Reworking Myth: Institutional Authority and Negotiated Legitimacy in Nezha 2.

This article examines how Nezha 2, a contemporary Chinese animated film, revisits classical mythology to foreground institutional authority and contested belonging. Drawing on multimodal critical discourse analysis, the analysis follows how institutional authority is materialized at symbolic, narrative, and cultural levels. Visual, sonic, and linguistic cues make the normalized process of classification and exclusion visible. Multiple storylines expose how authority is worked through procedures and rules that look impartial, yet tie prejudice to institutional practice and personal fate. The film reworks traditional Chinese myth to transform legitimacy from an unquestioned divine order into a questionable institutional arrangement. Heroism, in turn, shifts from rebellion to negotiation within relational bonds. This paper shows that an animation film can be a site where institutional authority, identity formation, and cultural belonging are critically reimagined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]