Pokemon Nicknames: Disney (5)

I thought I had finished doing Disney-themed Pokemon nicknames (at least through the generations I was familiar with) but while watching Disney movies with my daughters, I thought of plenty more--we're pretty much always watching a Disney movie. I felt like I had too many new ones to fit in another blog post, so here's a sampling of the new nicknames I came up with. 

Vaporeon as Ariel

Mankey as Spot

Talonflame as Maui

Morpeko as Hamsterviel

Krabby as Sebastian

Kricketune as Jiminy

Torchic as Hei Hei

Psyduck as Ducky Momo

Spheal as Gerald

Venonat as PT Flea

Disney-Themed Pokemon Nicknames:

• Gen I: Part 1
• Gen II: Part 2
• Gen III-V: Part 3
• Gen VI-VII: Part 4
• Additional: Part 5
• Additional (2): Part 6

Don’t Watch Pinocchio. Watch Pinocchio Instead!

(Guest post by Kobe)

These days, it feels as if every new movie needs to be connected to some previous film to be successful. Prequels, sequels, remakes, and spinoffs plague the movie theater screen and every single streaming service. So far this year, the top three grossing movies at the box office have been Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Jurassic World Dominion, and in first place, Top Gun Maverick. What do they all have in common? They’re all sequels. Even though these movies are occasionally decent or even good, the industry’s growing dependence on franchise films and remakes and the growing departure from original stories and unique films is enough to make a movie lover, such as myself, very cynical. If you’re anything like me, you get upset every time the next live-action Disney remake gets announced or released. No movie has done that quite like Pinocchio has.

Disney’s Pinocchio (2022) is a bad movie. At this point most, if not all, people can agree on that. It earned an abysmal 27% on rotten tomatoes, with it earning a similar 29% audience score. Critics gave the movie generally unfavorable reviews, with Alex Godfrey from Empire Magazine saying that “[Pinocchio] feels like an exercise. It exists because it can.” I watched the movie to see what all the fuss was about, and yes, the film completely deserves all the negative criticism it’s received. The movie feels lazy and passionless. The CGI looks gross and unpolished, the voice acting is passable at best, and the emotion and meaning of the story falls incredibly flat. You would think that with all this negativity surrounding the movie that nobody would bother watching, but the film did quite well and has a relatively large number of views on Disney Plus. Disney’s iron grasp on the entertainment industry means that they don’t need to be making quality content to be successful. Slap the Disney name on basically anything and people will watch it. This proves to be a big problem in the film industry, especially to movies like Guillermo Del Toro’s Pinocchio.

Del Toro’s Pinocchio (2022) is destined to be a great movie. It’s also a movie that is predestined to have much less viewers than Disney’s latest version. Esteemed Mexican director Guillermo Del Toro has been working on this passion project, a stop-motion version of Pinocchio, since 2008. Lack of funding delayed the movie inevitably until Netflix decided to acquire the project. This movie, releasing December 9th on Netflix, recently had its world premiere at the BFI London Film Festival and first reactions have been incredible, with the movie currently holding a 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. The trailer oozes magic. The stop-motion animation and the character and set design looks very charming. The movie also boasts an all-star voice cast including Ewan McGregor, Finn Wolfhard, Ron Perlman, Tilda Swinton, and Cate Blanchett. So yes, the movie looks great, has an amazing cast, and has great reviews. Comparing it to Disney’s Pinocchio, Del Toro’s version looks to best it in almost every way, but with less advertising and no notable brand name attached, the movie is doomed to have much lower viewership numbers.

Basically, the point of all this is to say that we should be supporting and championing movies like Del Toro’s Pinocchio, not another Disney remake. Disney could make quality content, they have the money and talent, but what incentive do they have to work harder when the low-quality content is already so successful? Time and time again people complain about these remakes that Disney keeps feeding to us on Disney Plus’s conveyer belt, but we watch them anyway. What does that say about us and the media we consume? Are we watching the type of media we want to support? Please, go watch the trailer for this new Pinocchio. Get excited. Get your friends and family excited. Most importantly, watch the movie when it releases. Maybe I hope for too much. Maybe this article is nothing but a Jiminy Cricket acting as a conscience to anyone who reads it. After all, Collodi wrote in his book, Pinocchio, that “a conscience is that still small voice that people won’t listen to.”

