MAJOR MOANA SPOILERS

I love Moana, it's my favourite Disney film in a long while, but while I love it something never made sense to me, and the more I thought about it the more a second narrative makes a lot more sense.

The initial thought that sparked this theory was just how Maui knows the name of Te Kā, supposedly he has been exiled on a small island for a millennium, starting from the time he had stolen the heart and had his fish hook lost in a fight against Te Kā. It's revealed that Te Kā is actually the form Te Fiti takes when the heart is lost, meaning Te Kā came into existence the moment the heart was stolen giving no time for a name and mythology to develop around her.

Despite this, Maui is especially confident as to the name of his adversary despite being marooned at the same time of her creation. Here's my solution to this problem, that is not Maui, and never has been. He is in fact a shapeshifting cohort of Tamatoa from the realm of monsters. Now I'm aware this is a leap, so I'll present all the evidence I have found to support this theory.

1. When Moana visits Maui's island, we see several fish hook shaped drawings, each line presumably relating to one day he was exiled. There simply is not enough lines to account for 1000 years, there would have to be well over 300k lines to support this.

2. After Maui has stolen the boat and the ocean helps Moana give chase, he gives up WAY too fast. It only takes Moana to reappear on the boat a few times for him to give up and swim for it. If he truly had been lost for that long, he would have fought a lot harder to get his way.

3. He immediately knows where his fish hook is, despite it being lost at sea for a millennium. Once he gets off the island his first destination is the realm of monsters to steal the hook from Tamatoa.

4. Tamatoa having the hook as the centrepiece of his shell. It's a priceless relic for sure, but Tamatoa makes it very clear during the encounter that he's interested in two things, shiny objects and free food. The hook is a powerful item but it is not shiny, making it extremely odd that Tamatoa would have it on his shell, let alone the main focal point of the display.

5. Maui's hook is nowhere near as strong as the legends suggest. This is an item that has the capability of lassoing the sun itself to bring it closer to the Earth, yet it cannot survive a strike from Te Kā without serious damage.

The biggest question remaining is why this being is masquerading as Maui. It's my belief that he is doing this to get a hook as powerful as Maui's own, while the hook he currently has is a fake. The fake Maui was aware of the prophecy regarding the return of the heart and decided to intervene with it with him in the role of Maui. He conspired with Tamatoa to place a fake hook on his shell and waited on the island for the prophecy to begin. Once Moana showed up, he played along confident in the knowledge that the voyage would be successful once he began travelling, he only loses confidence when the ocean itself intervenes but realises he has to play along as he cannot escape.

Fake Maui uses the hook in a staged fight with Tamatoa where neither are truly injured and continues the quest, the film plays out as you've seen from here until the fight with Te Kā. Fake Maui intends for the fight to be over in two blows of his hook which would destroy it before the heart is restored, however Moana pulls an unexpected move and he bails out of the con, only returning when he is confident that the fight will go his way after Moana goes back in for a second round.

The heart is restored, Te Kā becomes Te Fiti and grants Fake Maui a legitimate hook with all the power Maui's original hook bestowed. He now has the power of the hook, coupled with natural shapeshifting abilities, becoming one of the most powerful beings in the land, without anyone being any the wiser. It is likely Tamatoa is simply in this con for a reward of gold after Fake Maui obtains a true hook.

This theory was developed a couple weeks after I saw the film, so it's possible I missed a detail that explains the inconsistencies in Maui's story, if this is the case please let me know in the comments. Otherwise, I feel this is a decent theory that explains all of the confusing elements in Maui's story, I hope you all feel the same.

TL;DR: Maui is a fake, and conspires with Tamatoa to intervene with the prophesy in order to aquire a legitimate demigod fishhook from Te Fiti.