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Pixar's Next Three Films Will Be Sequels
brumgrunt writes "Should we be worried? As Pixar, with Up, once more proves itself to be home to some of the most original and daring blockbusters on the planet, the news that its next three films are likely to be sequels — with the confirmation of Monsters, Inc. 2 — gives cause for concern. Are commercial pressures catching up with one of our most inventive movie companies?"
You shouldn't worry. Shut up and get a life.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
...either sequels or remakes?
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Looks like they already made prequels as well
My UID is prime... is yours?
Toy Story 2 and GoodFather 2 where good examples. I have to admit that I liked cars more than Toy Story 2 but I loved Monsters Inc so I am actually looking forward to these.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
And sequels are safer bets.
Or this is just speculation and/or distorted information as the result of a long game of telephone, like the content of most articles you find posted on slashdot these days.
Assuming Pixar's "competition" will continue to be such "gems" as Madagascar 2, Ice Age 2 or whatever Shrek sequel is coming down the pipeline, there's nothing to worry about. Now if John Lasseter leaves, then we might be able to talk about Pixar going downhill.
Freedom is drinking a beer in the park when you're supposed to be at work.
The next three films are likely to be sequels? The article doesn't even make that claim. The person who wrote the summary likely thinks tha Pixar just "pops out" these films. In fact, they usually take about 4 years.
A cat can't teach a dog to bark.
This is Disney's modus operandi. The differences are that Pixar films have great story lines and aren't musicals. Other than that, I for one totally expected that Disney would start making sequels. Guess what's next...limited re-releases.
Other than this text, there is no discernible information contained in this sig.
I would not put Shrek 3 in any sort of comment talking about how sequels can be good...
-- the cake is a lie
Sigh.
First of all, Pixar has two announced films not mentioned here - The Bear and the Bow and Newt - both of which are original properties. Bear and the Bow is slated to share 2011 with Cars 2, and Newt is set for 2012.
Second of all, the suggestion that the "most likely" date for Monsters Inc 2 is 2012 is tenuous at best. The only time in the last decade Pixar has had a director do two films with only three years in between is when Brad Bird did Ratatouille three years after The Incredibles, and that was him coming on a film in mid-production. If Docter is directing it, it would be surprising to see it before 2013.
This story, in other words, is nonsense - the only actual content to it is that there's a sequel to Monsters Inc.
Philip Sandifer's academic website
Pixar's next three films won't all be sequels. Toy Story 3 and Cars 2 will be followed by two original films: The Bear and the Bow, and Newt. Since it was just announced, Monsters Inc. 2 will presumably be sometime after that.
Both incorrect itself (or couldn't even be bothered with IMDB) and its assumptions are misquoted blogspam.
So, let's see, confirmed on Pixar's future agenda (as we know now);
Toy Story 3 (2010)
John Carter of Mars (2012)
1906
Plus speculation in Variety from several days ago about Monsters, Inc 2 possibly being Docter's next film that has suffered a little in the blogspam reporting (ie accuracy), resulting in the OMG SEQUALZ?!? meme we're soaking in today...
Also speculation: various rumored Mater spin-off movies from Cars. Yes, Larry the Cable Guy might get his own... vehicle (ouch). God help us all, but it'd be a goldmine.
I get the impression that they're fairly well insulated from Disney's pressure. I think Disney realizes that they were digging themselves into a big hole with their own crummy animated movies leading up to the time when they bought Pixar. "Wall-E" took a lot of commercial risks, with the long, no-dialog intro and the overt political satire. "Up" dismayed the marketing types by having almost no merchandising opportunities (want to buy action figures of an old guy or a chubby boy scout?). Basically they've been putting the story first, and it's actually been a real winning strategy for them in commercial terms. Making some sequels doesn't necessarily equate to being commercial sell-outs; it depends entirely on whether the sequels are good, which we have no way of knowing about right now.
I'd watch for the big pressure toward commercialism to happen if and when Pixar makes its first big box-office flop.
By the way, Pixar-style CG movies are kind of a unique and interesting example of a purely digital form of entertainment that absolutely can't exist without copyright laws. If copyright was abolished tomorrow, we'd still have garage bands, we'd still have (low-budget) movies, and we'd still have novels (which most novelists don't make enough profit from to live on anyway). But a CG movie is an art form that by its nature requires a very large budget. It's not the render farm, it's the incredible number of hours of labor that go into those movies.
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"Bugs and Rats drive Nemo's Incredible Toy Car Up the Monsters' Wall"
Actually, I was expecting more of an underminer than an overlord.
"I'm not sure I like the fugnutish tone you used in your post!" -RogL (608926)-
I'm OK with sequels as some do indeed surpass the original.
