A Boatload of Potential

I've been thinking about this sort of thing for a while. What if the movie industry were to try adapting video games into animated films?

An animated film based on Insomniac Games' long-running and successful video game series Ratchet & Clank was just announced today complete with a promotional teaser! Sony is apparently really confident in this, as it's already on track for a 2015 release. Rainmaker Entertainment (Escape From Planet Earth) is teaming up with Blockade Entertainment to produce this computer animated adaptation of the series.



I really liked this trailer. It's a fun irreverent deconstruction of animated movie trailers that'll sure get the laughs. I certainly thought it was hilarious, but this trailer and the film itself are not what I'm going to discuss. Instead, I'll discuss what this film means for the animation industry and video game movies in general. If this film goes over successfully in 2015 then I think we'll see a new frontier in both animation and film adaptations of video games...

Up until now, many major Hollywood films based on video game franchises were done in live action. I felt that live action severely limits things for some of these video game adaptations, one example being the Mortal Kombat films (that, and poor writing). I always wanted to see an animated Mortal Kombat film that was brutal like the games yet had cool action. Animation could show off the powers that the kombatants have while also making characters like Shao Kahn or Goro believable. Super Mario Bros. is another disaster, Mario and live action simply don't go together. Only a few adaptations were fine as live action films, like the Tomb Raider films and Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Unfortunately, a lot of these films just weren't good and lacked what made the source material work.

Now take a look at Disney's Wreck-It Ralph. While the film isn't based on a pre-existing video game, it has thrilling video game-style action and excitement, it does everything better than any of those live action films listed above. That's the power of animation, it could pull off what several live action films couldn't in that one film. Video games are animated, so animated films based on video games would work out so well. It is a massive risk, but I'm happy to hear that Sony is willing to take it. Ratchet & Clank also can't be done as a live action film, no way.

Now with all that being said, what could happen if this were to go over well? What if Ratchet & Clank is a box office hit? Suits will approach video game movie adaptations in a new way, one that actually works! Animated films based on video games could really be a big help to the current American animation industry, as many of these films could be adult-oriented and get audiences to see animated films that aren't family-friendly or fall into the G/PG range. Plus, there's a lot of great franchises to plunder. Ratchet & Clank is only the beginning!

I'm not saying that all video game movie adaptations should be animated. A film based on Halo or Gears of War could work perfectly in live action with the right director and screenplay, but animation is good for something like Ratchet & Clank. I don't know why this wasn't thought of earlier, because there are several video games that would make for great animated film adaptations: Super Mario Bros., Sonic The Hedgehog, Jak and Daxter, The Legend of Zelda, Mega Man, Sly Cooper... The list goes on.

What do you think of the upcoming Ratchet & Clank film? Do you think it will work out? Or do you think that one isn't necessary? Should animated films based on video games be considered? Or not?

Sound off below!

The Winners

Well, it's official. Pixar's beautiful, moving fairy tale took home the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. That's right... Brenda Chapman and Mark Andrews' Brave. Pixar has won again at the Academy Awards. It was a tight race with some great competition, but it won just like it did at the Golden Globes last month.

To be honest, I'm not satisfied with this and a good many people aren't. Now hear me out, I loved Brave. Like I've said on here many times before, I don't think it's the extremely flawed film that others made it out to be. I felt it was a well-made, well-told spin on the typical fairy tale conventions with two very likable leads, some good humor and lots of heart. I'm not part of the "Brave is garbage"/"Pixar is no longer good" bandwagon. Not at all. I loved the film.

That being said, I felt it had some problems, but overall I think it's a very good film. Now you probably know what film I was rooting for. That's right... Wreck-It Ralph. Wreck-It Ralph was, to me, 2012's greatest animated film. It had so much good in it and very little bad. It had a confident screenplay, a very creative story that isn't in your typical animated film, excellent characters all around, a killer score and soundtrack (sans "Shut Up and Drive"), loads of references that never felt like they were thrown in to pander to gamers and of course, stellar animation and design. It was the kind of film that I want from Disney.

Walt Disney Animation Studios knocked it out of the park if you ask me. Wreck-It Ralph was risky and conventional enough for audiences, it toed the fine line between trying something new and satisfying moviegoers. Creative idea, familiar but well-done story and some twists and turns along the way. To me, it should've won, plain and simple...

Why Brave won, we may never know. Theories will probably be thrown around over the next few days. Some will say that it won because the Academy automatically awards Pixar (except if their film involves anthropomorphic vehicles) every year or because Brave was an animated film with a female lead and is a "feminist" film. I won't go into that, but some may see it that way. Why would the Academy NOT give the award to Ralph? Let a thousand theories spring forth.

My theory is that the Academy saw Ralph as a loud, noisy "video game" movie. Video games, like animation, aren't seen as an art form by many. So maybe that could be why the film didn't win. Brave on the other hand was about human beings, magic and adventure. Perhaps the mother-daughter story of the film appealed more to the Academy voters. Just look at Ralph and then look at Brave. I can see the Academy not feeling that Ralph was "Best" material. If you ask me, it would be the equivalent of them giving the Best Picture award to an action-heavy (but well-written and heartfelt) film.

ParaNorman and Frankenweenie didn't have much of a chance getting the award, because the Academy does think of box office when it comes to awards. ParaNorman and Frankenweenie didn't double their production budgets. The Academy most likely saw them as out-of-the-way flops, which is wrong because... What if those two were far superior to everything else? The Pirates! Band of Misfits? Out of all the nominees, that had the least chance at winning. Again, popularity and box office does play a part in what wins and what doesn't. Sad fact.

I will say though, it was nice to see Brenda Chapman being on stage and accepting the award with Mark Andrews. She wasn't present at the Golden Globes, and if I can remember correctly, she wasn't even invited. But to see Chapman on stage was good, so now she'll get the recognition she deserves for the film.

I am overall upset. I felt that Walt Disney Animation Studios was going to get the Oscar, one they deserved. They never got an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature before, since the category was created when the studio was being run into the ground. During its rebirth (2007-2009), it had tough competition. Bolt didn't stand a chance against WALL-E, ditto The Princess and the Frog against Up. Tangled wasn't nominated for 2010, ditto Winnie the Pooh for 2011. Here I thought this film would get it and finally prove to everyone that they are back. But to paraphrase Doc Hudson, it's just a golden statue. That being said, I wanted the win to boost Disney Animation's reputation...

Best Animated Short Film? By contrast, I was very happy with the results. Who won? Paperman... That's right, John Kahrs' beautiful and innovative meshing of hand-drawn art and crisp computer animation. While some of the competitors were impressive (particularly Adam and Dog), I was really happy to see Disney take home the award they deserved.

So... Were you satisfied with the Oscars? Are you happy with the winners? Or not? Which film deserved the award in your opinion and why? The same goes for the Best Animated Short Film category. Sound off below!

Bringing Back the "Event" Status

When's the last time a release from Disney's legendary animation house was a big event? A film that was thrown out there as a big gun... A tough competitor in the cinema world... There was a time when a new Disney animated film was a big event... A massive event at that. The Little Mermaid more than launched this new status for the studio's output, after a few years of successful films that weren't necessarily "event pictures". Pictures that weren't as big as the Golden Age classics.

When I say event, I mean something like the size of Beauty and the Beast or Aladdin. Even after The Lion King's record-breaking run, Pocahontas still managed to be a big hit. It grossed around the same amount of money as Beauty and the Beast. Despite what some will say about the post-Lion King Renaissance films, some of them were undoubtedly big at the box office. You could definitely call Mulan and Tarzan big hits. Sure, they didn't gross as much as the year's biggest films of their respective years or something like Aladdin, but they were still blockbusters nonetheless.

Now, that event status has been held by Pixar since the release of Toy Story. Every film of theirs was a hit, and the studio's critical track record (up until the release of Cars 2) was perfect. Audiences anticipated every coming Pixar film because the ones before a certain film delivered on all levels. Even if audiences or critics felt a bit let down by Monsters, Inc. or Cars, that didn't hurt films like Finding Nemo and Up. Almost every Pixar film since 1999 has opened with over $60 million at the domestic box office, impressive for a single studio let alone an animation company. Ratatouille is the sole exception, but that still opened with $47 million, great for an animated film back then. No 3D and no big competition outside of DreamWorks and Blue Sky. Even after the disappointment of Cars 2, Brave still managed to open big last summer. That shows that they have box office power, and they rightfully earned it making great films.

