Edna Mode

Edna "E" Mode is one of the minor characters in The Incredibles.

The Incredibles
Edna is a half-Japanese, half-German, short fashion designer and auteur. She is known for calling everyone "dahling" ("darling"). She is very talented and as demanding of others as she is of herself.

Edna first appears attending the wedding of Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl, sitting on the frontmost bench of the chapel between Rick Dicker to her left and Gazerbeam to her right.

Edna has created custom-made original outfits for superheroes since the "glory days", saying that she used to design for gods. It is apparent that she feels infinitely superior to all other designers in the world and shows much disregard towards runway boutiques and modern fashion models, claiming that she had gone to Milan to design clothing for the supermodels, and called them "spoiled, stupid little stick-figures with poofy lips who think only about themselves".

Edna is called out of a 15-year period of imposed retirement to repair damage to Bob's super-suit, and ends up producing a series of completely new, matching outfits for the entire Parr family. For safety reasons, she is very insistent on not including capes in the new design (recalling the cape accidents of Thunderhead, Stratogale, Meta Man, Dynaguy and Splashdown), mainly because any superhero who had a cape got killed or trapped.

Later, when Bob's wife Helen discovers that a rip of his super-suit has been mended, she suspects Edna. She contacts Edna, wanting to talk about the suit, and Edna insists that she come see her almost immediately. Helen goes to Edna's mansion, where Edna reveals that she has designed super-suits for the entire family, adding that each suit is equipped with a homing device. As Helen desperately wants to find out her husband's whereabouts, Edna hands her a device that gives her his exact location. When Helen finds out that Bob is on a faraway island, she breaks down in tears, in fear that she is losing the man she loves. Edna then whacks Helen on her head with a newspaper, demanding that she pull herself together, go confront the troubles he is facing, fight, and win, now that she knows where he is.

The Incredibles in a Magic Kingdom Adventure
Edna stars in the Disney on Ice play, Disney Presents Pixar's The Incredibles in a Magic Kingdom Adventure. She somehow anticipates an emergency at the Walt Disney World Resort (the Parrs chose to go there after their initial vacation plans were foiled by Mother Nature). Then, she hears about a robotic version of Syndrome interrupting the Main Street Parade and holding Mickey and Minnie Mouse hostage.

When the Parrs arrive to become the Incredibles, Edna tells them that she had heard all about the incident and then monologues about how "ridiculous" Syndrome's homemade super-suit looks.

After the day is saved, Edna goes with the Incredibles and Frozone to see the Enchanted Tiki Room (Helen wanted the family to go to the Room first, but her idea was rejected by the rest of the family). It is revealed in this play that Edna has a trio of comical assistants who apparently are supers themselves -- as evidenced when one of them is flattened in an ironing machine and recovers without getting hurt.

Behind the scenes
Director Brad Bird has stated that he intended E to be a combination fashion maven/gadget builder along the lines of 'Q' from the James Bond movies. The character, who presented the Best Costume Design Oscar at the 2004 Academy Awards, along with Pierce Brosnan, is voiced by Bird himself.

Some believe that Edna is based on the real-life fashion designer Edith Head and possibly Mary Quant. However Brad Bird stated on Twitter that E wasn't based on Edith Head, furthermore saying that "People from MANY countries [...] were convinced I based E on a local icon". Her name refers to EMode, a small piece of custom design software used by Pixar (not related to other similarly-named software). Calling the character "Mode" is also certainly a pun on the French and German word for Fashion. Also, her hairstyle, personality, and appearance at European fashion shows may be a vague connection to Vogue super-editor and fashion force Anna Wintour.

Others believe that this character may be based on Costume designer Una Jones, who shares not only in physical appearance with the character, but also in personality. Jones is also acquaintances with many Pixar staff, as she lives near Orlando, in central Florida.

Edna's hairstyle, ultra-diminutive stature and facial features also resemble actress Linda Hunt's fashion editor character Regina Krumm, in Robert Altman's 1994 film Prêt-à-Porter. Her catchphrase of "dahling" may be a reference to actress Tallulah Bankhead.

Due to her astonishing talent with fabric and fashion design—for example, the minimum width of Elastigirl is stated as 1 mm on the National Supers Agency file on the special edition DVD, her supersuit is missile-proof, resistant to temperature extremes, can stretch as far as she can (without injuring herself) and still retain its shape, and breathes like Egyptian cotton—she herself may have some minor mental super ability.

Role

 * In addition to Brad Bird, Edna is voiced by the following actors and actresses:
 * Thuraya Ibrahim in the Arabic version (female)
 * Favio Posca in the Argentinian version (male)
 * Nadia Carvalho in the Brazilian Portuguese version (female)
 * Eric Kot in the Cantonese version (male)
 * Emma Penella in the Castilian Spanish version (female)
 * Jiří Strach in the Czech version (male)
 * Paul Haenen in the Dutch version (male)
 * Anu Lamp in the Estonian version (female)
 * Amanda Lear in the French and Italian versions (female)
 * Mechthild Großmann in the German version (female)
 * Halász Aranka in the Hungarian version (female)
 * Tetsuo Goto in the Japanese version (male)
 * Dario T. Pie in the Latin American version (male)
 * Olga "Kora" Jackowska in the Polish version (female)
 * Zuzana Kronerová in the Slovak version (female)
 * Ewa Fröling in the Swedish version (female)
 * Asif Ali Baig in the Indian version (male)
 * In the Disney on Ice live show A Magic Kingdom Adventure, Edna is played by Pia Airaksinen and voiced by Kevin Delaney. Edna's comedic assistants are played by Shae Green, Kristian Ryan, and Richard Stringer.
 * Brad Bird says that he had approached Lily Tomlin as the voice of Edna, but when he demonstrated the voice he was looking for, Tomlin suggested that he did well enough to perform himself.

Bonus content

 * In the special features section of the special edition DVD of The Incredibles, Edna is "interviewed" about her work in the film. When asked whether working with superheroes was difficult, she replies, "Superheroes are easy, dahling. Mediocrity is much more difficult to work with -- and it is in such great supply."

Cameos

 * An animated Edna (voiced live by Brad Bird) presented Best Costume Design -- with Pierce Brosnan -- at the 77th Annual Academy Awards.

Trivia

 * She is one of the few female characters voiced by a male, as Brad Bird is male. However, she is voiced by actresses in some foreign language versions of The Incredibles.
 * Her surname, Mode, directly translates to "Fashion" in German.