And while I don't love every Pixar movie, their worst effort is still much better than everyone else. I will admit that Kung Fu Panda was a pleasant surprise from DreamWorks, but I trust them less with the sequel.
Monsters, Inc. is my 2nd favorite Pixar film behind The Incredibles, so I'm jazzed.
I am my own gestalt.
It was bound to happen. Wall-E was the last of the original ideas that were developed at that famous brainstorming session that came up with things like Toy Story, Monsters, and Nemo. And even though Wall-E was cool and amazing, it still seemed like they were running out of ideas. IF you just went by initial premises, Wall-E and UP are pretty different compared to before: Cars (anthropomorphizing gang of cars adventure), Nemo (anthropomorphizing buddy fish adventure), Toy Story (anthropomorphizing gang of toys adventure), Monsters Inc (anthropomorphizing buddy monster adventure).
I'm not saying different isn't bad, but it's hard to get the overwhelming masses to go see weirder and weirder premised movies. So I'm worried. I wouldn't say that it's not looking good, but it will be a great challenge to come up with some memorable movies after this.
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It appears to me that you are assuming Pixar's audience is exclusively children. I don't think that's ever been the case. Just because a film has been created using animation techniques it does not necessarily mean it's a a kid's movie--not everyone who enjoys animated features is a kid (or has one).
Pixar makes sophisticated computer-animated movies that appeal to a wide audience and, for the most part, they can be appreciated on several levels. This was the case with the original Toy Story and it continues to be the right through UP.
This ain't rocket surgery.
I seem to remember seeing an interview with one of the big guys at Pixar years ago talking about how much they regretted doing Toy Story 2 and how they would never do another sequel like that again, etc., etc. And so long as they were calling the shots, they didn't. Being that Disney is calling the shots these days, this shouldn't be a big surprise and while I can't be 100% I'm inclined to believe that's where the responsibility lies. The upshot is that Lasseter is now directly involved in non-Pixar Disney films as well. Take Bolt, for instance. It was a new franchise that, while not up to Pixar standards, I felt was noticeably better than what we've (sadly) become accustomed to from Disney. (full disclosure: Disney owns my soul)
Pixar's first twenty seven paying jobs were commercials; the only two you remember are the packs of life savers doing a conga line and the listerine bottle Tarzanning around to Hooked on a Feeling.
Pixar's first three movies were Disney contracts for things they didn't write; one of them is a sequel, Toy Story 2 (to their Toy Story 1, with A Bug's Life inbetween).
Of their next three films, only two are sequels; they are Toy Story 3 and Cars 2. The story linked thinks that Monsters Inc. 2 is among the next three; it is not. It will be preceded by The Bear And The Bow, as well as by Newt.
Indeed, more worrying than that they're sequels is that one of the three isn't in-house written; that's Toy Story 3, and we all know what a pile TS2 was.
The vast bulk of Pixar's work is commercial in nature. None of their films are art films; they're all carefully concocted, demographically targetted Disney style family fun factory output.
Can't imagine why anyone would think that Pixar is just now becoming money oriented. You don't shell out for Tom Hanks as a cartoon voice actor if you're not looking for wallet padding; they hired him for his name, not the quality of his work (he's a fine actor, but doesn't have nearly the range of some of the well established voice actors out there, the same of which can be said for most of Pixar's other voice staff.)
StoneCypher is Full of BS
When Steve Jobs sold Pixar to Disney (and became Disney's largest shareholder in the process), he said (paraphrasing here) that Disney should stop pissing on its legacy and cranking out direct-to-DVD sequels of decades-old classics. Believe me, he is not a fan of sequels just as a cash-grab.
But, these planned Pixar sequels are films that people actually want to see. They have been demanding them. I'm surprised to not see an Incredibles sequel on the list, because there are a lot of folks that want that one too.
I am not disappointed by this news. All of these will be great movies. I wish they could squeeze in some original flicks among the sequels, but I'm not worried about it. They are giving the fans what they want, and will blow us away with the next original Pixar movie when it comes out.
BTW, Up was great; better than Ratatouille and WALL-E, in my opinion. Mad props to Pixar for giving a great actor like Ed Asner a starring role in a high-budget blockbuster film at the age of 76. The man's earned the right to rake in some serious royalty cash for himself and his heirs.
:q!
Pixar-style CG movies are kind of a unique and interesting example of a purely digital form of entertainment that absolutely can't exist without copyright laws.
But do Pixar-style CG films require a 95-year copyright term?
See the trend? (and including the world releases follows the same trend). And I'm not including marketing costs, which can be nearing the cost of the movie.
