Pixar’s $1.4 billion trilogy might be their wildest movie franchise now that I think about it

Pixar has earned its place as the powerhouse studio in the field of animation, and as such it has seen a lot of success, but one specific trilogy is the studio’s wildest movie franchise for various reasons. Pixar began its reign in animation in 1995 with Toy StoryThe first completely computer-animated film, which marked the beginning of years of high-quality animated movies. Toy Story Continues to be Pixar’s biggest and most successful franchise, but it has also spawned other, smaller franchises.

Pixar started with a story about talking toys with feelings, and since then it has explored other fun and impossible scenarios, such as talking bugs, a world of monsters, rats that are extraordinary chefs, and more. At the time of writing, and Leaving Toy Story Separately, Pixar has five franchisesSome bigger than others: Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, CarsAnd Inside out. Although they all explore different scenarios with a lot of imagination, the strangest one by far, CarsAnd it also happens to be Pixar’s wildest franchise to date.

The Cars trilogy is Pixar’s most inconsistent movie franchise

Cars failed to have a consistent tone

In 2006, Pixar asked “What if cars were sentient?” And so it gave us Cars. Directed by John Lasseter and co-directed by Joe Ranft, Cars is set in a world populated entirely by anthropomorphic vehicles. Cars‘ Focus is Lightning McQueen (voiced by Owen Wilson), a young but arrogant race car who gets stranded in a forgotten city on his way to the most important race of his life. There he is forced to reevaluate his priorities and learns valuable lessons about love and friendship. Cars Received positive reviews and was a commercial success, spawning a franchise.

Cars Was praised for its imaginative world but not so much for its story – sure, it’s not the most complicated plot, but it didn’t have to be (it’s talking cars, after all). Cars Was innovative back then and was ultimately a fun watch, but the same can’t be said for the sequel. The quality of Cars 2 Was a downgrade from the first movie And it feels like a direct-to-video movie rather than a theater. Cars 2 Follows Lightning McQueen and Mater competing in the World Grand Prix, where Mater inadvertently becomes involved in a dangerous espionage mission.

While I appreciate the effort of adding more action to Cars 2Her plot was completely absurd And lost the essence of the first movie. However, it did well at the box office, and so on Cars 3 Happened. Cars 3 Tried to take a more serious approach by focusing on Lightning McQueen’s legacy as he, now a veteran race car, had to prove he was still competitive against a new generation of technologically advanced cars. Although it has Lightning McQueen a fitting ending, The tone of Cars 3 is so different from its predecessors That it only established the franchise as Pixar’s wildest and most inconsistent.

Why the tone of the Cars franchise changed so much between movies

The Cars franchise feels very disconnected

Cars Didn’t need a sequel, but it’s widely known that if it performs well at the box office, it will most likely get a sequel. The problem I see is that Pixar never really understood what its franchise of talking cars should be about In his heart. On top of that, everyone Cars Movie has a different team of writers, and it was evident (especially in the sequels) that there were too many ideas and styles involved in the making of the movies.

Although Cars was ultimately a successful franchise when you look at its box office numbers (earning over $1.7 billion, though that’s counting the failed Planes spin-off movies), it’s unlikely to be dethroned as Pixar’s wildest and most inconsistent – although that doesn’t mean it’s not entertaining, especially the first movie.