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Where’s the lamp? Show me the lamp!

34 Fascinating Peeks Behind the Pixar Curtain

August 04, 2024

Justice for Sid!

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WOODY Woody was based on John Lasseter's pull-string Casper doll, so he always had a voice box. GRAGKED.COM — Source

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BUZZ Buzz started out looking much more rigid, for 1 good reason - he was based on John Lasseter's childhood G.I. Joe. GRACKED.COM — Source

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ANDY WOODY Andy's room is a treasure trove of easter eggs, including hidden Mickeys, concept art for A Bug's Life, and an early sketch of Woody (supposedly drawn by Andy). GRAGKED.COM — Source

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REX Early versions of Rex were much cuddlier, then became almost steampunk, before they settled on the rigid plastic coward you know and love. GRAGKED.COM — Source

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ANDY HiTECHT 92 CRACKED.COM — Source

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SID FIRE DEPT Sid is named after Sid Vicious, but based on a Pixar employee who liked to build little toy freakshows. GRAGKED.COM — Source

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BUZZ BUCKLE UP! SPACE RANGERS Не became a bit goofier over time, but eventually split the difference. GRACKED.COM — Source

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MR POTATO HEAD He's slightly modified from the original toy version, so toy collectors were pissed when those modifications weren't present in the official movie merch. 01607 CRACKED.COM — Source

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SLINKY DOG We almost had a Mickey Mouse/ Wile Е. Coyote hybrid Slinky Dog, voiced by John Cleese. GRAGKED.COM — Source

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SID ORE SID STUFF NOTE THE FRO THE BAC FLEECE SWEAT SHIRT KNEE BEND SIDE DENIM JEANS BOTTOM GRAGKED.COM — Source

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WOODY But he came perilously close to being a nightmare ventriloquist dummy. GRACKED.COM — Source

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SID CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar

Pixar Rules of Storytelling 15 If you were your character, in this situation, how would you feel? Honesty lends credibility to unbelievable situations. Boo in Monsters, Inc. was voiced by actual four-year-old Mary Gibbs. This helped guide the story using the little girl's genuine reactions and emotions during recording sessions. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Inside Out

Pixar Rules of Storytelling No work is ever wasted. If it's not working, let go and move on-it'll come back 17 around to be useful later. Monsters, Inc. was originally about a man dealing with monsters representing unaddressed fears, traumas, or feelings. While discarded, the idea of making emotions into characters led to Inside Out. CRACKED COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 22 What's the essence of your story? The most economical telling of it? If you know that, you can build from there. Turning Red is about puberty. When you build it out, it is also about growing up Chinese Canadian, mother/daughter relationships, magical red panda curses, getting into trouble with friends, and the boy band craze of the 2000s, but the essence of the story is simply puberty. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar

Pixar Rules of Storytelling 16 What are the stakes? