Wish (Walt Disney Animation - November 2023)

[LittleBuford]

Japan was one of the few exceptions, and even there, apparently Magnifico is the fan-favorite character because that country's culture is big on respect, so he comes off as even more unintentionally sympathetic to those audiences!

Do you have a source for this? I’m struggling to understand why Japanese audiences would like the film overall given that it vilifies a character you say they hold in high regard.

 

[Miss Rori]

Do you have a source for this? I’m struggling to understand why Japanese audiences would like the film overall given that it vilifies a character you say they hold in high regard.

This is fairly anecdotal to be honest, but TvTropes explaining how well the film did there (in general, it had a very strong marketing campaign that even tied into local hits like Spy X Family) explain that in the Japanese dub, stuff like "This Is the Thanks I Get?!" was translated in such a way that it emphasized how Magnifico was upset about the disrespect others were suddenly showing him - after all, he is the king who founded this peaceful realm - and respect for elders is a huge deal in Japanese culture. Between that, his sympathetic backstory (which goes some way to explaining why he was so desperate to hang on to power) and his being a charismatic and handsome villain - really, not far off from the kinds of antagonists often seen in Japanese media, especially that aimed at young girls/women - he's a real love to hate/hate to love character there, and there's some more sympathy shown to him because in the end, he went full-on-evil because he just wanted respect!

(A comparison point might be how in Japan the most popular character on The Simpsons is Lisa because she is a diligent, if highly principled, student. The show saw more success in that country once the importers realized that and deemphasized Bart, whom they see as simply a disrespectful brat, in the marketing and such.)

 

[Miss Rori]

I should further clarify: Come on, the villains are traditionally one of the most popular parts of the classic Disney movies with everybody! In the case of Wish it's just more pronounced because the other characters just don't seem to click with a lot of viewers, and Magnifico's actions and motivations are a little easier to rationalize than, say, Maleficent or Gaston's. I think the filmmakers missed a trick in rethinking the plot so that he actually had a sympathetic backstory, because if they were going to do that, then they might as well have given him a redemption arc in the end. (I've seen comparisons made to Abeula Alma, who made her family stressed and miserable for two generations out of a misguided belief in a greater good above all. For some viewers it feels like Magnifico is being condemned for having a few bad days.) In fact, a lot of people who disliked or even liked the movie thought there was a lot of wasted potential by not having him and Amaya be straight-up classic evil, which would have been simpler but more exciting.

 

[LittleBuford]

I should further clarify: Come on, the villains are traditionally one of the most popular parts of the classic Disney movies with everybody!

No-one ever questioned that. Acknowledging that villains are popular is very different from claiming that Japanese audiences admired Magnifico as something approaching a hero (yet still managed to enjoy a film that clearly portrayed him as the bad guy).

 

[celluloid]

No-one ever questioned that. Acknowledging that villains are popular is very different from claiming that Japanese audiences admired Magnifico as something approaching a hero (yet still managed to enjoy a film that clearly portrayed him as the bad guy).

It makes sense in that culture as they like such complexities and have an eastern history of government and leadership.

 

[Sir_Cliff]

I should further clarify: Come on, the villains are traditionally one of the most popular parts of the classic Disney movies with everybody! In the case of Wish it's just more pronounced because the other characters just don't seem to click with a lot of viewers, and Magnifico's actions and motivations are a little easier to rationalize than, say, Maleficent or Gaston's. I think the filmmakers missed a trick in rethinking the plot so that he actually had a sympathetic backstory, because if they were going to do that, then they might as well have given him a redemption arc in the end. (I've seen comparisons made to Abeula Alma, who made her family stressed and miserable for two generations out of a misguided belief in a greater good above all. For some viewers it feels like Magnifico is being condemned for having a few bad days.) In fact, a lot of people who disliked or even liked the movie thought there was a lot of wasted potential by not having him and Amaya be straight-up classic evil, which would have been simpler but more exciting.

I wonder a little whether my reaction is shaped by the fact my work involves dealing with politics in Latin America where there are often competing narratives about who are the good guys and who are the bad guys. For example, it was the fiftieth anniversary of the 1973 coup in Chile a few months before Wish came out and I attended quite a few seminars where there was a lot of discussion about the remaining divisions in Chilean society over whether Allende or Pinochet was more the dictator or the liberator. Perhaps that's part of the reason it did not seem so straightforward to me who I should be rooting for when weighing up the pros and cons of what Magnifico and Asha were offering!

 

[LittleBuford]

It makes sense in that culture as they like such complexities and have an eastern history of government and leadership.

That seems more than a little essentialising to me.

