LittleBuford
Well-Known Member
My point was that the obsession with Lightyear’s failure, together with all the doomsaying that accompanies it, is disproportionate. (The same goes for Strange World.)
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Elemental (Pixar - June 2023)
- Thread starter DCBaker
- Start date
erasure fan1
Well-Known Member
But it wasn't just Lightyear. People are down on Pixar because of onward, soul, Luca, turning red... Of their last 5 films, none had that pixar magic. I'm not saying they were all bad, but they sure as heck didn't have major appeal. I'd say it's fair after their last stretch of films to question their ability.
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LittleBuford
Well-Known Member
I loved Onward (one of my personal favourites) and Luca and thought they had plenty of Pixar magic, so I’m obviously not going to agree with your assessment.
Before I overreact, I need to ask what do you mean?
erasure fan1
Well-Known Member
That's why I said they didn't have major appeal. I liked Luca the most but I wouldn't put it in near the same league as a nemo or incredibles 1... I like Thor 2 but most think it's the absolute bottom of the mcu. Heck, I loved Transformers 1 and 2 but I wouldn't try and convince anyone that they are absolute quality cinema.
The point being, it's ok to like something, while at the same time understanding it might not have hit with the masses. Personally I'm critical of Disney and Pixar, not because I'm a "hater troll" like some here like to label people who don't swoon over everything. But because I want them to be the gold standard again.
It was just one film… before you mention Soul, Turning Red, and Luca… we will never know how those would of done since those were streaming only…not theatrical
Nah, there are people on these forums purporting that the recent financial and/or critical duds means Disney as a whole has entered a new phase such that their current leadership and talent can no longer make the successes of the past and thus the complete collapse of the company and/or their studios. Thus, the successes of the past are irrelevant.
But we do know that they got the same high marks from critics and audiences that the previous 'magical' successes had.
erasure fan1
Well-Known Member
I already mentioned them. And here's the thing. The box office doesn't matter in my statements. I said they didn't have major appeal. If a movie can't hit D+ and people still love it, and it become a hit that people talk about long after release, Disney has a problem. Onwards box office was cut short, but it wasn't really making waves anyway. Turning red, Disney obviously knew it wasn't good. Plenty of people were going back to the theaters by that release. As far as soul and Luca go, very few care outside of, it was ok. "Baby yoda" became a cultural phenomenon not going to theaters.
Can they go back? Of course. Do they have the talent and leadership on staff, right now, to do it? Absolutely not in my opinion. We'll have to see what the next ceo decides they want to do. I see no chance under Iger we see any real resurgence. Do you honestly think that they have the creative talent on staff at this moment? And if so, then what's the issue? Why is so much coming out of Disney that isn't hitting the masses?
95% on the Tomatometer
82% on the combined RT and Metacritic scores
70% on the combined RT and IMDB audience score.
That may not be in the stratosphere like Coco or Toy Story 4, but for movies overall, those are excellent scored.
Not at all "wasn't good."
Prince-1
Well-Known Member
Some people on here use their own opinion as "facts".
BrianLo
Well-Known Member
Also we need to reiterate Turning Red was the second biggest streaming movie of the year, behind Encanto. On any platform.
doctornick
Well-Known Member
Yes, that would be my question. How would we "truly" know if those D+ streamed movies were "successful"? What exactly is the appropriate criteria?
For that matter, even some of the highly regarded Pixar releases of the past, box office wasn't exactly exceptional (e.g. Wall-E or Ratatouille) so a lot of the rep is based on critic and audience scores. And recent movies like Soul, Luca, Turning Red generally did well in those categories.
Personally - and I stress this is just my opinion - I would argue that Luca and Soul while maybe not the greatest are in the realm of quality of great Pixar films and Turning Red and Onward and even Lightyear were perfectly okay movies and way better than some past clunkers like Cars 2, Good Dinosaur and Brave. I have reasonable expectations that Elemental will be a quality film even if it isn't peak Pixar. That doesn't mean it will do great at the box office - the competition is not ideal - but I think it will likely be good.
erasure fan1
Well-Known Member
Then why not release it in the theater? Covid is not an excuse. And as a secondary, so now metacritic and tomato scores are something to look at? I was told on the Peter pan and Wendy thread that you couldn't trust it. But I guess when it fits the narrative it's ok?