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Hell, Fast and Furious released outside of summer timeframe and has hit 154mil with a 80mil cost, that's a 74mil US profit and still growing and it's definitely not oscar winning material. Now you know why crappy movies continue to dominate the scene. Show some T&A (thrill and action? ;) ) and the crowd forms.
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Yeah, don't worry, cause Dreamworks is in the same boat, as they discovered sequels cost more (just look at the Shrek series), Pixar will obviously come to the same conclusion. 3D (and real 3D) animation has just become just too expensive. Why? cause their employees think like IT: you need to constantly upgrade: cooler tools, faster computers, more editing, more realism, more challenges for the sake of keeping things fresh and innovative, like technology itself. Perfection is the motto of the tower of Babel. Which is ironic in a business where a simple, ingenious story can do wonders [with low-tech]. And some T&A doesn't hurt too (\tongue out\>
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I'd be interested to see how Princess and the Frog turn out...
I'm waiting for "Charm" and "Strange".
Your numbers are swapped for Finding Nemo. Also the profits aren't as slim as they seem.. Finding Nemo made $864 million worldwide. Yeah their profits are falling (coincidence probably) but those are profits. If you're making money ahead of inflation then you're alive.
If I had to make a completely uninformed guess, I'd say that they required at least a 5-year copyright term.
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Finding Nemo worldwide revenue $864 mil.
Cars worldwide revenue $461 mil.
Monsters, Inc worldwide revenue $525 mil.
The Incredibles worldwide revenue $631 mil.
Ratatouille worldwide revenue $621 mil.
Wall-E worldwide revenue $534 mil.
Up worldwide revenue (not launched internationally) 149 mil.
I don't see Pixar being in trouble at all, this is very solid business and seems to me very predictable above $500mil. per movie business. All figures from wikipedia.
It sounds frankly like you just don't like Pixar movies. I think depth of story is hugely important to what makes their movies special. Also Sid from Toy Story one scared the crap out of me and that is very old Pixar. This is nothing new.
When was the last time you got an Anthony Hopkins figure with a cheeseburger and fries?
I'd expect an Anthony Hopkins figure to be served with some fava beans and a nice chianti.
I'll never make that mistake again, reading the experts' opinions. - Feynman
You clearly have not seen Up.
Up! is an amazing, amazing movie. What they were able to do with that movie, which as far as I'm concerned is a legitimate piece of quality cinema, is simply fabulous. And how can you not like Doug, and Kevin, and an awesome airship?!
Before that there was this little movie called WALLâE you may have heard of -- I understand it was kind of successful, and well-received...
Yeah.... I'm not too worried based on the last several flicks. They've had a few movies I wasn't as hot on, but the recent trend seems to indicate higher quality than ever before, not lower.
US box office gross is an afterthought. Cars, for example, grossed over $461million worldwide, made a fortune in DVD sales, and made over $5 billion in merchandising, according to the article. Disney's $120 million investment returned over $5.5 billion, I doubt they're losing any sleep over The Fast and the Furious' $80 million budget.
I give Disney/Pixar credit for releasing imaginative films like WALL-E and Up knowing they'd make far less in merchandising and DVD sales. They would be crazy (incompetent in the eyes of their investors) if they failed to produce films capable of generating billions in revenue. And who's to say the sequels will be any worse than the originals? Toy Story 2 was one of Pixar's better films.
You also are forgetting licensing, toy sales, royalties on kids items, etc. No one has is selling 4fast4furious coloring books, beach towels, bath toys, shampoos... Finding Nemo on the other hand...
Or Wall-E or Ratatouille, for that matter.
...creative integrity. These movies stand a great chance of being awesome because the back-story has already been told. A movie spends a fair amount of time establishing context and character... they get to get straight into it, which is what helped ToyStory 2. Sequels can be great when they've been done properly with the right amount of creative integrity.
Ratatouille was just about complete and it wasn't what they were after. They brought in Brad Bird who re-wrote it and did it right. If they have the creative integrity to do things like this, then I'm fully looking forward to these movies.
Pixar really do deserve people giving their projects the benefit of the doubt at least until they make a dud. Their creativity and originality have been amazing; a step above of any other studio in the industry.
Disney used to have an official "crap sequels division", called "Disneytoons". Disneytoons was responsible for Sleeping Beauty 2, Mulan 2, Jungle Book 2, etc., direct-to DVD efforts designed to wring the last dollar out of each franchise. When Disney bought Pixar, Disneytoons was shut down. This was just as well. Sequels from Disneytoons were far, far worse than the originals.
