How does Finding Dory fit into the Pixar Theory? This week on the podcast, I’m joined by Jonathan and Ben Carlin (of the YouTube channel, Supercarlinbros) to answer just that question. But we’re not in total agreement, so it’s a battle of the theorists.
To get the most out of this debate, I highly recommend that you first check out Jon and Ben’s video about Finding Dory and the Pixar Theory, as well as my own write up, The Pixar Theory: Part 4, Finding Dory.
QUESTION OF THE WEEK: If you could suggest the next Pixar movie, reaching from your own emotional life stories, what would you pitch to them?
Let us know your thoughts (and your favorite podcast moments) in the comments, which we may read on next week’s show! Also, don’t forget to follow us on Facebook so you can send us direct messages and get podcast updates crazy fast. And be sure to subscribe on iTunes and/or Stitcher, where you can also rate/review the podcast if you like it!
SHOW NOTES
00:00:00 – Introductions and show overview
00:02:51 – Main Segment: The Pixar Theory debate, featuring Jonathan and Ben Carlin of the YouTube channel, SuperCarlinBros. This section will feature SPOILERS for Finding Dory.
- Cool stuff we mentioned: the video that spoofs the Pixar Theory by claiming all the Die Hard movies exist in the same universe as all the Pixar movies (and led to Andrew Stanton placing Die Hard references in Finding Dory).
01:03:28 – Feedback: We address your comments and questions from this past week.
01:23:40 – Coming soon: We briefly mention next week’s new movie releases.
This week’s cast:
Jon Negroni, Kayla Savage, Adonis Gonzalez, Maria Garcia, Jenny Pan, and Sam Noland.
I’ve been a big fan of SCB since the 2013 Pixar Theory post, so I loved hearing the Jons duke it out. Awesome episode! I think everyone made good points, even Adonis if you can believe it.
Sweet debate. I’m leaning more toward Negroni on this one because the animals don’t seem as smart when humans aren’t around if that makes sense. But SCB made pretty good points. They should do this more often. As for the Darla thing, I don’t get how it makes sense that she’d fly out all the way to Australia just to get a fish. I vote P. Sherman lives in California now.
I’ve been a fan of both you and the Carlin Brothers for some time now, so this podcast was a fantastic listen. Lots of great discussion and theories.
If I were to pitch a movie to Pixar, it would either be a distant prequel to Wall-E about a small resistance group trying to rise up against BnL, or an original movie about animated characters scrambling around inside Pixar’s computer network preparing for the day they hit theaters (the movie would be called META.)
Also, while these theories are all great, I only have one question about Finding Dory I’d love to see answered: How the heck does Hank hear dory through all that water?
I was on a trip to Mexico for a week and didn’t come back until late last night, so I couldn’t do anything last week. Anyway, I hadn’t watched it yet, but I believe this is the first Now Conspiring that I will watch in full because the Pixar Theory enthralls me so much. Seeing two of the best debate about it, GENIUS!
If the movie is to be based off my own experiences, then I pitch a movie where a class that goes downtown for a field trip and almost leave behind two people who lost track of time inside a Starbucks. Every time they make it back onto the bus, the day resets itself (I know it’s a blatant ripoff of Groundhog Day okay, I’m just so fascinated with the concept of it all). They spend the rest of the movie trying to figure out what went wrong – and it all comes to a head at the Starbucks counter.
I have another idea that might be a bit too grim for Pixar – what if civilization lived side by side with the Greek gods until Olympia somehow shuts down. The only thing left of that world is the Underworld, which continues to thrive as a sort of drug dealership. Water from the river Lethe would be used to forget your problems (and I kind of foresee this as the cure-for-all, where it could be used to “cure” trauma, “repair” relationships, etc).Water from Cocytus, the river of lamentation, could be used to make people lose their will to live, which the government could use as a weapon in wars overseas or on people they perceive as dangerous. Phlegethon water keeps people alive so they can endure more torment, another thing the shadier side of the government would exploit. River Styx would be used to make people invulnerable (at least if you got enough water to bathe in) and river Acheron would be another torture method where the person is forced to relive their worst memories. The actual story would revolve around a girl running away from her abusive household, and ending up on the streets homeless. One of the guys who go into the Underworld to acquire the river water sees her stealing something from a pedestrian while talking to them, and decides that her skill set would be really useful to them. They kidnap her and put her through training, and after a long period of time she is all ready to go on her first journey and get her debts paid. However, when she arrives in the Underworld she realizes that she was hoodwinked and that Hades was promised her as payment for the others taking water from the rivers of the Underworld. Together, with the rest of the captives, she tries to escape but the security is too tight. The movie ends ambiguously with her falling into the river Lethe and pulling Hades along with her.
