What bugs me about Zootopia is that it aims to subvert "profiling" by using stereotypes that are actually true to the animals shown.
Progressive Zootopia Movie Franchise Ideas And The Implications
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Thing there is in an animal society where all the animals have human level intelligence, you end up in a situation where one could easily subvert the expectations of an animal. Though to be honest, I never quite got some animal stereotypes. In what way is a fox "shifty" and "untrustworthy" for example? Then you have the elephant with a bad memory that is assumed to be able to remember fine details just because she's an elephant. I would've honestly loved to see a break-dancing stoat though. That would've been hilarious.Johnny Novgorod said:
The sloths are actually a bit of brilliance if you think about it for a few minutes. Most animals would go crazy at a desk job like the DMV, but to a sloth that's just enough activity to keep them stimulated. Clever, really.
Plus a lot of the situations are probably similar to Nick's. Social pressure and societal stereotyping don't let them move past the stereotypes of their species, thus making it difficult for them to find certain work or do certain things. "Well you do have a moped but an armadillo isn't exactly a fast animal. Doesn't sit well with our "fast delivery" theme. Now that cheetah outside...". In fact that was a thing in the alternate version of the movie that included shock collars for the predators. Nick's dad couldn't get a business loan for what I have to say was a pretty good idea in a good location that would have probably been pretty profitable (suits for all sized mammals rather than speciality stores) but he was repeatedly turned down because you can't trust a fox.
You realise that art and politics entwine as regularly as art and science? As art and music? All you just typed merely comes off as bitter dismissal of the art you'd prefer to ignore to sustain your layers of belief. At least pretend convincingly enough to care about art.slo said:
First of all, who decides how much money a job is worth? Secondly if earnings directly correlated with the amount of work done then the upper class wouldn't exist as they do not do hundreds of thousands of times more work than the average member of the working class does.Zontar said:
And thirdly, small and middle sized businesses are being hurt by the gigantic multinational corporations, not the working class. You know why it's hard to maintain a business if you're not part of the corporate elite? Because they'll offer everything you can provide but cheaper, faster and with a recognisable brand behind it. It's why being an entrepreneur or just starting your own business is so much more difficult than it was before.
And about that last point. While Admiral is the biggest car insurance company in Wales, they are hardly a "massive corporation". They have offices in a few cities, that's it. They weren't able to afford to give their employees bonuses because they had a bit of spare change lying around, they literally invested the extra profits they made back into their company. Any reasonable employer would do this, if you are able to afford decent wages for your employees you'd do it... wouldn't you?
That seems to be an argument in favour of some sort of basic universal income more than anything else. If you acknowledge that mechanisation is causing a great reduction in available entry-level jobs then there has to be a way to alleviate that. Because otherwise you'd be demanding that the workforce work harder than previous generations did, and surely if they work harder they deserve to be paid more?
Oh dear, imagine if the wages for those jobs were higher so welfare money wouldn't sound like the more reliable source of income. You're really arguing very contradictory things here.
But even if there are 3 million unskilled full time jobs available, there are 7.4 million unemployed Americans which is actually a reduction from last month. So if all of those positions were filled you'd still have 3.4 million unemployed Americans.
If an employer had no employees they would have no business. One can live without an employer but an employer's business cannot survive without employees.
The difference is that the more money you have, the more responsible you are for the economy of the country.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/nov/13/us-wealth-inequality-top-01-worth-as-much-as-the-bottom-90
The top 0.1% owns as much as the bottom 90%. The bottom 50% don't even own 1% of the nation's wealth. To say that the problem goes beyond socio-economic class is like saying that me dumping a sofa on the side of the road damages the environment as much as the BP oil spill.
I actually kinda disagree on both counts. Fantasia doesn't need a sequel per se IMO - only seen the first, but it doesn't have an overarching plot, but it works in the sense that it's a number of short stories told excellently (i.e. purely through visuals and mood rather than dialogue). You can slap on "Fantasia 3," but it wouldn't be a sequel per se.Silentpony said:
However, I disagree that Zootopia needs a sequel. Looking at the Disney Animated Canon, I have to commend them as to how few sequels there actually are (key word being DAC, ergo not counting direct to DVD stuff). As much as I love Zootopia, I don't think it really cries out for a sequel.