When did I say my opinion was fact? It's kind of assumed that what people say is their opinion on a, holy cow, wait for it..... Message board. What's funny is you are one of the biggest offenders of what you claim. If prince1 doesn't agree with what you have to say, be prepared. Oh wait, nevermind, even if you do agree with something he'll spin it around anyway. All hail king of the laugh emoji!
doctornick
Well-Known Member
At the time, Disney was still pushing to put higher profile content on D+ since the pandemic delayed production for original content. I don’t personally agree with pushing quite so many intended for theater films to streaming (especially all the Pixar films) but it seems they felt they needed something more to show in early 2022.
that is why they submitted Turning Red for Oscar consideration for which it was nominated
I didn't say that in the Wendy thread.
When one looks at online audience scores, one has to be careful. After all, it's not scientific. These are self-selecting reviewers and that attracts the extremes.
One also has to look at whether the websites one is looking at have a way to vet their reviewers to reduce bots and score-bombing , in which people angry at some idea of the movie want to make it look bad, even though they've never seen it.
That's why the IMDB one is useful because they can get hundreds of thousands of reviewers, making a thousand or two bombers votes meaningless.
And it helps if you have a CinemaScore grade, which is a scientific (randomized) polling of the audience on opening weekend. And it helps to see if the audience score is wildly off from the critics' score. If all the scores are in sync... well, there's no reason to distrust one of the scores.
As to why Turning Red didn't go into the theaters?... It did. Internationally. Where D+ wasn't in place. It was the last of the Pixar movies to go directly to D+ in the U.S.
At that time, both Bobs were on board with making D+ win the streaming wars with the tactic of getting as many subs as possible. And they didn't care about the cost or the needs of the rest of the company. Their stated goal, stated many times, was that D+ was Disney's top priority.
And that's why some Pixar movies when directly to D+.
Not because Disney panicked thinking it wouldn't do well in theaters.
Turning Red being sent to streaming was a mistake, and I think it was a factor in Chapek being forced out.
It would be fair to say though that Pixar has to earn their brand cache back after Lightyear. No Pixar theatrical release before had bombed as badly as that movie, and this will need great reviews to be even a modest financial success. That said I'm quite hyped for this, first Pixar romance since WALL-E which is my favorite movie of theirs (Thomas Newman did the film score for both that movie and this one, so extra hype there), and I think Peter Sohn's last directing effort is the studio's most underrated work by far. Also this is going to be screening at Cannes three weeks before release, and the only other Pixar movies that have done that have been Up and Inside Out, so they must have some pretty strong faith in this.
It would be fair to say though that Pixar has to earn their brand cache back after Lightyear. No Pixar theatrical release before had bombed as badly as that movie, and this will need great reviews to be even a modest financial success. That said I'm quite hyped for this, first Pixar romance since WALL-E which is my favorite movie of theirs (Thomas Newman did the film score for both that movie and this one, so extra hype there), and I think Peter Sohn's last directing effort is the studio's most underrated work by far. Also this is going to be screening at Cannes three weeks before release, and the only other Pixar movies that have done that have been Up and Inside Out, so they must have some pretty strong faith in this.
erasure fan1
Well-Known Member
I didn't say you did. I read in the thread that because of review bombing, you couldn't take it seriously.
The problem is review bombing goes both ways. There's nothing stopping people from going on the review sites and giving movies perfect scores. My point was, people can't say Peter pan and Wendy reviews aren't proof that the movie wasn't good. Then say it's proof that turning red was great.
It's just a bit hard to believe that Disney would sacrifice the box office completely if they thought the movie was going to hit mass appeal. They could have released it for the standard 45ish days then go D+.
Disney purposely was eating billions of dollars in deficits to win the streaming wars. So, it doesn't strain credulity for me.