Yikes. That definitely does not work for Pixar. No one should let me write children’s movies.
Possible Pixar pitch:
Young child is socialized as a girl. The child figures out he is a boy. Has do deal with bullies.
He grows up with Pixar movies with solace
How come you cannot see a lot of pollution during Cars? If the humans went to space because of the pollution, wouldn’t earth be filthy during Cars?
Boo’s real name is Mary. Pixar revealed that after toy story 3.
A family of six goes on a 3 week cross-country road trip with their elderly grandmother and aging labrador retriever. The trip is planned the summer before the eldest child (named Morgan because names will make this movie pitch easier to understand) goes off to college and the youngest (Melanie) enters high school. What was originally intended to be a fun adventure for the family and a potential last hurrah for the grandmother turned into an emotional rollercoaster for each family member as they realized a big chapter in their lives was about to end.
For Morgan, she was officially no longer a kid. In a few months, she’d be heading off to school to live by herself sharing a room and bathroom with people she’d never met. For Melanie, she now had to go off to the big and scary high school and somehow fit in with the upperclassmen that she was certain her siblings would turn against her. The middle children (Nathan and Alex) realized that starting next year, with Morgan leaving them life at home would be harder with their parents turning to them for assistance with everything where their older sister helped out quite a bit. For the grandmother, she was coming to terms with her lack of mobility and inability to go on other trips like this. And for the parents, their first child would be leaving the house in a few months and no longer need them on a day to day basis.
But instead of having jumping viewpoints and perspectives explaining how they all feel, the entire movie would be told from the point of view of the dog (Duke).
As dogs are quite sensitive to human behavior, Duke would note their sudden behavioral changes. But he doesn’t know why. He doesn’t fully understand why they’re all upset now. He knows that a few weeks ago they were all excited because Morgan decided what school she was officially going to. And as they were packing, he knew that he would be going with them as they packed his bed and toys, so he too was excited. But then they got on the trip and things began to slowly devolve.
At the various campsites they would arrive at, as they walked him around he’d find other animals: cats, dogs, squirrels, birds, etc. He would ask them about it and express his concerns that he did something wrong. The other animals would advise him to try and make them happy. Play with them, cuddle with them, bring them toys, do things that would make him happy.
His humans confide in him when they are alone and explain to him how they’re feeling. Morgan cuddles with him after crying and he helps dry her tears. The grandmother empathizes with the dog who’s also losing his energy and strength as time goes on. Nathan and Alex take turns caring for the aging dog when he slips or falls and in doing so they gain confidence in their ability to help out around the house. Melanie talks to him when she walks him telling him how nervous she is to go to the high school. The family seems to be coming around, back to how they were before with his aid.
But after a certain point, they arrive at a campsite and while there, Duke sees something he thinks his masters will really enjoy. So he goes to find it. He chases after it and soon enough, he gets lost. The family then have to come together to find the lost dog. At this point, the perspective will shift so we can see the family all blaming each other for losing the dog. Each sibling pointing fingers at each other. The parents saying they need to find out who let the dog escape. Eventually the grandmother lays down the law with a sass level equal to that of the Queen of Thorns, and the family focus on finding the dog.
They eventually find Duke and return home. Cue time jump and we end up on the morning of the first day of school as Melanie, Alex, and Nathan prepare hurriedly for school. Nathan woke up late and his hair was a mess and was on the phone with their grandmother as he shoveled cereal into his mouth. Melanie was just running down the stairs after trying on her fifth outfit of the morning. Alex was quietly sipping a cup of coffee sitting in front of her computer. Duke was lying at the feet of the father who was reading the comics section of the newspaper (the best part of the paper, might I add). The mother was face timing with Morgan who was away at school and just received a 97 on her first test of the semester.
As the family rushes out to school and work and all say their goodbyes. Duke thinks to himself how it’s great to have his humans back to the way they were before their trip. Not long after they walk out the front door, a young pup smaller than Duke’s head runs to the now shut front door and begins to cry. The older dog relays to the pup how they’ll return and how the pup will have to spend a lot of time training these humans because they have a tendency to get into unnecessary fights and have ridiculous mood swings. They’re temperamental and proud. All it takes is a lot of love to train a human well. Because while the pup will love them with all his heart, the humans care about some things they should not.
Potential easter eggs:
-The Jewel of Monterey California
-The dinosaur place that Riley’s family went to
-A museum with an apatosaurus family in the dino section, stuffed bears in the natural science (aka animal) section, an entire Supers section, a section on the rise of BnL, and for whatever reason a toy creation section
-The zoo that Ellie and Carl worked at
-One of those weird spinoff Gusteau restaurants Chef Skinner wanted to make
-The camper from A Bug’s Life at one of the campsites the family stays at
-The bluff from “Boundin”
-A car show displaying several of the cars from Cars as well as the Pizza Planet Truck
A good idea for a original Pixar movie could be about a teenager who has autism, but doesn’t act as a regular autistic child. He views the entire world on much bigger scale than everyone on Earth, and he’s planning to change the world.