While Pixar deserves to be trusted as a studio who makes "event films", Disney needs to be seen that way as well. Why's that? Disney has been making good films for the past six years. Films that adults, children and everyone else can enjoy for decades to come - unlike misguided films such as Brother Bear, Home on the Range and Chicken Little. Ever since 2006, Walt Disney Animation Studios has quickly improved their output and produced modern-day classics like The Princess and the Frog, Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph. However, I don't sense much love for these films from the company themselves; they may have been successful but they don't seem to come off as big events anymore. Just hits... That is all...

Let's look at Tangled for example. The film was first released in November of 2010. When did the first theatrical teaser show up? June. Just a few months before the film's debut. The teaser was awful, suggesting that Disney had no faith in the film's heart, story or better qualities. Disney went super-cynical with this film and made it look like an attempt to one-up one of the earlier DreamWorks films. In the process, they made a lot of animation fans worry. But what worked out in the end? The promotion was everywhere. Can't say the same about The Princess and the Frog. It was given a better release date with plenty of time to breathe, unlike the awful date Disney chose for Frog. The result? A film that took in nearly $600 million at the worldwide box office, their biggest hit since The Lion King. People also loved the film. All that aggressive marketing (no matter how bad the film looked) ensured a good-sized opening, and the word of mouth did its business from there.

With that film being a success, you'd think they'd milk it, right? Well you'll see Tangled in various promotions, and merchandise is all around. To someone who doesn't take interest in the animation industry, the film exists like The Lion King. A film that's well-known by your average moviegoer. But again, it wasn't marketed like an "event". It was marketed like another animated movie, the marketing only sold the film. It should've done more... It should've really hyped it up as a big event that will be treasured. The same goes for The Princess and the Frog and Wreck-It Ralph.

Wreck-It Ralph's marketing campaign was good. It was certainly effective. People went to go see the film. But the marketing didn't make it look like a big, grand entertainment event. Again, Disney should've made this look like a must-see film, not a "go see" "hit of the week" film. You'd think with the runaway success of Tangled, they'd go back to their 1990s marketing roots and trumpet the film as the next big classic from Disney. It was a hit no doubt, you could say it was a blockbuster... But it was essentially another successful animated movie that came and went. That's where competition factors in.

Between 1991 and 1998, no non-Disney animated feature film stood a chance against the Mouse at the domestic box office. $100 million back then was a real benchmark for an animated film, or a film in general. Disney only missed it once during this time, with Hercules, but that managed to gross $99 million so it was very close! Most of the big hit films grossed between $100-200 million, and your biggest blockbusters (or successes that came out of nowhere) grossed above $200 million. $300 million back then was sky-high. No film would cross $400 million at the domestic box office (in its first run) until Titanic came out in 1997. In short, anything above $120 million was darn good for an animated film. Disney had that top dog status, no one else did during the 1990s except Pixar.

Flash forward to this decade. DreamWorks, Blue Sky, Illumination and Sony Pictures Animation have films that normally gross over $120 million domestically. Disney would have to make films that gross over $250 million like Pixar's to reclaim the "top of the mountain" status. A lot of people saw Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph, but a lot of people also saw The Lorax and Hotel Transylvania. It isn't the same anymore with all this competition. Disney films are essentially doing what other animated films, sometimes highly inferior ones, are doing. Plus, with films easily passing the $400 million benchmark each year, these films are seen as big hits... But not as earth-shattering blockbusters. Or events...

So box office and competition have done this, but marketing can break that. If Disney were willing to promote their next animated feature, Frozen, with a big aggressive marketing campaign that makes the film look awesome (unlike the self-conscious trailers and commercials for The Princess and the Frog or Tangled's intentionally misleading marketing), then they'd have a huge hit on their hand that audiences will be raving about. The film to go see amidst the competition. Think Lion King big. Disney can definitely relive those glory days, just because they happened twice doesn't mean they can't happen again.

However, the reason I bring this up is because Disney might shift the "event film" focus to their new hot properties... Marvel and Lucasfilm.

Understandably, Disney wants to strike gold. They have two massive companies in their hand and they're going to milk that. That's fine, but I fear that Disney will put all the love and focus towards the upcoming Marvel films, the next Star Wars trilogy and the numerous Star Wars spin-off films that they have recently announced. Also, if they were to acquire another big company in the next couple of years, then expect the attention to go to that property as well. I feel that their animated films will just be ignored and given "enough" promotion just to ensure that it will break even at the box office. Disney should want more than that for their animated films - one of the very things their studio is based on.

From where I stand, Disney is all about Marvel at the moment. Monsters University's promotion has been slow, unusual for a Pixar film. It's only picked up speed now, with a new trailer and a couple of clips. Frozen probably won't appear until this summer, since Disney waited the till summer before both Tangled and Ralph in the years they came out to unveil trailers and promotional materials. Oz the Great and Powerful has gotten a suitable amount of marketing, The Lone Ranger is getting a lot because it cost them a fortune and it may bomb. I fear that this may continue into the next couple of years, since the Marvel Cinematic Universe is greatly expanding and Star Wars Episode VII is on the way.

Now I'm not against the Marvel and Star Wars expansion, I'm anticipating both. All the upcoming MCU films excite me, and I'm eager to see how the J. J. Abrams-helmed Episode VII will turn out. I'm all for that. I just hope that Disney doesn't give all the attention to those two things, whilst leaving their animated output in the dust. The animated films need love. They need to put them front and center, and ultimately have them be the big thing when they come out. I mean, it should be everywhere. I just fear that the new things Disney has latched onto will overshadow these animated films, and even Pixar's to some extent.

What's a marketing campaign that could hype up the current Disney animated films as events? Well, for starters, they should try very hard to help casual moviegoers tell when it's a Disney film. Tired of hearing people accidentally calling Bolt or Wreck-It Ralph Pixar movies? Well maybe Disney ought to do what Pixar does for their computer animated films.

Trailers for Wreck-It Ralph, for a recent example of course, should've done what the trailers for the 1980s and 1990s Disney films did: Remind audiences of Disney's achievements over the years. Pixar trailers normally say something like "From the creators of Finding Nemo". Why can't a trailer for a Disney animated film make mention of the studio's legacy?



Now look at that... This trailer not only briefly reminded audiences of Disney's past efforts, but it also did a better job at explaining the film's story, making time for jokes and making the film look exciting in less than two and a half minutes... We just don't get animated film trailers like that anymore...

What I'm saying is, what if a Wreck-It Ralph trailer began with a brief montage of the classics and even show the recent ones? Have an announcer or title cards saying, "For over 70 years..." and so on. Maybe they could even have the trailers say "From Walt Disney Animation Studios" instead of just saying "Disney".

Disney also won't put something like "From the creators of Tangled" in a trailer for something like Ralph, given the marketing department's paranoia over what young boys want to see. (Again, Disney, quit focusing on one particular fraction of your audience!) But if they took the time to showcase the best Disney classics in a trailer for every upcoming animated film, then there would be no problem and thus... No confusion. People will know it's Disney. Not Pixar.

In the 1990s, people knew when it was Disney, because the animated competition came and went. Plus Disney made it clear that it was by them. You knew it was Disney when you heard announcer Marc Eliot's voice excitedly hype up the film. The Disney logo was recognizable, while trailers for other animated films had the logos of their distributors (Fox, Warner Bros., Universal). Today, Disney's computer animated films are now swamped in a sea of successful computer animated productions. Again, they don't have that special position anymore.

But another problem with today's trailers and TV spots is that they go by so quick. Literally everything races by. Remember the days when TV spots would often end with the announcer slowly saying "Coming soon to a theater near you" and/or "check your local listings"? Nowadays: Film Title -> Rated PG -> Opens in Theaters Friday. All very quickly. It just isn't the same. Likewise, the trailers for these newer Disney films just say "Disney", and rather quickly too. That's not enough.