It looks like Pixar is being given Disneytoons' job. "Cars 2" is being made because about $5 billion in "Cars" merchandise has been sold, and with another Cars movie, another few million tons of injection-molded plastic can be shipped out. There's no other reason for another "Cars" movie; the story was complete in itself.
Apparently they're not doing another "Incredibles" movie. That concept has more franchise potential than "Cars". But it wouldn't move the injection-molded plastic.
Yes, my thought too. It's much easier to see a trend over time when you ignore the last three data points, isn't it? :)
Hollywood Accounting nuff said
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+2 Troll is Slashdot's way of saying groupthink is confused
First of all, you can't ignore foreign box office totals. These days, foreign gross can be 60-70% of a movie's total take, especially for animated movies.
Second, DVD sales dummy! DVD sales for Pixar movies are always relatively higher than other types of movies, because they're intended to be enjoyed by children. A family with a bunch of kids might not plop down $50-60 bucks to take the brood to the theater, but they'll spend $18 bucks on a kid's DVD to get the little bastards to shut up for 90 minutes.
Pixar is not in trouble, in fact they're one of the most consistently profitable studios in history. Dreamworks is somewhat in trouble, but not because of Shrek 3. Seriously? That movie will probably bring in over $1 billion in its lifetime, if it hasn't already.
You obviously have no idea what you're talking about.
Plenty wrong with 'bad' sequels, made entirely to cash in - but not with sequels per se.
Off the top of my head, they already made one with Toy Story 2 - which in my and most people's opinion was better than the original.
As to the comment below about falling returns, these films are going to be generating money for decades (think of the Disney back-catalogue that's getting continuously re-released to much fan-fare every few years).
Pixar never released the actual cost of the movies they make. Please don't trust the "budget" figures from boxofficemojo; they're pretty much made up.
Could someone please explain to me why Wall-E was a good movie? The graphics were good, the plot was rather cliched - and not even as good as most cliches because the robot was apparently developed with feelings rather than somehow developing them after an accident like in Short Circuit, which is still silly, but at least there is some kind of reason. I enjoyed Short Circuit much better than Wall-E. Perhaps my expectations were just far too high after them having adverts out for months in advance though.. I said to myself I'd probably never watch it again, but I might enjoy it better if I did. With Transformers 1 I didn't enjoy it much at the cinema either, but after I decided just to ignore some of the more stupid parts and get it on DVD, it makes a decent action/comedy kind of movie.
which is totally what she said
The main villain in the movie is an incredibly intelligent kid, capable of dreaming up and engineering devices that give him superpowers. This isn't good enough though- you have to be *born* with the powers to be of any value. Never mind that Buddy/Syndrome was fully capable of being a superhero, and indeed wanted desperately to be one- Mr. Incredible dismisses him with disgust, and he ends up a villain because of that rejection. It reminds me a lot of the football player picking on the geeky kid because he's not as strong or handsome.
Compare that to the messages in the rest of the Pixar films such as Up or Wall-E, and somehow the film ends up more than a bit tarnished.
"Seven Deadly Sins? I thought it was a to-do list!"
but they'll spend $18 bucks on a kid's DVD to get the little bastards to shut up for 90 minutes.
Not much of a family man are you?
Could someone please explain to me why Wall-E was a good movie? ... the plot was rather cliched
Yeah, just one of the half-dozen "robot cleans up trash on abandoned earth and meets a probe robot who he falls in love with and follows her back into space and eventually leads all of mankind back to repopulate the earth" movies I watched last year.
Also, I like how you complain about the cliche, then say that it's not even a good cliche because it doesn't follow the cliche like you expected. Here's a news flash for you: 100% original movies that don't borrow from a previous story concept at all are incredibly rare, so if you see any movies at all, you're probably seeing cliches, judging by what your definition of cliche seems to be. And if Wall-E isn't borrowing concepts from any movie more recent than 1986, then I'd say it's doing better that 99.9% of Hollywood movies.
But the point of the movie wasn't so much the story... it's that it had a lot of heart, and that Wall-E himself was incredibly lovable. The scene where Eve thinks that Wall-E got blown up, then they dance around in space was pretty amazingly well done. Also, I took my kids to see it (ages 4 & 6 at the time), and they were absolutely enchanted by the whole movie, and laughed and giggled the whole time. Seeing movies with kids puts things in a whole new perspective.
Do yourself a favor and watch it again. Judge it on its own merits, not in relation to the ad campaign. Notice how it's not only the robots who are too distracted to explore their own potential, but the humans as well. The story is not about AI, it's about how getting dirty, doing the hard work, and following your curiosity will build better character than having your every whim catered to you. That, and don't litter.
That's pre 7-11 thinking....
... but most of the merch revenue went to Disney.