That’s at least a sum of that story, so, ya.
My story would be about a kid who steals something from his school because his bad friends pushed home to do it and cops get involved and he puts his parents jobs in the line with his mistake. He soon realized that he needs to learn from his mistake rather than beating himself up about it. When he comes back to school people don’t stop asking him questions except for one person who becomes a great friend to the kid. The story would envolve a lot of emotion because Pixar is good at that. Since I’m not good at making names Pixar would make the name.
Can we get tshirts PLEASE? Like “I Believe in the Pixar Theory” shirts or “Warning: Pixar Theorist”?
The world needs to know about this. Tshirts are the way.
Maybe Darla is Helen from The Incredibles she had braces the last time I saw her and red hair and she had to constantly move and change her name because of Heros Protection Program. 😛 I think Elasta Girl had braces she sounds like she did because that’s how I sounded when I had them and got them taken off.
Also in the Magazine it’s not just Darla it’s also that chef lady from Ratatouille. The Chef lady Colette! Where it says “STARS SECRET” you can see it’s her!
A man becomes a hero when he dies saving a group of children from a disaster. Several decades later, he awakens, distraught to discover that he is now a statue memorializing himself. The other statues in town are also alive – the other statues of people have generally already accepted that they’re not their inspirations, while the more abstract sculptures are shambling, often outright malicious creatures of varying intelligence. The protagonist must uncover an evil plot and come to accept that they are a shadow of their former self – but that they were created out of love for what they’ve done.
Hi!!!:) This is the first time I have listened to one of your podcasts and I can definitely say that I will be becoming a full-time listener (and most likely commenter to) you guys are so funny and just make me smile.
As for the question of the week I would pitch something about having to leave your parents for the first time whether it be moving away or just leaving for the night this can be a really hard thing and I just think Pixar could take the subject and make people feel better about it because I think that’s what they do best.
I’ve been having this idea for a pixar/animated movie ever since this happened to me and as soon as you said pitch your idea I had to write it. Not sure if you’re still reading these but here it goes.
A group of friends were walking down the sidewalk when they noticed a family of ducks. A mother and her eight chicks. The mother walked into the road and the group noticed that the upcoming car was not slowing down. They started waving their arms and shouting out to try to stop the car. The car continued driving ignorantly and hit the mother duck. Immediately following the other chicks ran into the street to try to help their mother but the were too small to see by the rest of the oncoming traffic. It was a horrible sight but one member of the group would not sit by and watch. She ran into the street and grabbed the last baby chick, saving its life. The group heads quickly to the fast-food restaurant they were walking to and puts the chick in a Styrofoam to-go box to hold. They then bring it to an animal hospital where they assure the group that they will take the chick to a rehabilitation center.
The story would be about either the girl taking the chick home and raising it as her own, which was what my friend planned to do if the shelter couldn’t take it, or the chick growing up in that rehabilitation center and eventually being set free in a nature preserve, a very different environment than the suburban area where it was raised. It would be an emotional story but I feel like Pixar would capture it well.
I noticed that Dory does have a good memory while with others. That was not Gusto’s ghost, Remy was being delusional. That tiny translucent Gusto was basically Remy’s conscious. An animal can start to lose its instincts after being in captivity. Charles’ dogs have thought translators, they do not really talk. There are no humans on screen in A Bug’s Life. Riley’s family might have been on vacation. Hank is Pixar’s Waldo. Puberty made Nemo’s original voice actor have to be replaced. Blu-rays are discs, not tapes. Herby the love bug was under the water. Larry the Cableguy’s 1st role was Mater. Now he has his own show and is on a med commercial. I heard that Cars 3 will be about finding a different clean fuel after Allinol was a bust. I loathed Monsters versus Aliens. The holiday that inspired Halloween was/is similar to Day of the Dead. Toy Story 4 will take place before Toy Story 3. Boo’s real name is Mary.
The villain in The Incredibles 2 will be someone from the 1st movie. Many think it will be The Underminer, but his story ended in a video game. So others think it might be a rebellious Dash. The star of Newt was in the potion the witch from Brave made.
Riley’s entire class is in finding dory outside of the tank, and assorted around the aquarium. they bare definitely in the same timeline, but i doubt her and her family are in the traffic jam. BTW i have a been a huge fan of SCB for years, pre pixar theory, and they brought me here, i am definitely watching more
how can u explain the scene where flick from bug’s life showed up in toys story 2?
You rude idgets im Scottish you idget American