Aside from reminding audiences of Disney's past efforts, these trailers need to make these films look like serious, must-see events. My problem with a lot of trailers for animated films today is that they follow a routine: Jokes, bits on the story, jokes, action sequence, jokes... Trailers, even the ones for Pixar films, tend to focus heavily on comedy and less on the story. The best trailers for Disney (and Pixar) films today are the marvelous Japanese ones, which value story and heart over constant jokes. They use humor when it is needed. I can't say that about most trailers for Disney or Pixar films, and trailers for any animated film really. Disney needs to move away from that formula in order to separate their work from everyone else's. That way, it would be unique amongst the competition.

It would be nice to see Disney's recent and impressive output get the treatment it deserves. The likes of Frog, Tangled and Ralph are just as important as those Renaissance super-hits and the first Golden Age greats. This is coming from someone who also thinks that the not-so-popular Disney films deserve care. I mean, Disney needs to quit acting like The Rescuers or Treasure Planet don't really exist. But if any of their films deserve lots of love, it's their recent ones. These are the new classics coming out during a new Golden Age. They should be more than just hits. They should be more than just profitable little things for the company...

They should be events...

Annie Aftermath

See all the nominations and winners here.

Last night, the 40th Annual Annie Awards ceremony took place. As usual, several films, short subjects and television shows competed for a grand prize; whether it was for best writing or best storyboards or best effects in a live action film...

One particular film went over like gangbusters at the ceremony. No, it wasn't DreamWorks' Rise of the Guardians. That would've happened if that film came out in 2010. No, no, no... This film particularly wrecked a good portion of the ceremony...

That's right. Walt Disney Animation Studios' Wreck-It Ralph took home the award for Best Animated Feature; while also winning Outstanding Achievement for Writing, Directing and Music. Alan Tudyk won for Voice Acting and deservedly so; his King Candy character was marvelous. To top it off, John Kahrs' ethereal Paperman took home the award for Best Animated Short Subject. Deservedly so. It was a win-win situation for the rejuvenated Walt Disney Animation Studios...

One minor gripe. Wreck-It Ralph did not get a nomination for Production Design in an animated feature. Sure it took home other and better awards, but Wreck-It Ralph had some of the best art direction in an animated film released in 2012, period. Handling three distinct video game worlds, I felt, was a bigger feat than what was accomplished in Ice Age: Continental Drift and Hotel Transylvania. Ralph was unjustly left out of that category... Can't say I'm pleased with that.

Aside from Ralph's victories, I felt the rest of the ceremony was overall solid, but littered with massive problems.

Remember that last Annie Awards ceremony with all the flubs? Well, it seems like the negatives were amplified here. Yes, the wrong envelope incident happened again. But even worse was when they were presenting the nominees for Best Directing for an animated television production, they showed the feature film nominees by accident! Oops...

Other than that, you had the hosts often messing up, even greats like Leonard Maltin himself. Wreck-It Ralph director Rich Moore was able to deliver a good enough speech, and even took a nice jab at the generally unorganized ceremony. Also, they started late. What is with this ceremony and why are they out of it? Many commentators, animators and writers agree that the Annie Awards need to get their priorities straight. This is supposed to be animation's "Highest Honor". If you ask me, this lack of care is a dishonor.

Pushing all those scratches aside, I felt the ceremony was somewhat balanced in its choice nominees and what ultimately won.

I was happy to see ParaNorman get a few awards, both in the character design and character animation department. I felt that the crew also deserved an Effects in an Animated Feature award as well, instead that went to Rise of the Guardians. Hard to complain, all the runner-ups in the category were very strong. I, however, felt that ParaNorman beat them all by a hair since it was a stop-motion film and the effects were very convincing. Brave got two, one for editorial and one for production design.

Frankenweenie got very few nominations and took home nothing, sadly. Ditto The Pirates! Band of Misfits, but the competition was very strong. It still would've been nice to see those two films take an award home. The rest of the animated films - from Ice Age: Continental Drift to The Rabbi's Cat - got nothing. Again, Ralph trail blazed a lot of categories. Tough competition.

However, I felt most of that was balanced... What wasn't as balanced was in the television animated categories.

If you ask me, DreamWorks' Dragons: Riders of Berk took home a few too many awards. It took home Directing, Music and Storyboarding. It beat out titles like Adventure Time in those categories, while also being pitted against rather lame competition like Jake and the Neverland Pirates. Where was Disney's surprisingly great Gravity Falls and the ever-so-creative Regular Show?

Gravity Falls managed to get some love, but a very minimal amount. Kristen Schaal took home the voice acting award, and I felt she deserved it. Her Mabel character is hilarious, and arguably the best character in that show. It also got a nomination for production design, but it lost to something that deserved it... Tron: Uprising.

Tron: Uprising was a surprise hit at the ceremony, and hopefully it'll teach the ignorant people who moved it to the midnight time slot that they made a terrible mistake. Disney essentially killed this show just as it was about to really take off. They could've had another season or two on their hands, and the Tron franchise would've been expanded long before the third film arrives to theaters. What's going on, Disney?

The series also took home the character design award, though I wasn't too fond of the character designs in the show. I felt that was one of the weaker elements, it should've gotten awards for best music or something. Nope, Dragons hogged some of that up and even had more than one nomination in a single category. The Penguins of Madagascar also had quite a few nominations. All that aside, it was nice to see something Tron-related making a splash at the Annies.

Again, some of the nominees in certain categories were plain laughable. Sofia the First? Are you kidding me? Jake and the Neverland Pirates? What? Justin Time? Yeah, some of the nominations were a bit undeserved. I would've liked to have seen Regular Show or Archer or something other than a Nickelodeon or DreamWorks show get some attention. Alas, this didn't happen.

I was also happy to see what won in the live action categories. Life of Pi's tiger, Richard Parker, was certainly an astonishing feat. It won for best character animation. Why were the effects not up for best effects in a live action film in this ceremony? The Avengers took home the best effects award. With the exception of John Carter, I felt the film's effects were stronger than what was seen in its competition: The Amazing Spider-Man and Battleship.

It was also nice to see the Annies giving the spotlight to student films too.

The lifetime achievement awards were a highlight.

Terry Gilliam, June Foray, Mark Henn, Oscar Grillo and Howard Green all made good speeches and definitely deserved their awards.

Pros
- Wreck-It Ralph cleaned up house.
- Brave, Rise of the Guardians and ParaNorman got some recognition.
- Paperman took home Best Animated Short Subject.
- Most of the "feature" nomination selections were balanced.
- The lifetime achievement award segments.
- Mark Andrews (finishing director of Brave) certainly gave quite a speech. He's fun to watch.
- The speeches the recipients made were good.
- Tron: Uprising made the rounds here and there.
- Kristen Schaal winning.
- Life of Pi's Richard Parker winning.

Cons
- Television animation nominations; a little unbalanced. A little too much Dragons and Penguins hogging up space.
- Dragons took home too many awards.
- Some of the nominations in the individual TV animation categories were weak, a lot of much stronger entries were absent.
- Wreck-It Ralph not being nominated for production design in an animated feature. Big mistake.
- Frankenweenie not taking anything home.
- All the screw-ups, the drawn-out and awkward speeches. This is a ceremony!
- Still a little too much DreamWorks. I know the whole "rigging" controversy is over, but I couldn't help but think that they had a few too many slots in the television animation categories.

What did you think of the 40th Annie Awards? Were they a bust? Or do you think they made the right choices? What about the ceremony itself? Were you peeved by the unorganized nature of the whole thing? Or did you think it wasn't a problem? Sound off below!

Stop-Motion and Disney: The Nominations

The Academy Awards have announced all of their nominations today, so what animated films made the cut? 4 out of 5 my predictions came true. How many of yours came true?