I won't disagree about the quality of those films (bar Sleeping Beauty, which I haven't seen), but a "Dreamworks movie?" Seriously? About the only thing Zootopia and Shrek have in common is that they both use CGI and both have talking animals, and even in the latter Donkey is the exception rather than the rule.Samtemdo8 said:
I'd argue quite a bit though. I can't comment on Sleeping Beauty, but "inspiration" is a far cry from "plagarism." I'm not even sure how you COULD plagarize Grimm fairy tales since they exist in the public conciousness of Western culture, anymore than an adaptation of a Shakespeare play is plagarizing it, even if you change the setting and context of the adaptation itself (e.g. Baz Loman's Romey & Juliet). The Lion King does take inspiration from Hamlet, but that doesn't stop it from being a great movie in of itself. Haven't seen The Little Mermaid, but it's not hiding its origins as an adaptation any more than The Jungle Book (either one) is. And see above for why Fantasia is an excellent piece of pure visual storytelling.Silentpony said:
Now, while Zootopia does take the top spot for me in the DAC right now, that was still a position once held by The Lion King. If Disney had a golden age in the 1990s, and another one in the late 200s/early 2010s, then I think there's material in both eras that has merit.
Wait...you HAVE actually seen Zootopia right? As in, you're giving your opinion based on first-hand experience? Right? Right?Samtemdo8 said:
There's a reason why I can't (or rather, won't) comment on Sleeping Beauty or Little Mermaid y'know.
I haven't seen an animated movie tackle the same themes as Zootopia, but fine, let's say that's right. But how were Prince of Egypt or Titan A.E. "risks?"Samtemdo8 said:
Prince of Egypt is certainly a good film, and it ranks quite highly in the Dreamworks lineup for me. But a "risk?" A Bible story adapted to film? Gee, where have I seen that before? Everyone knows the story of Moses, everyone would know where the film was headed before it began. That doesn't stop it from being a good film, and it certainly excels in a number of areas (e.g. the relationship between Moses and Rameses), not to mention that I think it's an excellent example of how a faith-based film can be good, without ever preaching to the audience. But a "risk?" I can't agree there.
Likewise, Titan A.E.? Where was that a risk? I enjoyed Titan A.E. back in the day, it's by no means a bad movie, but what was risky about it? Earth being destroyed, and humanity forced to flee/scatter? That's not a risk, that's a cliche. It's a plot point that drives the rest of the film, not to mention that the drej's motivation for doing so is only really explained in the novelization.
I can sympathize with the idea of audience perception - certainly I've felt awkward going to some of the movies I did this year. But again, Prince of Egypt being for adults? Yes, adults will enjoy it as well, but it's hardly an "adult" movie in of itself.Samtemdo8 said:
But I liked Frozen...Dizchu said:
Okay, maybe I'm digging my own grave here, but it seems that the approach on Frozen is that it's either the greatest Disney movie ever (it isn't), or the worst Disney movie ever (it isn't), with so little middleground it's like standing on thin ice (hah hah). But I will say that I do think Frozen is a good film - it makes it into my top 5 DAC entries (or round about). If Disney is in a second renaissance, then I will say that Frozen certainly exemplifies the quality of said renaissance.
Wait, what?Silentpony said:
I'll give you some of that. Zootopia would be right up Movie Bob's alley, if not for the fact that he's now dedicated his channel entirely to superheroes and pop culture that sometimes aren't superhero-based. Angry Joe's movie reviews are, as far as I can tell, reserved for big budget blockbusters with plenty of action and whatnot (e.g. Avengers, Batman v Superman, etc.). It's part of why I don't put much stock in AJ's (movie) opinions, because his range of taste is so narrow. Nostalgia Critic I can understand - he has his biases, and while I don't fault him for them, he's more like Sam here in that his tastes appear to be rooted in "classic Disney," to the extent that he groups Pixar as part of Disney in of itself (in fact, I'd say NC is an outright Disney fanboy, but whatever).
On the other hand, I've seen Zootopia get plenty of attention among YouTube reviewers - Chris Stuckman, Jeremy Jahns, Cellspex, etc.
Frozen's not a bad film at all it just isn't as good as the other films that came out around the same period like Tangled, Wreck-It-Ralph and Big Hero 6. I'd say it's the "Pocahontas" of this era, not a bad film but one that is outshined by others released before and after.Hawki said:But I liked Frozen...
