Wish: Disney Flop?

Walt Disney Animation Studios has recently celebrated one hundred years. To mark this momentous occasion. Disney released a short animated video including all the Characters of all animated movies Disney movies. It also featured a new character from the latest movie to be released in honor of Disney's 100th anniversary. Her name is Asha, and the film is called Wish as a Disney fan. I was excited about this movie before I saw the trailer or the Animator's Takes on the trailer alone.

Animation has changed a lot in the past hundred years, and if you look back at Disney movies from the late 1940s onwards, you will see that for the first few decades, every Disney movie was hand-drawn by animators on transparent sheets called cells. They were put together like a flipbook and eventually alongside the audio tracks recorded for the movie—every Disney movie from 1940 until early through the late 2010s.

When Disney began to implement more "Modern" technology to help improve its animated movie styles and keep up with other studios that were starting to do the same thing, it moved away from what made it super appealing and magical in the first place.

However, as time progresses, things change, and not adapting to changes is often worse. Companies that stick to older techniques are often seen as outdated and not considered modern by critics or fans. (Many Disney fans prefer the 2D, hand-drawn animation compared to the now 3D computerized animation.) Unfortunately, Disney can no longer afford to use this old style, as it is no longer needed and is considered to be time-consuming.

Animation-style movies have changed over the years and continue to evolve every year. Disney is trying very hard to keep up. I believe that because of this. Disney has resorted to having their female characters all have the same ridiculous, dorky, and "cute" personalities. No differing personalities or anything. Everything about these characters is the same, apart from their looks. Anna, Asha, Rapunzel, etc. These characters all have the same strange and awkward personality. Rapunzel was the first character to have this personality when Tangled returned in 2010. This personality makes sense for a character trapped inside who has never been adequately socialized or influenced by someone other than her mother. For Anna, it makes sense because she and her sister have been separated for years. Neither has been outside of their castle for years. To keep both girls safe.

However, having the same personality among many different female characters becomes too repetitive and predictable. As a Disney fan for many years, I loved going to the theatre to see a new Disney movie. While I was never a fan of Disney Princesses, the stories were still good, and there was excellent voice acting, music, and characters with diverse backgrounds and personalities.

Now, I only bother seeing any new film Disney releases if it seems like something I'd be interested in. (I prefer the animal movies.) Disney has been around for years and, with their extensive catalog, has allowed families to bond and create memories and generations of Disney fans.

Kids who grow up loving Disney will travel to Disneyworld, Disneyland, or any Disney park—the importance of Disney films and how they impact a child's upbringing. Kids are not clueless. They know when something is repeated, whether in a story, theme or otherwise. Disney movies are something anyone knows; even if you haven't seen their most popular movies, you are still aware of them because Disney is everywhere. Seeing such an essential part of my childhood become repetitive and almost dull is disappointing.

Wish is a movie with a not-so-interesting plot, terrible music, and a character who is adorkable and dumb. The music wasn't even written by people who've written for musical films,

i.e. Lin Manuel Miranda. The atrocious songs do nothing to help the lackluster plot or terrible characters.

Valentino is a goat and given a deeper voice as a funny plot point, which has been done to death not just in Disney movies but in another animated film not made by Disney, and trying to blend 2D and 3D elements in this film made it look strange and unfinished.

No Disney movie has made over 1 billion dollars in years, and that's showing a lot through recent films, and that's sad to see.

I hope Disney can learn from this horrific mistake and come up with better characters, plots, etc. Disney needs to know about style changes, character, personality, etc. It's great to be different; having fans return to the movies, park, etc., is essential. With change, you will see progress and success. I hope Disney recovers, but at the rate they are making terrible movies, it seems impossible.

Want to learn more about Disney's Adorkable problem? Watch this video Essay Here.