family.
I don't believe that he could have stopped playing music, and that is fortunately not how the story ends either.
However, it is clear that the message is that he would become unhappy if he hadn't embraced his family.
And we can see in "Encanto" what happens if you truly become a "black sheep" in a Latin American country.
Bruno clearly had a strained relationship with his family, but he still loved them and didn't want to leave them.
He didn't go into hiding before he thought that he had to do so to protect Mirabel from his mother's wrath.
It is clear though that him leaving his family without an explanation turned most of the community against him.
For it looks like you can't do that in a small town in Colombia without suffering the consequences for it.
People must have felt bad though when they realized that Bruno only did it as a sacrifice for his little niece...

Hector in "Coco" is another example of what happens if you disappear from your family without an explanation.
Your name will be smeared until most people no longer know the truth about who you really are/were.
And in "Coco", you die a second death when the last person who remembers you dies or forgets about you.
It is true that the outcasts can stick together as friends while they wait for their last moments to come.
But still, you don't really want that final death to happen to you if you can help it.
And in the end, Miguel managed to save himself and Hector from that fate by healing the family.
But it was a close call with Hector, since Coco had become senile and was losing her memories of him...
"Encanto" decided to deal with the same issue in a slightly more subtle way.
But we can see how Julieta refers to her brother Bruno disappearing as him losing "his way in this family".
This is yet again clearly a culture, where you're expected to belong to a family and never leave it.
And now, Julieta is really scared that her daughter Mirabel might be the next Madrigal to become an outcast...
It is admittedly later shown that living as a hermit for ten years hasn't been too good mentally for Bruno.
However, you can tell that he couldn't leave his family entirely and start a new life away from them.
Bruno had to be lonely and unhappy or return to them, with no third option available for him.
Luckily, they want him back as soon as they see him again and show him that they have missed him.
Abuela and Pepa had been angry with Bruno, but it was because they were hurt by his "disappearance".
They believed that he didn't care about them and were just happy to be proven wrong.
And I just love that there still were pictures of Bruno on display in at least three different places.
As much as his family didn't talk about him, that is proof that that they had never stopped wanting him to return.
Hector in "Coco" wasn't even given that much until his daughter revealed that she had kept a photo of him...

(Continued...)

That said, it is notable that both Mirabel and Miguel feel like they're outsiders within their own families.
It is often the "odd ones", who will become protagonists since they make things happen and get a story to tell.
But also, they have to show the rest of the family that they need a change too and must stop their toxic behavior.
It is not like the writers behind these stories deny that every individual has their own needs and dreams.
So they won't tell us that your family should control your life and make all your decisions for you.
Miguel in "Coco" is allowed to become a musician after all when Imelda finally relents.
And seriously, that boy is a prodigy and couldn't and shouldn't have to live without music anyway.
Thus, they had to let him embrace his talents or watch him become very unhappy in the future.
And in "Encanto", it is finally possible for Mirabel's sisters to stop pleasing other people all the time.
Luisa can be strong and still relax sometimes, and Isabela won't have to marry a man that she doesn't want.
However, it is clear that the characters won't get a happy ending by rejecting their families.
So I guess that the message is that you must find a balance between being yourself and honoring "la familia"?
But also, it is important for the matriarchs to realize their mistakes and learn to love the kids unconditionally.
And as for Mirabel, I don't believe that she ever asked for more than feeling that she belongs in her family.
Or as she puts it when she talks to Bruno about it: her goal is to make her family proud of her just once!
And gradually, it is revealed that she's the one to get everybody else to talk to her and make them start healing.
She happens to also be the one to bring the magic back and most likely is their next leader.
That is her role and her future, and we can tell that she's only happy to take on that responsibility.
She is after all the girl, who decides to risk her life to try to save the candle.
She has no personal gain to get from that since she has no magic gift, but does it anyway for her family...

Besides, it is not like my points from my previous posts don't still stand.
Mirabel doesn't have problems with any family members except for Isabela and Abuela.
So I don't see how her rejecting especially her parents and Luisa and Antonio would have been fair.
They love her even if the family is dysfunctional.
And also, we should remember that Mirabel is only fifteen years old.
So as much as she can be wise beyond her years, I don't feel that she should have to make it on her own yet.
Besides, I don't see where she could have gone when the encanto was isolated from the rest of the world.
Remember that Bruno who was forty years old didn't get further than hiding behind the walls in his family home.
It is true that we don't know if he tried to climb the mountains and failed or if he never even tried.
However, it is clear that there were many reasons why leaving your family was almost impossible in "Encanto".
Besides, Mirabel had to stay and heal her family and make even Isabela and Abuela talk and accept her again.
How would that have happened if she had left?
So again, there are plenty of reasons why the characters in "Encanto" have to stay where they are.
But we must realize that "la familia" clearly is very important in Latin America.
Really, you can see that Bruno was stopped by the mountains from leaving the encanto as a metaphor.
It is like his love for his family and their love for him were mountains, which protected him from harm...
Miguel in "Coco" is only twelve years old and even younger than Mirabel, but takes on a similar role as she does.
So he must not only save Hector, but he must also heal his family and stop their toxic behavior.
That is why he's not allowed to reject them despite his understandable anger with them earlier in the story...

Now, I have to point out that I can't fully get the Latin American concept of "la familia" either.
Especially, it is hard for me to understand why Miguel in "Coco" is prepared to (try to) give up music.
It is clearly presented within the story as honorable and heart-warming.
But I can only think "how will you being unhappy to please your toxic great-great-grandmother be a good thing?"
However, it is clear that calling an ofrenda stupid and saying that you don't want your family is terrible in Mexico.
So I guess that this was deemed necessary because Miguel had to learn a lesson about honoring his family.
Which makes no sense to me, but I can only be glad that Imelda relented and blessed Miguel without conditions.
And in "Encanto", it is made clear that "la familia" is equally important in Colombia.
So it makes sense that the characters in these stories do things, which might feel weird to me and you...

I saw a different message. That was an unhappy family. Most of them (Isabela, Luisa, Bruno, Dolores and Pepa) were trying to live up to other people's expectations. Mirabel was the one who turned things around for them and allowed them to live the lives they really wanted. People in the community also got a chance to give back after being the ones to profit from the family's magic for so many years.

I just want to point out that most of the people who want to cut off "toxic family members", supposedly to preserve their own mental health, are in fact toxic themselves.

I call it "The weaponization of mental health".