 

[celluloid]

That seems more than a little essentialising to me.

Saying any audience the size of a country and larger culture receiving a film would be. Different than a monolith. Just big enough to be well received in its culture. It is not a shocking claim. Japanese films love dealing with such complexities differently that the melodrama take of the typical United States audience. No shock.

 

[Miss Rori]

For example, it was the fiftieth anniversary of the 1973 coup in Chile a few months before Wish came out and I attended quite a few seminars where there was a lot of discussion about the remaining divisions in Chilean society over whether Allende or Pinochet was more the dictator or the liberator. Perhaps that's part of the reason it did not seem so straightforward to me who I should be rooting for when weighing up the pros and cons of what Magnifico and Asha were offering!

Interesting. Walter Chaw's (negative) review at Film Freak Central discusses how Wish might have played differently for him if it opened before the current escalation of conflicts in the Middle East: "...all I can think about is all the dead children chalked up as casualties of an inevitable religious war designed to bring about the end of the world by the death cult we have collectively voted into power. This suffering is the product of wishes, too–the ones had by “good” people worshiping “good” religions. Asha and the plight of her little buddies hits differently now than it would have a year ago, six months ago. King Magnifico–white, bearded, unshakeable in the belief of the correctness of his wisdom–hits differently as well; the idea that a cult leader or a nation of people not doing a good job of disguising how quickly they turn to retribution and tribalism might see the hell they’ve created as utopia is possibly the only thing I found realistic about Wish, even as Wish promises that what you’re seeing when you’re watching a horror movie’s resolution [Magnifico being imprisoned forever and everybody free to pursue their wishes, because what will they do after they are all realized?] is something good instead of something depressing."

 

[Miss Rori]

Thank you so much for the update. How very nice of you to respond to my question.

No problem. If you type "Disney Wish movie" into Google to look up current news, close to the only "news" to be found are clickbait articles from nerd-media sites asking when the movie will start streaming, which inevitably end with variations on "Maybe soon?"

 

[Sir_Cliff]

Interesting. Walter Chaw's (negative) review at Film Freak Central discusses how Wish might have played differently for him if it opened before the current escalation of conflicts in the Middle East: "...all I can think about is all the dead children chalked up as casualties of an inevitable religious war designed to bring about the end of the world by the death cult we have collectively voted into power. This suffering is the product of wishes, too–the ones had by “good” people worshiping “good” religions. Asha and the plight of her little buddies hits differently now than it would have a year ago, six months ago. King Magnifico–white, bearded, unshakeable in the belief of the correctness of his wisdom–hits differently as well; the idea that a cult leader or a nation of people not doing a good job of disguising how quickly they turn to retribution and tribalism might see the hell they’ve created as utopia is possibly the only thing I found realistic about Wish, even as Wish promises that what you’re seeing when you’re watching a horror movie’s resolution [Magnifico being imprisoned forever and everybody free to pursue their wishes, because what will they do after they are all realized?] is something good instead of something depressing."

I must admit that I didn't connect Wish to what is currently happening in Gaza, but it is probably the first Disney film I haven't been able to disconnect from broader thoughts about politics. In my case, this was in a negative sense. I wonder if this has to do with the fact that most Disney films deal with issues on the level of the individual, whereas Wish was more about how you run a society, particularly the tensions between the collective good and individual freedom?

I know this will invite comments about thinking too much about the plot of an animated feature, but I feel films from Beauty & the Beast, Aladdin, Lion King, Pocahontas and Hercules to Frozen, Moana, and Encanto were focussed more on dilemmas characters faced in their own lives that had to be resolved in a way that was true to themselves and established their character. Wish, on the other hand, dealt more with a system of government.

 

[Miss Rori]

I know this will invite comments about thinking too much about the plot of an animated feature, but I feel films from Beauty & the Beast, Aladdin, Lion King, Pocahontas and Hercules to Frozen, Moana, and Encanto were focussed more on dilemmas characters faced in their own lives that had to be resolved in a way that was true to themselves and established their character. Wish, on the other hand, dealt more with a system of government.

If you know where to look you'll find really funky interpretations of Wish. Some see it as anti-Christian ("I'm a Star"'s messaging often gets brought up in those, and/or how Magnifico is a God-like figure whose judgments Asha questions and rebels against), one YouTuber saw it as nihilistic (since it's easy to read the message as "Your desires are all-important to your being, and if the system doesn't give them to you, destroy it"), some see it as woke (brown girl and diverse friends destroy the near-utopia established by a white guy), some see it as not-woke (Asha destroys a communistic system where people aren't free to realize their desires!).