The Nominations

Brave

Frankenweenie

ParaNorman

The Pirates! Band of Misfits

Wreck-It Ralph

I had thought that the French-Austrian hand-drawn animated film The Rabbi's Cat would get a nomination, given the Academy's usual routine. Ever year, they try to get an animated film (usually hand-drawn) from another country (with the exception of the UK and Japan) in there somewhere (2009 with The Secret of Kells, 2010 with The Illusionist and 2011 with A Cat in Paris and Chico & Rito), so I was pretty sure they would nominate that film or another French animated film called The Painting.

Nope, that slot went to The Pirates! Band of Misfits, a very good film. What's more important is that all the stop-motion films released this year were nominated. Wreck-It Ralph made it, deservedly, as I was hoping for. Brave also made it too, and I was somewhat convinced that it wouldn't. All three Disney releases got nominated.

So, who will take it home? Frankenweenie was a critical darling this year but not a box office success (the Academy Awards do think of box office, whether it's right or wrong). Brave got good but not great reception, but it's generally seen as a good Pixar film and not "bad" like the previous one. The Pirates! Band of Misfits got very positive reviews, but it only did moderately well at the box office. Aardman took home the award before (in 2005 with Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit), so I'm not sure if this will win.

ParaNorman and Wreck-It Ralph are the two that I think will take it home. It's going to be close, that's for sure. ParaNorman was innovative, bold, daring and pushed the envelope for what a PG-rated family film could do. Wreck-It Ralph is one of Disney's best and an overall great film, with lots of creativity, a strong screenplay and a concept that is thankfully out of Disney's comfort zone. I'll be happy if either one wins, but I'm rooting a little bit more for the nine-foot-tall colossus.

For me, I think Walt Disney Animation Studios needs a Best Animated Feature Oscar since they never got one. Being a studio that was there since the Golden Age and one that delivered some of the greatest animated films of all time, I think they are overdue for one. Laika on the other hand didn't get an Oscar yet, Coraline was up against very tight competition in 2009. It'd be nice to see them get it too.

On a side-note, it's too bad DreamWorks was left out of the race, considering how impressive their fare has been lately. Rise of the Guardians getting a slot would've been nice, but maybe next year, DreamWorks can score a spot. Everything else that was up and running for a nomination didn't seem like Oscar material to me, aside from the two Japanese animated films: From Up on Poppy Hill and The Mystical Law. When will a Japanese animated feature ever be nominated again?

Who do you think should win?

Looking Back on Twenty-Twelve

2012 was quite a year for animation, wasn't it? As we are now in a new year, let's pause and remember the best of last year...

- Rango, Gore Verbinski's incredibly risky animated Western tale, rightfully took home many accolades and proved to the industry that you can in fact pull off big risks.

- Rich Ross, the controversial man who was the Chairman of the Walt Disney Studios, got the boot. The seasoned and film-savvy Alan Horn took his place. Disney is back on track after a relatively downer period.

- The year had three animated films that grossed $200 million at the domestic box office. While the quality of some of the films are debatable, it's still good to see animation doing fine.

- Three impressive stop-motion films graced the silver screen: Aardman's The Pirates! Band of Misfits, Laika's ParaNorman and Tim Burton's Frankenweenie.

- Pixar proved to critics that one film couldn't stop them. Brave, despite getting a good number of negative reviews, was still a well-received film.

- Pixar also announced many new things: Two untitled upcoming films (one of which is being directed by Teddy Newton), the title of Bob Peterson's dinosaur film and Lee Unkrich's upcoming "Dia De Los Muertos" film.

- Wreck-It Ralph became another runaway success for Disney, showing that Tangled wouldn't be their only big hit. They are here to stay.

- Paperman, the ethereal short film attached to Wreck-It Ralph, certainly made quite a splash. It was a six-minute miracle of innovation and technological breakthrough in the medium. That's what Disney is known for, right?

- Disney also seemed enthusiastic about the upcoming films for Walt Disney Animation Studios, such as Big Hero 6 and Ron Clements and John Musker's untitled hand-drawn project.

- Many good animated television shows continued to run successfully, and impressive new entries came in as well.

- DreamWorks kept releasing critically acclaimed films, and also scoring their first big box office blockbuster domestically (in over two years) with Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted.

- Paramount announced more plans with their in-house animation studio, and are very enthusiastic about competing with the heavies.

~

Well, with all that being said... Happy New Year everyone! What was your favorite animation moment of 2012?

2012 Animation Box Office Stats

With the year coming to a close, let's take a look at how the animated batch did this year...

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Dr. Seuss' The Lorax - Easily the most surprising and befuddling animated box office success of the year. Yes, the highest grossing Dr. Seuss film did gross over $200 million (How The Grinch Stole Christmas), but it didn't seem like The Lorax would get anywhere near that amount since it looked derivative from the trailers and turned out to be a very derivative film. Also add in the fact that several animated films in 2011 had unspectacular opening weekends and that the last animated Dr. Seuss adaptation (Horton Hears a Who!) didn't hit $200 million. It was suggested by some that animation was in a bit of a rut in 2011. I just think last year didn't really offer any "must-see" events, or the good stuff was a little too out of reach for audiences (i.e. Rango)

However, I've been thinking now that these kinds of family films are "the thing" now. Meaning, family films that are really more for kids than anything, but ones they drag their unfortunate parents to. I mean, explain why Yogi Bear pulled the ridiculously good multiplier that it did, and why The Smurfs did so well. These kinds of movies are hot at the moment, which is too bad, the good stuff should be making money. Worldwide, it didn't really sail. Horton Hears a Who! was no smash worldwide either, so this gross was expected, even with the film being in 3D and IMAX 3D. It made a nice $348 million worldwide. It cost almost nothing for Illumination, so it's a big success for them and everyone else involved.

The Pirates! Band of Misfits - Time and time again, I find myself wondering why stop-motion animation films have such a difficult time at the American box office. Sometimes I blame inept marketing, other times I believe it's because the subject matter in some of the films isn't really mainstream or conventional. The Pirates! Band of Misfits, I believe, suffered from both. Though I analyzed the overall box office performance earlier this year, I thought I'd address this point as well.

To a casual American moviegoer, The Pirates! would look undesirable, even if Columbia didn't market it the way they did. Not just because it's stop-motion, but because it comes off as a weird pirate film and American audiences are not truly accustomed to the animation medium to begin with. After the big budget spectacle of the Pirates of the Caribbean films, who would want to see this kind of film? Outside of us animation fans and those who are knowledgable about Aardman and the book series, no one would really. Of course, in a world where tons of adults shun animation, you really need to have something in your animated film that will interest adults from the get-go. The Pirates! really had no chance, being from a studio that makes quirky animated films that just don't seem to catch on here in America.

Of course, the folks at Aardman's home country were charitable. The Pirates! was a hit in the UK, and it did well enough all around the world. It did double its minimal budget of $55 million, so it's a moderate success for the studio. It certainly did better (profit-wise) than their last feature, Arthur Christmas. The optimist in me, however, hoped that the film would've made more dough in the states. Releasing this (a 3D film no less) right before The Avengers was an incredibly stupid move from Columbia. If released earlier in the month, it could've had time to get good legs and make more than the paltry $31 million it ended up making. Stop-motion really needs to take off in the domestic market.

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted - Given the dwindling opening weekend totals of the DreamWorks films and the lackluster reception Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa got from audiences, I was expecting this to open with a very low total (in the $30 million range), but I guess all that colorful pizazz and singing zebra action really got people hyped for the film. Opening with $60 million, it had very good word of mouth and became the series' highest-grossing installment. Good thing too, for I believe it is the best of the series and a good film overall.

The film also broke $200 million, ensuring us animation fans that the $200 million benchmark would be reached more than once after a year where no feature did so. Over $700 million worldwide? DreamWorks certainly played their cards right with this film, and it was a much-needed super-hit for them.

Brave - I was certain that this would cross $200 million, and it did. Cars 2 only missed it by a hair, so I felt Brave would have no problem clearing that. Plus with the reception it got, it was bound to happen. It opened well (Over $60 million is the usual for a Pixar film) and had very good word of mouth, though it was more on the level of WALL-E than something like Ratatouille or Up. That being said, it is currently this year's highest grossing animated film domestically and will most likely keep that title.