Okay, maybe I'm digging my own grave here, but it seems that the approach on Frozen is that it's either the greatest Disney movie ever (it isn't), or the worst Disney movie ever (it isn't), with so little middleground it's like standing on thin ice (hah hah). But I will say that I do think Frozen is a good film - it makes it into my top 5 DAC entries (or round about). If Disney is in a second renaissance, then I will say that Frozen certainly exemplifies the quality of said renaissance.
I will gladly admit however that my distaste for Frozen is because of that god damn 4-chord song. Might not have even been insulting if the other songs from the film weren't so lazy.
See I would argue that maybe if Zootopia doesn't need a sequel, it deserves one and has more than earned it. And I think part of that is how rich and vibrant a universe Disney has created. There are just so many stories that can happen, with Nick and Judy or otherwise. With other Disney movies, there isn't much that could happen after the movie, or outside of the main characters.Hawki said:
Princess and the Frog was great, but it still just New Orleans in the 20s. There's a limited scope of what you can do there.
Sleeping Beauty is just generic pseudo fantasy world, so whatever follow-ups have been done a thousand times in other movies and shows.
Frozen is just...Frozen. The story was fairly singular and is finished.
One could argue Zootopia is just another big city, but I think the animal slant to it adds a plethora of ideas and potentials. You could do a series of shorts, black/white Noir stuff about Nick hot on the case and just go full cliche. Dark and stormy nights, trench-coats, fedoras, Judy in a red dress that Nick keeps calling 'Dame' and 'Toots', a Nick narration and Dick Tracey style villians and as a final twist it turns out the whole thing is Bogo reading a case report Nick wrote, while Judy is trying to die from embarrassment.
Or one about a day in the life of Bogo, trying to deal with the endless shenanigans of Nick and Judy.
Or what Finnick does after Nick joins the police force.
Or hundreds of others! Its rich with potential in a way other Disney movies simply aren't. It would simply be a waste to not do more with this IP.
Economics. If someone has a job that produces 12$ for the business an hour and they need to be paid 13$ an hour, the job will be cut. It's the reason why for every 10% increase in minimum wage black youth unemployment goes up 6%.Dizchu said:
That ignores the fact that the capital used to run businesses and even just start them come from somewhere, and that the only successful economic systems have been those which reward this investment with returns. Now whether those returns are higher then they should be is another discussion onto itself, but to pretend that they are inherently the problem is to open up a discussion that came to an end on the international level 25 years ago.
I can't talk about how it is where you live, but here in Quebec labour unions are a much, much worst force for harming small and mid sized businesses then corporations are. Half of that has to do with government laws protecting said businesses from corporations and the other from unions being a public menace here, but the fact remains.
If I was running a business here I'd wonder what the hell is wrong with me and move up river to Toronto like all the other major or mobile businesses already have. If I had to stay here though, I'd be more interested in finding a way to reach the brake even mark due to the sky high taxes, high wages, mandatory employee benefits and other such issues that make the average company have a 2% net profit at the end of the fiscal year. Unless I broke into the construction racket or some other corrupt to the core business area here, but at that point I'd just bit the bullet and join a labour union so I get all the result with only a tenth of the work.
Well actually what happened was the 75% of jobs eliminated had their workers sent to other sections of the factory (takes about 10 days of shadowing someone to learn the ropes). No one lost their jobs as a result of the mechanization, and in fact 200 jobs where created due to production being increased. Hell over the summers I've been working there we've had about a dozen welders and masons dedicated to internal expansion.
That's one thing I like about Quebec's overly complex and overreaching regulations: you get so many fines for closing jobs through mechanization that companies instead up production and move people around instead of firing them, and those being moved around are never enough to meet the demands of the expansion.
If those jobs did get filled the unemployment rate would drop from 5.5% to 3.2%. Considering that that would be the lowest level of unemployment since 1953 (the same year the US got its record low 2.5% unemployment rate) that would be a victory onto itself to accomplish.
On the contrary there are plenty of 1 person businesses out there that aren't shell corporations. Now these are some of the smallest businesses such as small retailers, kiosks or the smallest of restaurants, but they exist. I do have to ask this though: how can an employee live without a person creating the job they need in the first place? Someone needs to determine there is a need for the job that constitutes the time, effort and monetary value of an individual filling it out in the first place (unions and public sector work excluded).
