urquan
Hold! What you are doing to us is wrong! Why do you do this thing?
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User ID: 226
urquan
Hold! What you are doing to us is wrong! Why do you do this thing?
5d ago
A Bug’s Life was good, but I think the insect-oriented concept repelled people and it didn’t do well. I don’t consider it one of their best, but I enjoyed it.
I also put Cars in that category, and I do like Cars, but I don’t think it represented the best that Pixar can offer in terms of concept. But it was well-executed, and has attained iconic status, and sells merchandise better than Toy Story! I think if Pixar makes another movie as compelling as Cars, it would be good. Like Coco, it’s a situation where Pixar expressed its creative strength outside its core conceit.
I also forgot about The Good Dinosaur — which even though I’ve seen it I don’t have any idea what it was about.
urquan
Hold! What you are doing to us is wrong! Why do you do this thing?
5d ago
I felt like the biggest problem with Brave was that it didn't lean fully enough into being a Disney princess animated musical
I actually forgot until I wrote the post and looked at a filmography list that Brave wasn't a princess film made by Disney Animation and not Pixar.
I didn’t care for Luca much. In general, I think Pixar does best at movies that show “the world within the world”, where there are non-human characters who are related in some way to humans and we see what the “human world” is like from their perspective. Once you notice that pattern, you realize all of Pixar’s best movies fit that pattern.
Toy Story is about toys who have to navigate the world of children playing with them. Monsters inc is about monsters who scare humans, but are deathly afraid of them. Finding Nemo is about fish having to navigate the world of commercial fishing and aquariums. Wall-E is about robots who have to clean up after lazy humans. Ratatouille is about rats navigating an human kitchen. Inside Out is about internal emotions who have to try and regulate themselves to deal with the problems of their host person. (Not actually the first time Disney developed that concept.)
The Incredibles breaks the mold, but I guess it depends on whether you consider supers human or non-human. Regardless, it participates in the same “secret world within the world” trope.
Luca, Brave, Up, Elio, and Coco are the opposite: about humans exploring the inner world. I find that inherently less interesting. Coco is by far the best out of the bunch; day of the dead has such color as a cultural festival, and the idea of an elderly grandmother with memory issues remembering her father is such a raw and poignant human experience that I’m not sure anyone left the theater with dry eyes. Up is pretty loved, but mostly because of the first 20 minutes. I liked Elio more than most people seemed to have; I’m considering an effortpost review since it came up.
Soul and Turning Red (never saw that one) I guess are like that, but less about a world and more about a transformation? Not considered Pixar’s best.
There are also the “non-humans as a human allegory,” like Cars, A Bug’s Life, Onward, Elemental. These are, at best, controversial. I think humans need to be in a Pixar movie, but not as the main characters.
I never saw Lightyear, and I think that was their worst ever concept for a film. I hated that they made a 3d Pixar movie as the in-universe buzz lightyear movie; I prefer the original 2d galactic command TV show. Toy advertisement media is far more silly and zany than a Pixar film.
Pixar is at their best when we get to imagine non-humans “inside” our world and what they might think of us. If I were an exec, I would be demanding that creatives pitch more of those ideas.
o3 is definitely more capable, but it also has a remarkable ability to hallucinate more believable things, and to communicate ideas in highly technical ways that are hard to understand — and thus fact-check — if you’re not a domain-specific expert. I don’t ask ChatGPT questions about personal medical problems, but when I ask dumb shower thoughts about medical research (“what do researchers think causes Alzheimer’s?” etc) it starts going on about highly technical detail with no introduction or explanation. If it’s right, wow is it smart. But if it’s wrong… I’m not smart enough to know how.
With 4o, I know I’m going to get something overly emotive and excessively buttkissing, but at least I can understand what it’s giving me.
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