Worldwide... What happened? I was thinking that this kind of fantasy film (not to mention 3D) would do Up numbers (i.e. over $400 million) overseas. Guess I was dead wrong. After all, How to Train Your Dragon grossed around the same amount. Over $500 million is good for any animated film, but it's not a monstrous total. But again, it's a big success for Pixar, once again.

Ice Age: Continental Drift - Looking at Shrek Forever After and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, I knew this fourth installment in the series would dip and make the lowest total in the franchise domestically. It sure did, but $161 million is still good enough for Blue Sky. Worldwide, it exploded. We all saw that one coming. $875 million. Biggest animated film at the box office this year, and one of the biggest of all time. Are you not surprised?

ParaNorman - Like Coraline and other stop-motion films, ParaNorman only opened with a small amount. Word of mouth seemed to be great, the film pulled a 3.9x multiplier, the biggest this year so far for animated film. Again, another masterful stop-motion film has underperformed overall. Worldwide? It didn't make much of a mark, sadly. With $99 million overall, it looks like ParaNorman isn't much of a success. It didn't double its $60 million budget. Shame, but Laika will prevail.

Hotel Transylvania - Unlike the two other spooky-themed animated films released this year, Hotel Transylvania was certainly very mainstream and accessible. ParaNorman and Frankenweenie were not mainstream and are overall films that aren't entirely suitable for an audience that wants a specific kind of animated film presented to them (unless it's Pixar making the film). This on the other hand was perfect for casual moviegoers with its star-studded cast, appealing animation and funny jokes. Yes, it's been made clear many times: American audiences would rather see an animated film like this, and not something truly creative or daring like ParaNorman.

It is currently Sony Pictures Animation's biggest film domestically with $143 million and a healthy $308 million take worldwide. The budget? Only $85 million. Again, Sony Animation knows how to make a profit much like Blue Sky and Illumination.

Frankenweenie - Despite some pushy marketing from Disney, this Tim Burton stop-motion critical darling just couldn't do it. It opened low like every other stop-motion film and crept its way up to the mid-$30 million range. Its current worldwide total is $66 million, but that isn't enough to double the $39 million budget. It opens in a few more territories in the next few weeks, so who knows at this rate. Again, another stop-motion film has underperformed.

Wreck-It Ralph - Opening with a strong $49 million (though I had hoped it would've opened with more, but Hurricane Sandy affected the box office somewhat), Wreck-It Ralph was on its way to really wreck the box office. It has done very well so far, it's looking like it'll end up somewhere around $180-$190 million. How come it will fall short of $200 million? With the buzz it has been getting, why won't in reach it? How come it couldn't outgross Tangled?

The final worldwide total is too early to tell, since other countries haven't gotten the film yet (the latest arrival will be in Japan, in March). It's not really making a stir in most countries, but it's got the chance to add a good $200 million overseas and help the great Walt Disney Animation Studios film crack $400 million worldwide. With a $165 million budget, Disney will have a success on their hands if it makes that much. It should, a lot of effort went into it and it better get what it deserves.

Rise of the Guardians - What happened? Well, I looked into it and it seemed like another case where it was a combination of bad things. However, Rise of the Guardians has scored some impressive legs and word of mouth. It should at least hit $100 million by the time it is out of theaters here in the states. Worldwide, it's doing steadily but not spectacularly. Around $300 million seems to be the final amount for this film, which is good but not as much as DreamWorks' films usually do worldwide. It's no flop, but it's no big success.

~

Overall, this was certainly a better year than last year. It wasn't, however, an excellent year like 2009 or 2010. Three films hit $200 million stateside, proving that feature animation can still thrive with mass audiences despite a rather dry year behind it. But it wasn't without disappointments: Rise of the Guardians underperforming was certainly a shock to the animation community, and while it was expected, it was still a bit discouraging to see ParaNorman, Frankenweenie and The Pirates! not doing too well. I was hoping for some sort of stop-motion revolution this year since Coraline was able to do well enough three years back, but alas it did not happen.

Another thing that irks me is that something so obviously commercial like The Lorax could open so high ($70 million) and easily coast to $200 million stateside. Brave did the usual for a Pixar film, though I was hoping it would perform like Up, but this didn't earn the very strong word of mouth that film got. Worldwide, it did well but it was no titan. I guess that was going to happen, like I said earlier. Madagascar 3's success, I felt was deserved, since it was a quality film. I'd take a "good" loud/busy/obnoxious movie over a bad one. Nothing wrong with a busy, chaotic animated film done right. Ice Age's performance, I'm happy with, it shows that people are slowly getting tired of the franchise here in the states. While I'm happy to see Wreck-It Ralph doing well, I was hoping it would crush Brave at the box office being the year's best. Oh well...

What box office performance surprised you this year? What did you predict for these films? Did they match your predictions? Sound off!

Who Will It Be?: Oscar News and Revised Oscar Predictions

As Oscar season gets closer and closer, the more we find out. The critics' circles are currently picking the films they deemed the best of the year. Of course, they also have a slot for animated features. So far, the results have been... Interesting, to say the least.

It seems as if Tim Burton's Frankenweenie is getting a lot of love, on top of getting warm reception from critics. The Boston Society of Film Critics and The New York Film Critics Circle went for Burton's re-imagining of his 1984 short film. I have not seen the film yet, but I'm happy to see that stop-motion is getting some form of recognition.

Another stop-motion great got props from the Washington DC Area Film Critics, Laika's brilliant ParaNorman. How this one isn't edging out Frankenweenie on its story, creativity and originality is beyond me. Not that I'm decrying Frankenweenie, it could very well be a better film or one that's equally supreme, but ParaNorman seemed like it would be the year's best-received stop motion film.

The National Board of Review was the only force rooting for Disney's Wreck-It Ralph, which is the film I am personally rooting for in the race (as well as the Annies, of course). Perhaps the video game theme, the loud and busy pacing of the film and the familiar story turned off other critics. Or maybe they just felt that it held the film back from being the best of the year. That being said, it's still a very well-received film that's sure to at least get a nomination. I'm glad that one circle called it the best.

Brave, on the other hand, hasn't gotten any love. I have a strong feeling that the Academy Awards are just going to leave Pixar's film out of the race, since it got good-but-not-great critical reception. Then again, it was relatively more successful with critics than most of the films released this year, so it may get by on that. Disney's "For Your Consideration" ads are effective and striking, but who knows where that will get the film.

So what does that mean for this year's Best Animated Feature category? Here are my revised predictions for the Oscars.

Earlier Predictions

Brave

The Painting

ParaNorman

Rise of the Guardians

Wreck-It Ralph

Current Predictions

Brave

Frankenweenie

ParaNorman

The Rabbi's Cat

Wreck-It Ralph

I had assumed that The Painting, a 2011 French animated film that will be released here this year, would be the foreign title to snag a nomination. This is the Academy's deal now, as they want to honor animated films from around the world instead of American endeavors. However, I think the nomination will go to another French-Austrian animated film, The Rabbi's Cat. This hand-drawn animated film also got a nomination for Best Animated Film in the Annie Awards, so I think it'll be the Academy's foreign animated pick.

I eliminated Rise of the Guardians, as the reviews were positive but the consensus is that it isn't anything beyond something simple. DreamWorks is pushing for a Best Picture nomination for this film (and Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted, which is absurd if you ask me), but I have a feeling that it will be left out of the race due to the reception it has gotten plus the box office numbers. The Academy Awards won't nominate a film that's deemed a box office dud or failure. This doesn't apply to independently released foreign films, for the most part. The Academy does tend to contradict the "box office" rule. (After it, it is the Academy Awards...)

I kept Brave and Wreck-It Ralph, because both films got better reception than most of the animated films released this year. Brave might be axed in the end if the Academy doesn't feel like giving three slots to Disney, or if some behind-the-scenes work gets it booted out. There's no way Frankenweenie can be cut at this rate, given the acclaim it's getting, but the box office returns may hold it back from winning. Wreck-It Ralph got a small piece of the acclaim, but Brave didn't get any. It might just not make it.

