My Comments on Various Pixar Movies

Today’s entry is going to be an interesting one. Sometimes I like to make various comments about the plot. Keep in mind that these comments are subjective. While I did go over the Toy Story franchise last month, today’s entry goes over Pixar as a whole.

Just letting you know, I have seen every Pixar movie from Toy Story to Inside Out, and seen every odd-numbered Pixar movie from Toy Story to Soul. For about the first two decades of the 21^st Century, there’s this odd/even rule where the odd-numbered Pixar films (Toy Story tetralogy, Finding Nemo duology, Cars, Wall-E, Brave, Inside-Out, Coco) tend to be better than the even-numbered Pixar films (Monsters duology, Incredibles duology, Cars sequels, A Bug’s Life, Ratatouille, Up, The Good Dinosaur). With the exceptions of Up and Brave, the odd-numbered movies were a lot better than the even-numbered movies, not just personal preference, but also some facts.

• The odd-numbered movies brought in more cumulative total revenue than the even-numbered movies.
• The odd-numbered movies also have a higher average rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
• The first Pixar movie to get a 100% rating – Toy Story (the 1^st Pixar movie).
• The first Pixar movie to get a rotten score – Cars 2 (the 12^th Pixar movie).
• The first Pixar movie to win “Best Animated Film” in the Academy Awards – Finding Nemo (the 5^th Pixar movie).
• The first Pixar movie to not get any Oscar nomination – Cars 2.
• The highest-grossing Pixar movie – Toy Story 3 (the 11^th Pixar movie).
• The first box office bomb of Pixar’s – The Good Dinosaur (the 16^th Pixar movie).

For today’s entry, I have cherry-picked 12 different movies (all Toy Story movies released so far, Monster’s Inc, Finding Nemo, Cars, Wall-E, Up, Inside-Out, Coco, and Soul) and made some comments. You’ll see what I mean.

My Comments on Each Movie:

• Cars (2006) – the best scene in the movie was the ending, because it shown how much Lightning McQueen changed after his stay in Radiator Springs and how little Chick Hicks changed from the beginning. Lighting could’ve won the Piston Cup, got the gold trophy, and win the Dinoco sponsorship. Instead, since Chick Hicks pushed King out of the way (which caused him to crash), Lighting threw the race to help King finish his last race, turned down the Dinoco sponsorship he was awarded in favor of brand loyalty to an inferior brand, and put Radiator Springs on the map. This shows that he stopped caring about winning the race. Chick Hicks, however, may have won the golden trophy, but his selfish actions costed him the Dinoco sponsorship he longed for, his fans, and his entire racing career, while also not given a proper ceremony.
• Coco (2017) – Elena was right about smashing Miguel’s guitar. As abusive she was as a grandmother, doing that ultimately led to the problem being solved. Had she not done that, Miguel wouldn’t have ran away, but music will still be banned in the Rivera household, Hector will be forgotten and would never see his daughter again, and Ernesto de la Cruz would’ve ultimately gotten away with his crimes. It took a visit to the Land of the Dead to learn Ernesto’s dark truth and who Miguel’s real great, great grandfather was, ultimately exposing Ernesto de la Cruz and ruining his reputation in both worlds. Now Hector Rivera would forever be honored, Ernesto will be forgotten, and the ban on music was lifted.
• Finding Nemo (2003) – the real main antagonist of Finding Nemo would have got to be the barracuda at the beginning. Despite not appearing in most of the movie, its eating of Coral and most of the fish eggs was why Marlin became an overprotective parent in the first place. His overprotectiveness resulted in Nemo becoming rebellious, and thus getting captured by a diver (who turned out to be a nice dentist). All of the other obstacles, like the sharks, the anglerfish, and the jellyfish, weren’t even villains, and despite the dentist being the one who captured Nemo, he wasn’t doing it to be mean, and his daughter isn’t that evil either.
• Inside Out (2015) – everything that went wrong with the control center and the personality islands may seem like they’re destroying Riley’s mind, but in reality, complete emotional shutdown is one of the symptoms of depression. Riley clearly wasn’t happy about moving to San Francisco or moving out of Minnesota. She tried to stay happy, but she couldn’t regulate her emotions, thus causing her to be fearful, angry, and disgusted at everything, while also not being happy with any of her interests. She then went to a point where she finally stopped caring about anything, and considered on moving to Minnesota without her parents. If you went through too much stress, this is what can happen to you.
• Monsters Inc. (2001) – the premise of the movie was that kids were no longer being scared of the monsters, which is leading to a power crisis. As TV Tropes pointed out, one possible cause to that was the kids’ exposure to TV. Their exposure to friendly monsters on TV and real horror (such as war and terrorism) possibly made them less afraid of monsters. It took children’s laughs, not screams, to produce power more easily, thus averting the energy crisis.
• Soul (2020) – 22 didn’t start getting interested into having a life even after being tutored by the experts, but when she got tutored by Joe Gardner, who was an ordinary person, she started gaining interest. This can teach a lesson that sometimes, you shouldn’t leave something to the experts, but rather someone who has more experience with what experts aren’t used to.
• Toy Story (1995) – both Woody and Buzz had similar situations. Both of them were selfish, then faced a harsh truth, then changed for the better. At the end, two worst enemies became best friends.
• Toy Story 2 (1999) – Emperor Zurg is the most villainous looking character in the entire franchise. However, he did very little in the main series, as the real villains of each movie were worse for more realistic reasons (including Gabby Gabby from Toy Story 4).
• Toy Story 3 (2010) – seeing Sid as a garbage man at the beginning gives a hint that he might be the same one who strapped Lotso to the front of the garbage truck. If this is true, then it shows that he has not learned his lesson about torturing toys, especially now that Lotso was bound to face a much worse fate than the other Pixar villains, including Hopper and Syndrome. But Lotso deserved it.
• Toy Story 4 (2019) – Andy’s toys didn’t just get a new owner. Toy Story 4 was a lot different to the rest of the franchise, given that most of Andy’s toys were reduced to minor characters, the main cast of characters are different, and that Woody and Buzz have deteriorated over time.
• Up (2009) – Charles Muntz was the most sympathetic villain in all of Pixar. All he wanted was to be a scientist, but he was mocked on and rejected despite having valid evidence.
• Wall-E (2008) – some of the content featured in the movie (Earth being heavily polluted, people being morbidly obese, and people becoming too dependent on machines) are all warning signs based on today’s issues and the issues from the time of the film’s release. It also took place 800 years after Toy Story 3 was released in theaters in real life, not 700 years into the future.

I could say the same stuff about Dreamworks, but you’ll see that next Tuesday. But you can see how I make comments like these.