Pokemon Nicknames: Disney (4)

Throughout this year I've been working on some Pokemon/Disney nicknames. Now it's time to finish off the Pokedex--minus the Galar Pokedex, since I've yet to play Sword. So without further ado, here is my last Disney/Pokemon mash-up.

Braixen as Marian

Froakie as Thaddeus

Pyroar (or Solgaleo) as Mufasa

Tyrantrum as Butch

Decidueye as Owl

Litten as Simba

Crabominable as Tamatoa

Rockruff as Bolt

Mudbray as Lampwick (or Pinocchio)

Disney-Themed Pokemon Nicknames:

• Gen I: Part 1
• Gen II: Part 2
• Gen III-V: Part 3
• Gen VI-VII: Part 4
• Additional: Part 5
• Additional (2): Part 6

7 Top Disney/Once Adaptations

With "Once Upon a Time" over (finally) we got closure to the seven years of Disney remixes. So in honor of the show that should have ended three years ago, I've got a few of my favorite adaptations of Disney characters that "Once Upon a Time" did.

Evil Queen/Regina Mills
The original Evil Queen from "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" was very flat. Her sole motives were about vanity and power. Now there's definitely evil in the world that appears so petty, but it's pretty one-dimensional. In constrast with our wanna-be beauty queen, Regina Mills spent seven seasons developing into a complex character. Season 1 revealed her backstory and why she had some much anger. Season 2 and Season 3 began her redemption as she fought for Henry's forgiveness. Season 4 and 5 she actively fought her dark side to find love and acceptance. Season 6 and 7 she flourished as a hero, maybe even surpassing Snow White in how she clung to hope.

Peter Pan
Disney's "Peter Pan" featured an immature little boy, who had a heart full of goodness, but also full of mischief. He brought his friends together and fought Captain Hook, mostly because he was a little boy craving buddies, but he was good. "Once Upon a Time" twisted that around 180 degrees. Instead of a fun-loving boy, we got a greedy old man (masquerading as a boy) who held more darkness in his heart than most of the villains the show featured. Each return of the Pied Piper was a chilling moment, right through until the end. All of his actions leading to power and selfishness.

Tiana/Sabine
Tiana was a Disney Princess that I was not introduced to until years later. Her strength and bravery in "The Princess and the Frog" changed her life and Naveen's life. She had to learn to chill out a bit, but she clung to hope of something better. During Season 7, while many of the new characters left me underwhelmed, Tiana/Sabine was a faithful adaptation of the New Orleans princess. I would have liked if she was fleshed out more and more complex, but I liked the role-reversal of Tiana being royal and Naveen not. While keeping the basic traits of the character the same, the original Tiana was still flipped around, both in the Enchanted Forest and Hyperion Heights, to be a new Tiana.

Pinocchio/August
The backstory of the "real boy" didn't really change from the Disney version, so there was no actual adaptation of his backstory. Instead, we got an interpretation of what happened after. I'm not aware of any other Pinocchio that got tested after becoming a real boy. Does he remain selfless, brave, and true or not? Well, in this case we got to see both. August was a "real boy" in more ways than one; he was a good Pinocchio, but he was also a real person with real reactions to real problems.

Alice
(I really liked "Once Upon a Time in Wonderland" so I had to include one of their characters. I thought about Jafar... but his Season 6 appearances left me wanting) I grew up watching "Alice in Wonderland" (my brother likes to remind me about how I watched it on repeat) so I can clearly picture the immature Alice traveling Wonderland and reacting to the fantastical world kind of naively. This new version of Alice was tough and willing to fight for her life and her love. She became a proficient swordswoman and she fought against the most evil sorcerer. In contrast, all the cartoon Alice could do was call the Queen of Hearts names.

Mad Hatter/Jefferson
Not much was seen of the silly Mad Hatter in "Alice in Wonderland" and even less substance to the character. So as much as I enjoy "Alice in Wonderland", I loved seeing the Mad Hatter brought to life as Jefferson. Even just the backstory as to why he's crazy was a nice addition. The only thing I would have changed is letting us see Jefferson more... but I also like Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes, so I guess that kind of makes it okay.

Cruella De Vil
Cruella was a beastly character in Disney's "101 Dalmatians". I mean, in many ways she's probably one of the freakier and scarier Disney villains, even without any sort of power and influence, besides money and henchmen (Jasper and Horace). "Once Upon a Time" took that same darkness and evil into a character with some devious powers. Her backstory episode threw me for a loop. As they intended, I was guessing she had some tragic backstory about her mother, when instead we just a straight up sociopath.