But if Brave were to go, what would take it's place? Another foreign animated film? Perhaps the Academy will also nominate The Painting or something else. Maybe Aardman's The Pirates! Band of Misfits? That got warm reception, though a few dissenting voices thought it could've been better. Anything else? Well something like The Lorax or Hotel Transylvania certainly has no chance, so it's either Brave or a foreign film. I still think Brave has a good chance because the film still got praise from a good number of critics. The critical reception was Cars-level.

ParaNorman also remains on board given some of the love it's gotten, and there's no way the Academy Awards should snub the film because it's a Laika film, the critical reception was great and the film is seen as a real game changer for animation (which I believe it is).

So there you have it, three Disney releases (unprecedented), a foreign feature and a Laika film. Out of those, who do you think would take home the prize?

What are your Best Animated Feature predictions?

Endless Possibilities

Disney wants it. Director Rich Moore is enthusiastic about it. Fans want it, too. What do they want?

A sequel to Wreck-It Ralph...

If Disney will approve of a sequel to Rich Moore's video game adventure comedy, it'll be a rare moment where Walt Disney Animation Studios will actually produce a theatrical sequel to one of their animated films. In their 89 years of existence, only two sequels have been produced: The Rescuers Down Under and Fantasia 2000, though calling the latter a "sequel" per se, is debatable. You could also argue that Winnie the Pooh is a sequel to The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, but I've never seen it officially listed as a sequel to the 1977 film.

Out of all the canon films, Wreck-It Ralph begs for a sequel since the first one took place in an arcade and three game worlds. Like Toy Story, there's so many other worlds outside of Litwak's to explore, from console games to massive online games. Moore has made some comments on a sequel over the last few weeks, but recently, he mentioned that he wants Mario to make an appearance this time.

Mario did not appear in Wreck-It Ralph because the team felt that him making a cameo appearance wasn't enough, not because it would've cost too much to include him. If Moore does want the famed Italian plumber in the film, that means that he'll have to have a bigger role. Perhaps he, and other licensed characters, could play a more important role in the plot in the sequel. Some were hoping that Q*Bert, Sonic and the other characters featured in the marketing would have good-sized roles in the story, but they obviously didn't.

Moore also talked about a game world that was completely scrapped from the film, a Grand Theft Auto/Sims parody called Extreme EZ Livin' 2. It being included in a sequel was alluded to, so maybe that'll make a comeback. Again, there so much they can tackle in a sequel and throw in some witty satire for good measure.

So if Wreck-It Ralph 2 is a go, I'll root for it, especially with Moore returning to the helm. Rarely do I encourage sequels, but this one has a lot of potential.

"Wreck-It Ralph" Scribe Will Co-Direct "Frozen"

Walt Disney Animation Studio's Frozen is not due out until November 27, 2013, but it's probably in some form of production right now. However, Disney surprisingly added another director to the project today, Wreck-It Ralph screenwriter Jennifer Lee.

This raises a lot of questions. First off, why so late in the game? Was something not working with what director Chris Buck had? It's no secret that Disney's adaptation of The Snow Queen was on and off at the studio for many years, dating back to the 1990s even. Perhaps the problems from the earlier versions are still present?

Or did Disney feel the need to add her to the project due to Wreck-It Ralph's success? If so, that seems like a bizarre move. Sure, Lee and Phil Johnson's screenplay for Wreck-It Ralph was a winner, but wouldn't Disney bring her on board the project as a writer and not a director? It all seems strange...

What are your thoughts on this move?

"Ralph" Holds On, "Guardians" Disappoints

It looks as if one animated film was able to soar this past weekend, while another one didn't do the same...

Thanksgiving weekend is normally a lucrative time for box office, but this weekend in particular was massive thanks to big blockbusters with good word of mouth like Skyfall, but this weekend also worked in Wreck-It Ralph's favor. Disney's current animated champion is now sitting at $149 million at the domestic box office, and it's only going to go higher thanks to the very positive buzz (that it rightfully deserves) it's getting. Wreck-It Ralph was also able to hold its ground against Life of Pi and Rise of the Guardians, both 3D and marketed to the family audience. Life of Pi however was mis-marketed, a film that I can't see as something appealing to family audiences. It still opened well for a film in the league. (And yes, I saw the film, I thought it was stunning.)

DreamWorks' Rise of the Guardians on the other hand didn't exactly rise. The film only opened with $23 million over the three-day weekend and it didn't get much of a boost from its Wednesday opening either. I was hoping that this film would be a big success for DreamWorks since their output has been consistently (for the most part) good for a while, plus the critical reception for this film was mostly positive. So what happened?

From what I gathered from all the pre-release buzz, the film most likely opened poorly because the concept just didn't appeal despite the fact that the trailers did a decent job at making these childhood heroes seem like something to take a bit seriously. To others, it looked too silly. Left and right, people were deemed the concept ridiculous and that it would have a hard time appealing, even to children. Maybe I'm just biased, but I'm surprised that the visuals, the funny bits in the commercials and the spectacle didn't work with audiences.

This opening means that word of mouth is definitely going to save this one, perhaps the way it saved other films that didn't make much on their opening weekends. A How to Train Your Dragon-sized multiplier is out of the question since that film had no family-friendly or animated competition in its way for a while. Rise of the Guardians will have to duke it out with Wreck-It Ralph, Life of Pi, the 3D re-release of Monsters, Inc. and The Hobbit. Can it make it to $100 million domestically? I think it can, what do you think?

What's your take on this weekend box office results?

"Wreck-It Ralph" Blu-ray Cover Artwork Revealed!

Well... Not all of the covers, because we all know Disney's deal: There's the standard combo pack, the big loaded one and the DVD-only release. What's the release date? We don't know yet, but given the usual schedule, this Blu-ray will probably hit stores sometime around March.

It seems like Disney is picking up this "Ultimate Collector's Edition" packaging trend with their recent Blu-rays. Brave was the first to sport this label, and the forthcoming Blu-ray releases of Finding Nemo and Monsters, Inc. 3D will also be Ultimate Collector's Editions.

That being said, I love this cover and the nice gold border. The main image comes from the international poster, which I believe is one of the best posters alongside the original 8-bit teaser poster. What do you think of it?

Disney's 8-Bit Hero

The following review is spoiler-heavy...

“Sure must be nice being the good guy...”

So laments the colossal Wreck-It Ralph (voiced by John C. Reilly), the antagonist of a 1982 arcade game called Fix-It Felix, Jr., to other villains from other video games in an alcoholics anonymous-style meeting called “Bad Anon”. But he’s not really a mean rival to the game’s titular hero (voiced by Jack McBrayer), it’s just his job. To follow the program, to do what’s he supposed to do in his game like everyone else.

Yes indeed, Walt Disney Animation Studios’ 52nd film looks at video games from a Toy Story perspective: What do those characters do once the arcade closes?

This particular Fix-It Felix, Jr. arcade game is housed within Litwak’s Family Fun Center, a good-sized arcade that remained in business for over thirty years (if only more arcades existed in the United States). When the day’s work is done, the various game characters hang out in Game Central Station, which is inside the arcade’s power strip.

Fix-It Felix, Jr. takes place in a quaint and pleasant little city called Niceland. The good people live in a big red brick apartment building, one Ralph wrecks. Why? His home used to be there, a mere tree stump. A sprightly little hero named Fix-It Felix, Jr. undoes his wreckage with a golden magical hammer that fixes the mess in a flash. The object of the game is to fix the building. When the game is conquered, Felix gets a nice medal and the Nicelanders collectively throws Ralph off the building and into a mud pit. He spends every night in a dump. Being the bad guy is Ralph’s job, but the smaller occupants of his game’s big apartment building ostracize him. They don’t invite him to the game’s 30th anniversary party, nor are they nice to him when he shows up anyway.

Fix-It Felix, Jr. himself is a little more sympathetic towards the big brute. Ralph sees how he gets medals and all the love, and he wishes, just for once, to get that kind of respect. He sees more to life than just programming, though he is warned by Mortal Kombat villain Kano (who even shows us his classic fatality move) to not mess with the program. He is warned not to “go turbo”. The impatient Mayor of Niceland, Gene, only drives Ralph to prove himself. You ultimately feel for this character very early on, he just wants to be treated fairly despite being a building-destroying goliath.