 

[LittleBuford]

Saying any audience the size of a country and larger culture receiving a film would be. Different than a monolith. Just big enough to be well received in its culture. It is not a shocking claim. Japanese films love dealing with such complexities differently that the melodrama take of the typical United States audience. No shock.

I don’t understand what you’re trying to say, but I’m happy to move on.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

To be honest, I am sceptical that it will suddenly find an audience on streaming because I didn't think the film was particularly good. Elemental and Encanto, on the other hand, I thought were great, so I'm not surprised they did so well on streaming. I'm remaining open-minded, though, to the possibility that Wish was ultimately better than its disastrous initial reception suggests and will find some kind of audience once it is more widely available.

I would have thought something about the film would have caught on by now if it was going to, though. That includes the music, which obviously people who did go and see it weren't rushing to buy or stream. Who knows, maybe there is a We Don't Talk About Bruno sleeper hit in there, but I'm not seeing where so far.

This is how I feel too.

Remember that neither Encanto, or even Frozen, were sensations right out of the gate. It took time for word of mouth to build, but it did within a couple of months.

Its been 4 months since Wish's release. If there was any genuine word of mouth momentum, we would know by now.

People talk about how older Disney films found their audiences years later, but the whole strategy and significance of Disney re-releases is a far cry from what it used to be and there is substantially more content produced now competing for attention. The days of millions of people buying a movie ticket or some random Disney title on VHS just because it's a Disney release and there's nothing else for kids to watch are long gone. And Disney movies are too safe to find some ironic counter-culture following like Alice in Wonderland or Fantasia either. It's the reason why Atlantis and Treasure Planet are still not profitable classics, even if some people are nostalgic for them.

 

[Miss Rori]

Its been 4 months since Wish's release. If there was any genuine word of mouth momentum, we would know by now.

People talk about how older Disney films found their audiences years later, but the whole strategy and significance of Disney re-releases is a far cry from what it used to be and there is substantially more content produced now competing for attention. The days of millions of people buying a movie ticket or some random Disney title on VHS just because it's a Disney release and there's nothing else for kids to watch are long gone. And Disney movies are too safe to find some ironic counter-culture following like Alice in Wonderland or Fantasia either.

This. It's one of the saddest things about how the U.S. entertainment industry works these days - that the market is so flooded with content that something has to be a hit out of the gate or it's over. Even if it is a hit, will it stick with audiences the way pre-New Tens successes do? The Beauty and the Beast remake made a billion dollars. And...what since? Do people quote memorable lines from the total Marvel Cinematic Universe the way they do beaucoup lines from the original Jurassic Park alone?

Today a wonderful retrospective of the output of the short-lived but ambitious Sanrio Films was posted. Older posters who had The Disney Channel in the '80s or recall the days when every town had someone renting VHS tapes may well remember some of these Japanese-American co-productions, many animated, such as The Mouse and His Child or the Unico anime features.

Sanrio Film's Extravagant Quest To Be The Next Disney - Aftermath

From 1977 to 1986, Sanrio Film embarked on a journey to do the impossible: become the next Disney, at the behest of its CEO Shintaro Tsuji.

aftermath.site

I am fascinated by '70s and '80s "family movies", including those of Disney's "dark period", because they are so much more interesting than most (not all) of what's aimed at that market now, not least because they are often not safe. And they had a chance to find their audiences in the aftermarket of home media. That is no longer an option for even Disney. If beautiful films like Kubo and the Two Strings or the Guillermo del Toro Pinocchio struggle to find their audiences in this environment, something like Wish is going to have it even harder. But who knows, miracles can happen.

 

[celluloid]

This. It's one of the saddest things about how the U.S. entertainment industry works these days - that the market is so flooded with content that something has to be a hit out of the gate or it's over. Even if it is a hit, will it stick with audiences the way pre-New Tens successes do? The Beauty and the Beast remake made a billion dollars. And...what since? Do people quote memorable lines from the total Marvel Cinematic Universe the way they do beaucoup lines from the original Jurassic Park alone?

Today a wonderful retrospective of the output of the short-lived but ambitious Sanrio Films was posted. Older posters who had The Disney Channel in the '80s or recall the days when every town had someone renting VHS tapes may well remember some of these Japanese-American co-productions, many animated, such as The Mouse and His Child or the Unico anime features.

