Having not yet seen Cars 2, it’s impossible to say unequivocally that the Pixar juggernaut is about to have its first failure; at least critically speaking. But if any of the marketing thus far is to be trusted, one might surmise that not only does Cars Part Deux look not very good, it looks downright embarrassingly terrible.
It’s a pretty sure thing that the movie is going to make money. Cars is probably Pixar’s biggest money maker if you take into consideration merchandising. Kids seem to not be able to get enough and I’m sure they’re frothing at the mouth for more Lightning McQueen and his buddy Mater. The rest of us? Even the lovers of the original Cars, such as myself, are absolutely dreading the day and have thought the notion of a sequel a bad idea. It may end up working out; time will tell. But nonetheless, with the originality and creativity Pixar studios has shown us in the past, I can’t help but think a sequel to an already less-than-well-received feature seems at the very least to be lazy and unimaginative. A cash grab if you will. Still, knowing the kinds of things Pixar is capable of, we’ve yet to see them misstep and I still remain cautiously optimistic.
I’ll see Cars 2 with interest and hopefulness but as the Pixar sequel train keeps chugging along (after Toys and Cars), word has been floating around for a while now that there would be a Monsters, Inc. sequel in store for us as well – albeit with a couple of new properties thrown in between. Today I learn (and it has been confirmed by Disney/Pixar) that this new Monsters will in fact be what has become known as a prequel: Monsters University. In which Mike and Sully meet up in college, initially hate each other and then learn to be friends. Being that Monsters, Inc. is still my personal favorite of the Pixar filmography, I feel it’s stands its own perfectly and shouldn’t be touched. To make the idea potentially even worse, nothing has been confirmed about John Goodman and Bill Crystal reprising the use of their voices for our two main protagonists. Remember Dumb and Dumberer?
With other animation studios hot on the heels of the Pixar machine with films such as ILM’s Rango and Dreamworks’ How to Train Your Dragon, showing huge profit margins as well dazzling visual and critical and audience adoration, it’s going to be the studio that has the highest levels of ingenuity, foresight and artfulness that comes out as the leader in today’s animation. With Pixar seemingly taking the easy way out with their next couple of ventures, I can’t help but wonder if the steam has finally been exhausted from this boiling kettle known as Pixar.