It’s your basic “bad guy wants to be good” story, and you might be saying "That's too much like Despicable Me and Megamind." Not really. Wreck-It Ralph has what those two 2010 animated films didn’t have. Despicable Me, as far as I’m concerned, is really nothing more than a cuddly, fun little entertainer with lots of laughs and a decent story. It’s really nothing beyond that. Megamind? A superhero spoof that also tries on that story, except it doesn’t go any higher than it should and is ultimately stuck in a rather bland screenplay. Gru is established as a big supervillain in Despicable Me, same with Megamind. Ralph is programmed to be the bad guy, something he can't change.

The film is far more passionate. Ralph not only wants to be a good guy because he feels left out, but he's also going to go against the program. Being a story about video games, the writers and creative team don’t back away from accuracy. They didn’t want a trivial film that only had generalizations about video games, they wanted something accurate. A love letter, much like Cars. Most of the games in Litwak’s are real, but the fictional ones like Fix-It Felix, Jr. look like they would not be out of place in an arcade in the 1980s. Accurate, accurate, accurate. You could only imagine how happy I was to see arcade video games portrayed realistically in an animated film. Beforehand, only Toy Story’s arcade heaven Pizza Planet came close.

None of the video game-centric humor is cheap either. I mean, it is a story about video games, why not have that kind of humor? To complain about that seems pointless, it only adds to the atmosphere. The cameos are there for a reason as well, as many have pointed out the Who Framed Roger Rabbit connection. We see tons of cameos from the big ones: Pac-Man, Sonic the Hedgehog, Frogger, Bowser, Dr. Robotnik, Zangief, Bison, Clyde... We also get to see characters and games that may not be as famous. I was beyond happy to see games such as RoadBlasters and Burger Time get referenced in some way.

What really dragged me towards this story was the whole idea of an 8-bit game character. As a kid, I loved the minimalism of retro video games and still do to this day. There’s something about them that can’t be beat. I’d always buy compilations of arcade classics, and went through a phase where I looked up lists upon lists of arcade games that were released from the 1970s until the 1990s. I played numerous collections from Namco, Atari and Midway. I took a great interest in the NES and SNES era, as I mostly grew up being familiar with PlayStation and Nintendo 64, though I had an NES when I was very young.

Being a writer of original stories in my spare time, I often gravitated towards retro games for ideas, ones that never took off. When I first saw the Futurama episode “Anthology of Interest II” (director Rich Moore was animation director of both The Simpsons and Futurama), I got more and more into the idea. That episode presented what life would be like if the world was a video game, with parodies of real game characters. The retro game idea is one I tend to go back to, but a Disney animated film covering that ground got me excited. Disney, of all studios.

When we look at the Disney animated classics from the last twenty-five years, we know the fairy tales, the talking animals films, the big sweeping musicals and the occasional radical experiments like Atlantis: The Lost Empire or Lilo & Stitch. Wreck-It Ralph is more akin to those films, being something that’s out of the current comfort zone for Disney. Disney succumbed to a formula after the success of The Little Mermaid, thanks to a strict business model that stifled creativity in favor of consumer products sales. Whenever they’d make a film like Atlantis and Stitch, it would seem odd because audiences were used to “Disney status quo”.

But John Lasseter and the crew know that sticking to the formula was what hurt Disney animation, along with heavy executive interference. This is why everything after the regime change at Disney in 2005 is a significant improvement over most of the work that preceded it. Bolt shocked many who weren’t expecting it to be a halfway decent film, and The Princess and the Frog and Tangled pull some twists on the familiar fairy tale grounds. Walt Disney Animation Studios is now basically like Pixar, they are free from corporate power controlling them. What’s their duty? Make films that’ll last for generations that appeal to both the young and old.

After a few films that covered tried territories, Wreck-It Ralph coming so soon came as a bit of a shock to me. This was a dream come, Disney was finally branching out and doing what they should’ve done two decades ago, but the right way. I was confident that it wouldn’t turn out to be a meddled mess like Atlantis and Treasure Planet. It would be one that had a great story, heart and left you satisfied. Wreck-It Ralph was just that, and then some.

The video game angle makes it unique amongst its animated brethren, even outside of Disney. While most mainstream animation goes for talking animal romps or a tired re-imagining of something we grew up with, Wreck-It Ralph dares to give audiences something different, something creative. Isn’t that what Disney animation should be all about? I think so. Why in the world did Walt Disney try different things with each of his films.

It's great because we live in a world where the family animated feature isn't exclusive to just one studio, and Disney happened to fall under not only due to their problems during the Eisner regime, but the fact that what they were cooking up didn't look entirely original. Chicken Little did expectedly good, but Meet the Robinsons came off as derivative when it came out, ditto Bolt, despite the fact that they turned out good. Wreck-It Ralph differentiates itself from the likes of Sony Animation and Blue Sky's films and other non-Pixar and DreamWorks animated competition.

Wreck-It Ralph is visually one of Disney’s most creative films. I could write a book on how much I loved this film in terms of the look. Everything just screams “wow”. In this film, we are presented with three sprawling video game worlds and a cast of characters that is just as colorful.

The first of which is Fix-It Felix, Jr., with its black sky, simplistic building architecture and minimalist character designs, it does look like a 1980s video game if it were reality. Early on, I was actually wondering if Disney were to tell the Felix portions of the story in 8-bit animation entirely, but that would probably be more of a novelty than a good storytelling device. As such, I was actually pleased with how they ended up portraying this world. All the Nicelanders move like 8-bit game characters, whereas Felix and Ralph, not so much.

Hero’s Duty is easily one of the darkest and coldest environments in a Disney animated film. It obviously spoofs Halo, Gears of War and numerous sci-fi first-person shooters, and they even mix Tron: Legacy’s look into it as well. Skrillex’s thumping soundtrack is a suitable backdrop for this game, something I wasn’t expecting to actually prefer. It rightfully clashes with the two other worlds we see. The rough-n-tough Sergeant Calhoun (voiced perfectly by a no-nonsense Jane Lynch) looks like your typical video game character in this day and age, and would be out of place in an animated film of this caliber: She’s highly realistic, but yet the Disney animators still make her look like a caricature. Now that’s an accomplishment right there. The game’s enemies, the parasitic Cy-Bugs, are nice to look at and have pretty cool designs. The architecture is mostly metallic and unattractive, but intentionally so.

Sugar Rush, where the bulk of the film takes place, is loud and colorful. Pretty much everything in this world is a sweet of some sorts. The audience watching the races? All kinds of goodies. The architecture and the overall design of this place is extremely creative, every visual gag that rolls out in front of you is a nice surprise. Sure, they may lend themselves to some take-it-or-leave-it jokes and puns, but the amount of work here is very satisfying. From the dense candy cane forests to the chilly ice cream mountains, it’s literally eye candy, and that pun is shamelessly intended!

But enough chit-chat about the visuals, let’s just put it this way, it’s a Disney animated film. Of course it’s going to look good! Now how about that story? Wreck-It Ralph’s story does smack of familiarity, and some moments are ones we’ve seen done before in other animated films, though these said moments aren’t done worse. That didn’t bother me, though it does detract from the story a bit. What I cared about most was the characters, and how the screenplay effectively showed its heart.

Like I said earlier, you immediately care for Ralph, who is no flesh-and-blood being but just a virtual entity. All these characters are just great, I loved them. Fix-It Felix, Jr. is the toast of the town in his game, but what I liked about him was that he wasn’t cocky and self-centered. He wasn’t an upstart, he genuinely cared for Ralph and it did show in the first act of the film. He wasn’t so mean to him like everyone else, he struck me as the kind of person who needed to satisfy those who love him while not hurting the guy they don’t like.

Sergeant Calhoun is great, she’s rough, she has a metallic exterior and doesn’t mess around. Felix immediately takes a liking to her and the high definition of her face, and their romance is played for laughs until the end. The tragic-but-hilarious wedding backstory was a nice bonus as well. Then there’s Vanellope von Schweetz (voiced by a hyperactive Sarah Silverman), the obligatory cute character and at times I was worried: Will she be the annoying, wisecracking sidekick? Will she be the one to keep kids laughing, going against the mood of the story? Luckily, no, she isn’t.