Here's the thing though: it IS a problem that exists in all social classes. Many of the lower class, even if wealth was redistributed, would still end up in the lower class due to a simple inability to properly manage money. Money management skills are one of the single largest means of determining if someone will end up in poverty.
And here's another thing to remember about that top 0.1% everyone complains about: they aren't the bulk of those who are effected by the attempts to "right this wrong". It's the other 9.9% of the top 10% who are most likely to be the ones to create new jobs in the first place due to being the ones who actually manage the companies in question. Like every other human being they act in their own interest, and when that interest is "cut 10,000 jobs because keeping them will actively loose the company money", then they'll cut those 10,000 jobs faster then you can say the words. It's the reason Old HB went out of business (and was the reason why for 7 months Twinkie's where not available in the US) due to labour costs raise negotiations by the union making profitability literally impossible for the company and costing 18,500 jobs.
Contrary to popular belief, most businesses are not banks or entertainment companies. I don't know about how things are where you live, but here in Quebec a 5% increase in taxes and a 5% increase in wages would kill off a full quarter of the economy and our GDP with it.
The scenarios you mention are more in the sense of expanded universe/spin-off stuff than full blown sequel territory.Silentpony said:
Now that kind of stuff I could certainly get behind. Disney's done that before for its other properties (Lion King, Aladdin, Little Mermaid, etc.), and Zootopia itself has a rich enough canvass from which to draw from.
But as for a full sequel...look, I certainly agree that Zootopia is good enough to deserve its own sequel. There's certainly other aspects that sequel could focus on (other social issues, maybe branching off into the world's non-mammal cities, etc.) But while I wouldn't object to a sequel, I'd still prefer Disney focus on original content as:
a) Sequels sometimes improve on their predecessors, but it isn't a universal improvement. Plenty of sequels fall flat.
b) In Disney's animated films, I can't think of a single sequel that actually improved upon its predecessor, and even some of the best ones (Lion King 2, Return of Jaffar) still fall short of said predecessors.
c) Zootopia being as good as it is, you'd have a very hard time matching or surpassing said quality.
d) Sequels are very common with animated films in the West (Dreamworks, Blue Sky, Pixar to an extent, Illumination, etc.), and the DAC is an exception to the rule. I don't mind sequels to animated films, but for personal preference, and the above entries, an original work would be the better use of resources IMO.
Zootopia is certainly one of the better choices for a sequel (I think it certainly makes more sense than Frozen 2, the cash-incentive aside), but per the above points, I don't feel the need for a sequel, and I can't imagine that sequel improving on its predecessor.
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Its that I want that level of care and attention done and scope Prince of Egypt done for an adult audiance.
And trust me I found Prince of Egypt barring a few moments to be a surprisingly adult movie. Heck I would not show it to any kids of mine despite being marketed as "Children's Animation"
And Titan A.E. again the idea that Earth is destroyed and humans and the whole theme that humanity is scattered and weakened and perhaps endanger of utter extinction.
Just showing that in a "children's animation" you would scare the kids showing how straightly played the destruction of Earth is.
Replying to your post to me.Hawki said:
Its that I want that level of care and attention done and scope Prince of Egypt done for an adult audiance.
And trust me I found Prince of Egypt barring a few moments to be a surprisingly adult movie. Heck I would not show it to any kids of mine despite being marketed as "Children's Animation"
And Titan A.E. again the idea that Earth is destroyed and humans and the whole theme that humanity is scattered and weakened and perhaps endanger of utter extinction.
Just showing that in a "children's animation" you would scare the kids showing how straightly played the destruction of Earth is.