Sanrio Film's Extravagant Quest To Be The Next Disney - Aftermath

From 1977 to 1986, Sanrio Film embarked on a journey to do the impossible: become the next Disney, at the behest of its CEO Shintaro Tsuji.

aftermath.site

I am fascinated by '70s and '80s "family movies", including those of Disney's "dark period", because they are so much more interesting than most (not all) of what's aimed at that market now, not least because they are often not safe. And they had a chance to find their audiences in the aftermarket of home media. That is no longer an option for even Disney. If beautiful films like Kubo and the Two Strings or the Guillermo del Toro Pinocchio struggle to find their audiences in this environment, something like Wish is going to have it even harder. But who knows, miracles can happen.

It is a great case for physical media, as Disney is not wanting to rush Wish to Disney Plus but is happy to sell it on dvd for those who enjoy it. On Streaming,

There are exceptions to your point of content being pumped out. Theatrically, it was a great time for Godzilla Minus one and other great films that played for so long and made more profit than they likely ever would have before.
There were a few slow burns last year that caught on because they were good and word of mouth. So I see things as slowly going back to that.

 

[BrianLo]

This is how I feel too.

Remember that neither Encanto, or even Frozen, were sensations right out of the gate. It took time for word of mouth to build, but it did within a couple of months.

Its been 4 months since Wish's release. If there was any genuine word of mouth momentum, we would know by now.

Now I’m actually not making bets to the contrary, because I still remain a bit confused why the movie landed as poorly as it did. But Frozen had theatrical word of mouth and Encanto a very tight D+ release frame. Wish is essentially not available to its core audience, which has been previously hyper trained to wait for streaming.

I find it interesting from a profitability lens how our three holiday releases are being framed, versus an actual longevity lens. I’ll admit Migration has a tail of greater significance and if it goes to Netflix will have far more exposure.

But none of those three movies were very popular ultimately. Again profit is irrespective of popularity. They all sold roughly the same number of tickets. Trolls a little less, Migration a little more.

All three need their time in the streaming sun to see if they are being carried forward or buried.

 

[BrianLo]

I think it would be odd to add Asha to the Princess lineup, and not just because the art book explicitly points out she's not a princess (or even a chief's daughter, thank you Maui!) but an ordinary person who makes good. There's the fact that the movie already has some royal characters in it like Queen Amaya and it would be weird to act like she's an adopted daughter or something! The one non-princess princess I can think of offhand is Mulan, and that was largely so there could be a non-white character in the line who was more recognizable than Pocahontas. There's already an official black princess with Tiana so Asha wouldn't add anything new. It's like how Mirabel's wildly popular but hasn't been added to the line.

I think Encanto is being treated like its own franchise, similar to Frozen. I also wouldn’t be surprised if Mirabel isn’t the obvious solo primary lead in the (inevitable) follow up.

The princess branding is more of a wrapper to prop up many films together. Which critically excludes Frozen. One wonders if they wish they could unwind Moana, or alternatively are happy they have a legitimately popular recent princess in the stable.

I have no idea though and appreciate Asha really isn’t a princess in any fashion. It’s a bit sticky since the king is the villain, so there is far more of a traditional European royalty lens. It feels like there was a script treatment once upon a time where she was a princess.

 

[Miss Rori]

I have no idea though and appreciate Asha really isn’t a princess in any fashion. It’s a bit sticky since the king is the villain, so there is far more of a traditional European royalty lens. It feels like there was a script treatment once upon a time where she was a princess.

I don't know if there ever was such a treatment, but the idea of her being a princess, and specifically Magnifico and Amaya's daughter, has been picked up by fanfic writers creating alternate continuity stories. (Fan writers also like to play with the concepts that were mooted but dropped, like Star having a human form and Amaya being evil.)

 

[Sir_Cliff]

If you know where to look you'll find really funky interpretations of Wish. Some see it as anti-Christian ("I'm a Star"'s messaging often gets brought up in those, and/or how Magnifico is a God-like figure whose judgments Asha questions and rebels against), one YouTuber saw it as nihilistic (since it's easy to read the message as "Your desires are all-important to your being, and if the system doesn't give them to you, destroy it"), some see it as woke (brown girl and diverse friends destroy the near-utopia established by a white guy), some see it as not-woke (Asha destroys a communistic system where people aren't free to realize their desires!).

We are kind of in a weird moment when people are reading all sorts of things into these films, but in the specific case of Wish I kind of get it. My view was honestly that it tended toward the libertarian end of things as the message seemed to be that no trade off in terms of collective welfare was worth giving up individual freedom, even if it is completely voluntary because you don't realise what you are really giving up. So, basically, abolish the state. That said, it was a little contradictory in that Rosas still ended up with a monarchy after a revolution based on that principle.

The thing with this film that is so unusual, though, is that I suspect that wasn't the intent of the filmmakers.