She’s simply an outcast, though she doesn’t let it get to her, as seen in her playful but mischievous attitude towards Ralph early on. In fact, her role in the story is incredibly important, which shocked me. She is the unfortunate victim of the film’s main villain. All the other racers in the game treat her terribly, she lives alone and she isn’t allowed to race. Why? She is the game’s glitch, something to be shunned. Now this where the heart begins to ooze, in a typical Disney fashion.

The ruler of Sugar Rush, the pompous and corrupt King Candy (voiced flamboyantly by Alan Tudyk), is hiding something. He was once the title star of an arcade game called Turbo Time, which would soon be overshadowed by Atari’s RoadBlasters (I was so happy to see that game get referenced). He went to that game, and trouble ensued. Mr. Litwak eventually got rid of what he perceived was a malfunctioning game. We are told about Turbo halfway through the film, which explains why Ralph’s game jumping is hazardous to the entire arcade.

Oddly enough, when we first see the Turbo Time machine, it heavily resembles the Namco game Rally-X. I thought it was at first, but saw that the name was different, so I was a bit confused. But take a look at the US cabinet artwork for the 1980 game. It's really cool to see the film referencing the games that aren't what you immediately think of when it comes to the early 1980s.

That being said, what I liked about this villain was that he was already a selfish jerk to begin with. In fact, I was rather surprised when they revealed that he was Turbo during the final act climax. He goes from a mean-spirited pinhead to a menace, as he tries to kill Vanellope in the film's climax. Turbo's design is also kind of unsettling. In his 8-bit form, he has emotionless eyes that stare into your soul (literally) and his grin... He's somewhat creepy because of this. When we see him in his real form, he's pale and he looks like someone gave him black eyes and bleached his skin. When he takes on the form of a Cy-Bug hybrid, it gets even more interesting.

That’s another subplot that keeps the story going, Ralph inadvertently brings a Cy-Bug into Sugar Rush that lays eggs which ultimately make the climax ten times more hectic. Best of all, we don’t know why Turbo has it out for Vanellope until the ending. It's another case where everything we know all locks together at the end. But what happens between Ralph’s game jumping and the reveal of King Candy’s schemes is no disappointment. Felix and Calhoun search for the Cy-Bugs, while Ralph gets to know more about Vanellope and ultimately attempts to help her race. The relationship between the two is semi-brother/sister handled perfectly. Vanellope is a bit obnoxious, but she really does have a heart under that snarky attitude. Not once does the film really slow down, so the second act carefully balances Ralph and Vanellope’s scenes with Felix and Calhoun’s scenes. The romance between Felix and Calhoun is not only hilarious (given how unlikely it is), but it's actually believable though it is one of the more criticized aspects of the film.

In the mean time, the writers pepper everything with humor that works. There are a few candy puns here and there that were a bit cringeworthy, but others were hilarious. Vanellope is mostly funny, though she does tend to crack some potty humor a little too much, and personally, combining toilet humor with a candy-coated setting does not work in any way. Thankfully, it’s not as in-your-face as it was in Disney films like Brother Bear or the earlier DreamWorks films. Aside from that, you have all the video game cameos and the different references. So chances are, you'll laugh at something.

As such, do you have to be in the know about video games in order to enjoy it? I wouldn’t think so, because the majority of the jokes work for non-gamers and the whole concept of it alone is enough to pull you in. As I said, it’s a very creative idea, and the non-gamers who came with me to see the film with were enthralled. I get that from a lot of the critics as well, so the film is appealing whether it’s about video games or not. No matter what it’s about it, it’s the characters and the heart that are most important. Pixar proved that you can tell a story about anything, and still get the masses to go see it. Ralph is no different, it goes beyond the video game setting and can appeal to anyone.

Now with all this about the look and the feel of the film, what about the sound? Henry Jackman’s score matches each video game environment, but the whole tone of the score really does suit what’s going on. Various artists submitted different songs, too. J-pop band AKB48 contributes “Sugar Rush” to accompany the game itself (the film itself is called Sugar Rush in Japan for a good reason), and if there wasn’t a much more perfect fit for such a world, I wouldn’t know. Skrillex’s contribution adds to the loud, tech-heavy world of Hero’s Duty quite wonderfully, and this is coming from someone who normally dislikes this kind of music.

What I could’ve done without was the use of a current pop song like “Shut Up and Drive”, that’ll be dated in a decade. Pixar used contemporary selections for the Cars films, but those songs fit the setting and they won’t necessarily age. That said, it’s few and far in between in this film. Other than that, we get Kool & the Gang “Celebration” for a brief sequence, but that’s a song everyone knows that’s been around for three decades so it won’t seem dated. Owl City’s contribution, “When Can I See You Again?”, is saved for the credits. Even better is Buckner & Garcia’s “Wreck-It, Wreck-It Ralph”. When the first trailer hit earlier this year, I was wondering if “Pac-Man Fever” would get some sort of spotlight. No, they get the two that did the song to do a new one! What more could you ask for? In total, the soundtrack really shines.

The film really does get the atmosphere down pat from the look to the sound. Again, the story is nice and simple but the characters elevate it. The clever little twists and turns only add to it, making for an experience that keeps you glued to the screen. Like any animated comedy, there are going to be the jokes that could make you cringe. Even some Pixar films have this, but the best is, it’s never distracting.

Wreck-It Ralph is essentially a film done in the Disney tradition, but it’s buttered with creativity and genuine dedication. The video game elements are never cheap or half-hearted nods to gamers, they are integrated into this story which again attempts to make sure it entertains anyone who isn’t a gamer. Everything about it feels sincere, it’s made to give everyone both young and old a film they deserve. Director Rich Moore summed it up, “We can’t just tell jokes for 90 minutes. The audience really needs to connect with these characters and identify with their feelings. That’s when a film goes beyond being a movie and becomes an experience.” He went on to say, “My earliest movie-going experience was The Jungle Book. I remember it vividly, not just because it was entertaining, but because it was a great experience shared by the entire family. That’s what I want to give back to families today.”

Wreck-It Ralph is a bona fide winner, while its does have a few kinks that could’ve been ironed out, it’s a feel-good film that’s not afraid to venture out a bit. That’s the Disney I want to see in the future, and it will happen.

Now... John Kahrs’ Paperman...

When Disney first unveiled this short film, I was already impressed by the style they went for. Simplistic but complex, black and white, appropriately soft in structure... Then I realized it was going to be a blend of computer animation and traditional animation. After months of stills and a video about how that style was pulled off, finally seeing the whole seven minutes of it was an absolutely joy.

Such a simple little tale of love, yet it merits a big reaction. Truly an ethereal experience, and one that has a whimsical sincerity that’s right there in the first few frames. What I truly loved what was how the art captured a soft 1950s feel. The decision to tell this story in black and white only adds to it. Everything about it is a gem, and yes, the story itself is charming. Christophe Beck contributes a lighthearted score that complements the feel of the picture, one that immediately fires up when the short film nears its end.

This film is real proof that Walt Disney Animation Studios is capable of innovation in this day and age, and it should remind audiences that they aren’t an outmoded studio. The recent string of films alone should’ve proven this. Disney made such an incredibly wise decision to attach this work of art to Wreck-It Ralph, so everyone could see the beauty of it.

It’s getting praise all across the board, so Disney better take note of this. Animation fans are already hoping that Disney does a full-length animated film in this style. Well, back when this short film was unveiled, it was immediately suggested that the untitled hand-drawn film in development at Disney (directed by the Disney dream duo Ron Clements and John Musker) was going to be done this way. I’ve talked about it in great detail before, and yes, I would be the happiest man if they announced that the film will be done like that. I sincerely hope that it happens.

Make no mistake, Paperman is the first sign of greater things to come. The experiment totally pays off, not only will this add more creativity in a world where computer animated films dominate, it will pave a new road in animation. Perhaps more mainstream animation studios will want to emulate that and be more creative with their projects. You can say that this short was only the beginning...

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