ATTENTION: THE FOLLOWING RPEORT IS A RUMOR. PLEASE TAKE THE FOLLOWING STORY WITH A GRAIN OF SALT.
Ever since his departure in 2018 former Pixar and Disney Animation head, John Lasseter, has seemingly been a thorn in Disney’s side. After he “stepped down” following accusations of misconduct he, along with other Disney alumni, went to Skydance and headed up their recently formed animation division. Their first film, Luck, released on Apple TV+ in August of 2022.
Since his departure Disney animation is now headed up by Clark Spencer and Jennifer Lee with Pete Doctor taking over Pixar. John Lasseter was also the glue holding together the Disney-Ghibli partnership, so that expired soon after his depature.
But ever since, a number of Disney’s animated projects have either underperformed or straight up bombed. Those come down to multiple factors, such as the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic, the multiple Disney+ exclusive releases, or even the failed same day ‘Premium Access’ plan.
2022 was perhaps one of the worst years for Disney animation in a long time, with both of their major animated theatrical releases, Lightyear and Strange World, outright loosing massively at the box office. Lightyear was a surprise to many due to its association with Toy Story. But, audiences weren’t interested in something that was divorced from the source material.
But audience members aren’t the only ones unhappy with Disney’s output, because according to a recent report from Matthew Belloni of The Puck. He states that Lasseter was “Extremely critical” of their recent output. Highlighting that he had distain for Lightyear in particular.
John Lasseter had a strong connection to the character and has a specific idea for who Buzz Lightyear was when he created him.
The closest on-screen version of this idea was the introduction to Toy Story 2 (The animated series from 2000 wasn’t a bad attempt either). But the 2022 version didn’t have any of that, thus his distain for this incarnation can’t be explained in just words.
Disney is looking to have a pretty bumpy 2023 with their only animated films, Pixar’s Elemental and Disney Animation’s Wish, possibly underperforming as well. We’ll see what happens later in the year.
What do you think? Would you agree with Lasseter’s dislike of how Disney Animation has been handled ever since his 2018 departure?
Source: Screenrant
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