It's been standard for most of Disney's live-action remakes to run for at least two hours. "Aladdin" and "Beauty and the Beast" expanded outward into two-hour live-action films compared to their trim animated counterparts. Added scenes and new songs definitely pad out runtimes and add extra value to those who have the original movies memorized.
So it is with "The Little Mermaid," which contains brand-new songs co-crafted by Lin Manuel Miranda and Alan Menken, the latter of whom wrote the music for the 1989 film. Per the official soundtrack listing, that will include tracks such as "Wild Uncharted Waters," "For the First Time," and "The Scuttlebutt" — a rap number for Scuttle (Awkwafina) and Sebastian (Daveed Diggs). Notable, for the first time, Prince Eric (Jonah Hauer-King) will have a solo song in a production of "The Little Mermaid." That's definitely adding something brand-new to Ursula's (Melissa McCarthy) bag of tricks.
