>>88097331Nope. Tamatoa being like Bowie was born out of Lin Manuel Miranda wanting to do a tribute after his death.
>>88097411Tamatoa wasn't originally in the story, no. At first, the realm of the monsters was actually going to be more or less the underworld--Moana was supposed to be there at a moment in the story when she was in deep despair, and she would meet her ancestors and they were going to help her rise up--figuratively and literally--out of the depths. It was eventually decided that the story needed Maui and Moana to have a bonding moment, and the realm of the dead became the realm of monsters. The crappy screencap of the art book flip through has a storyboard of this original concept. This moment was eventually moved and changed a bit. It sounds like this concept was still in the story when Moana's ancestors played a bigger role, with her grandmother teaching them their names and such.
After it was changed into a monster realm, it seems (from what I've read) like the sequence was going to be much longer originally. Moana was going to have to disguise Maui because the monsters were all after him, and they were going to have to travel through this realm to find Tamatoa's hideaway and Maui's hook.