But that's just it, you can't trust a fox. With animals, stereotypes tend to be true.Vausch said:
In what regard? I'm pretty sure you can't trust a lion either if your trust is in that it won't eat you. That's not so much a stereotype of an individual animal in so much that it's a wild animal and a carnivore (omnivore in the fox's case). I mean what, did you loan 20 bucks to a fox and he keeps having excuses to not pay you back or just ran off never to be seen again?Johnny Novgorod said:
Well, to each their own. Prince of Egypt is certainly a mature movie, but I can't single out anything that would be "adults only" within the film. Even in the darker elements (plague, death of Rameses's son, the sea crushing the Egyptians, etc.), I don't think those sequences are so intense that a child would be scarred by them or anything. It's more a PG than M film.Samtemdo8 said:
Now Titan A.E., as someone who saw it in theatres when it came out (and I would have been 10/11 at the time), I can attest that, on the personal level, I was never scared or taken aback. The destruction of Earth is played straight, true, but it's more akin to Alderaan conceptually - it's a catalyst to move the plot along rather than something that's being presented as a tragedy. There's reflection on and consequences from said events, but I wouldn't call it a dark moment per se. Even the darkest moment in the film (where the drej drone shoots the cockroach/cook alien) is more a case of dark humor than being presented as a horrific act of violence against a non-combatant (which it would be if done in the real world).
So, yeah. Titan A.E. isn't a bad movie, but it's first and foremost an action-adventure movie in space. Stuff like Prince of Egypt and Zootopia itself are far more mature in regards to the subjects they address. The presence of death and destruction in a work of fiction doesn't automatically make it more "adult" or "mature."
No but they're considerably intelligent and resourceful when it comes to survival, hence the (dreadful) appeal of fox hunting.Vausch said:
Because foxes want to eat our chickens and are apparently somewhat clever animals. I haven't seen Zootopia, but I'm interested in seeing it. and Samtendo8, I partially share your pain, though my reasons are mainly superficial. CGI movies just don't do it for, I'd love to see cartoon movies do a comeback with a good budget and story. Oh, a movie about Blacksad comics would be great!Vausch said:
Why is it that whenever someone asks you to back up your garbage you respond with anecdotes? Equality in employment is beyond the left-right dynamic. We have arms manufacturers rallying against anti-trans laws in the US. They do ot for a purely economic reason. Companies since the 60s have been big on an ever larger workforce. Funnily enough, as we're playing anecdotes. Every person I've met complaining about a larger workforce has done so solely because they've had to compete with more people for less jobs.Zontar said:
Is such criticism valid? Perhaps... It's certainly harder to get job security. But that goes for *everybody*. It's certainly got fuck all to do with their 'hardwork'. More that White guys aren't the only ones with degrees in a global economy. As per award systems for pay and job entitlements, it often has got little to do with minimum wage and everything to do with looser hiring and firing contract laws that can take advantage of ever larger talent pools.
So much so that minimum wage laws do the bare minimum they can to stop cross-Western reduction of real wealth across the middle and working classes. Even then, they only protect the poor and arguably don't do that either.
The narrative someone earning 10 million a year is a 'job creator', is mythical. Purely by an economic basis, a handful of proper middle class who spend 80% of their gross will create more jobs than that multi-millionaire. The US is the richest country in the world... it seems poorer than most of the West solely because while revenues constantly grow, when it gets to the point where the huge slabs of 'middle class' live hand to mouth, there's fuck all job opportunities for others to break out of poverty.
Minimum wage laws do stuff all about that. Arguably minimum wage laws are the very least a country can do. Even then it won't stop Walmart paying an ex-con $7/hr and saying; "We're for equal opportunity employment." Sometimes the only thing to stop some percentage of ex-cons reoffending might be whether or not the government says you need to be paid 8/hr due to inflation. That won't help protect real wages of people with student fees and teritary qualifications as a machinist or teacher.
Why is it when people wax poetic about the past, they fail to take into account wealth inequality? Back in the 50s and 60s a blue collar, 40hr/wk worker earned upwards of half that of middle management, and an eigth of higher executives. Maybe instead of a minimum wage, we should have a relative maximum wage to your workers? It used to be working as a civil servant was scrub work. Because the government never used to pay as much as private. But the polarity of that has shifted for all except the top 10% highest earners. The reason being that while government workers have had continual pay raises to meet inflation to maintain real wealth (though not CPI and RPI, which is a huge issue on its own), the private sector has done little to combat wealth inequality.
It's also hilarious when corporate leaders turn around and lambast the public sector for simply raising relative wages to inflation even though by tax rate and relative income, they're paying less tax now and paying no more by inflation than they were 50 years ago.
Personally I just wish I see things like Game of Thrones and the Godfather and even Lord of the Rings in Animated form.Hawki said:
Oh an Lone Wolf and Cub in animation because the ending of that Manga deserves to be visualized, voiced and with music and sound and motion.