Pixar Merger with Disney Has Hurt Quality

Discussion in 'TV & Media' started by VulcanJedi, Nov 15, 2012.

  1. bigdaddy

    bigdaddy Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Oct 19, 2007
    Location:
    Space Massachusetts
    I liked Cars 2 more than Cars 1.

    ANyways your point is not really based on anything. John Lasseter is still in command of Pixar, he is also in charge of Disney animation. Pixar got a great deal from Disney. They make more movies now, so more of them suck. But we got Toy Story 3, so right there proves it's not just a merger that messed things up.

    I havent seen Brave, and a prequel to Monster's Inc., which I love, is completely not needed, but my least favorite Pixar movies are Cars 1 and The Incredibles. t's just personal taste.

    I was really looking forward to Newt, but they canceled it. However they are making a dinosaur movie and how can you mess up a movie with dinosaurs. I have faith still.
     
  2. Bob The Skutter

    Bob The Skutter Complete Arse Cleft In Memoriam

    Joined:
    Jul 12, 2001
    Location:
    Bob The Skutter
    I thought Brave was wonderful. Not sure why people didn't like it, because although it may not be Pixar's best film ever it was still great. Toy Story 3, Up, Wall E. These are all very good films. Cars and Cars 2 are the only Pixar films I'm not all that fond of. Cars 2 actually bored me.
     
  3. CaptainCanada

    CaptainCanada Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 4, 2004
    Location:
    Charlottetown, PEI, Canada
    I thought Brave was fine, I just didn't think it was up to Pixar's normal standard.
     
  4. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    I'm not sure Pixar has a "normal standard." I think it's more of a continuum -- some great films, some very good films, some pretty good films, and two or three mediocre films. I'd put Brave in the "very good" range, or at least on the border of "very good" and "pretty good." Certainly in the upper half of the spectrum.
     
  5. Ian Keldon

    Ian Keldon Fleet Captain

    Joined:
    Dec 22, 2011
    Was "Incredibles" pre- or post-merger? That was the last Pixar film I thought was really worth anything.

    Disney has been creatively stagnant for well over a decade now.
     
  6. bigdaddy

    bigdaddy Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Oct 19, 2007
    Location:
    Space Massachusetts
    It was before. The merger was 2006, and the films take a few years to make.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Pixar_films
     
  7. propita

    propita Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 9, 2001
    Location:
    fresno, ca, us
    Beauty and the Beast had that voice-over intro for exposition. True, it was short and was visually great. But it was needed, though made no sense logically. But who's watching a fairy tale for logic, right?
     
  8. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    "Show, don't tell" is not an absolute dogma. As with anything else, it depends on the needs of the particular story. There are cases where getting the exposition out of the way with a quick narrative infodump is the right choice because it lets you get on with the important part of the story. I don't remember Brave well enough to recall how I felt about the exposition, but one shouldn't just make a kneejerk assumption that telling is invariably inferior to showing. Rules like that are guidelines, not straitjackets.
     
  9. Owain Taggart

    Owain Taggart Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2009
    Location:
    Northern Ontario, Canada

    Agreed. It's definitely contextual. It's often necessary in terms of world building in order to set the scene for what's to come, and when done well, it can really add to the story.

    However, I hate it when it's simply a wall of text. The recent terrible World Without End miniseries did this, being the first thing you see, and it took away from what they could have shown and felt incredibly cheap. In a way, it did set the tone because the rest of the miniseries was incredibly bad.
     
  10. Sci

    Sci Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 2, 2002
    Location:
    Montgomery County, State of Maryland
    The Incredibles was released in 2004, two years before Disney acquired Pixar. Their 2006 film was Cars. It's kind of hard to classify any particular film as a "post-merger" film, though, because a lot of the films released in the first few years after the acquisition would have been in the works before it.
     
  11. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    ^Right. It takes years to make an animated film as elaborate as Pixar's productions, and they always have several overlapping productions going on at any given time -- which is why each of their films is able to include an Easter egg foreshadowing the next film.
     
  12. Amaris

    Amaris Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Dec 25, 2002
    Location:
    United States
    I loved Toy Story 3. Waterworks broke out, and everything. Strongly disliked Cars 2 (much to my huge surprise), even though I loved the first one. The movie just felt wrong. It's hard for me to explain. Brave, which I finally saw the other day, was good. It had a nice feel to it, but yeah, I wouldn't say I was head over heels with it like I was many of Pixar's other ventures.

    To be fair, no matter who you are, you can't always push perfect quality. For me, Cars 2 was a big sign, for me, that something was wrong. I mean, I used to believe Pixar on a bad day was better than anyone else on a great day, but after that movie, I don't believe that anymore. Still, Pixar has a lot of greatness in them, and I hope to see more of it in the future. As of now, though, the latest Pixar contributions are Cars 2, and Brave. Both less than their stellar standard. In theaters right now is "Wreck-It Ralph", which is playing to great reviews, and is made by Disney's in house animation team. The playing field has opened up enormously, so I do have some worry for Pixar. It's not the idea that they'll fail, it's the perception of them already failing, and perception is reality in the movie industry.
     
  13. Ian Keldon

    Ian Keldon Fleet Captain

    Joined:
    Dec 22, 2011
    Either way, that was the last Pixar film I thought really worked.

    I miss the annual-or-18-month, Disney animated summer blockbusters of the 90s.
     
  14. Bob The Skutter

    Bob The Skutter Complete Arse Cleft In Memoriam

    Joined:
    Jul 12, 2001
    Location:
    Bob The Skutter
    I don't know how anyone can out Cars 2 and Brave in the same sentence when talking about quality. Brave was a wonderful film, I would easily put it up there with my favourites, whereas Cars 1 and 2 would both be at the bottom. I can see other's wouldn't agree with placement but I don't understand putting them together anywhere on the list.
     
  15. Amaris

    Amaris Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Dec 25, 2002
    Location:
    United States
    Aside from being in the same sentence, I've made it clear that Brave is quite superior to Cars 2.
     
  16. Bob The Skutter

    Bob The Skutter Complete Arse Cleft In Memoriam

    Joined:
    Jul 12, 2001
    Location:
    Bob The Skutter
    Was what I was going off. Brave was a fun, non-traditional take on the traditional Princess needs a Prince story, the animation was beautiful and the story, moral and intent of the story were everything it should have been for a film like this.

    It just seems to be another case of people being given what they asked for then not liking the fact it wasn't exactly what the would have done. People have asked for a Pixar film with female leads and their take on the traditional Disney Princess story and that's what they did.
     
  17. Gaith

    Gaith Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    May 11, 2008
    Location:
    Oregon
    Not for me (though I haven't seen Cars 2): no one has arms! An entirely planet full of creatures without arms, hands, fingers, thumbs, or wrists! Or legs, for that matter! Doesn't that freak anyone else out? :p
     
  18. Christopher

    Christopher Writer Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 15, 2001
    Meh, it's no worse than My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Although at least the unicorn ponies have telekinesis to manipulate things with.
     
  19. Amaris

    Amaris Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Dec 25, 2002
    Location:
    United States
    The first part of that post was this:
    Which, when compared to Cars 2:

    Shows that I consider Brave to be superior to Cars 2.

    All you can really do is figure it as something you have to accept as a part of the universe.
     
  20. Bob The Skutter

    Bob The Skutter Complete Arse Cleft In Memoriam

    Joined:
    Jul 12, 2001
    Location:
    Bob The Skutter
    Sorry, I somehow misread that bit.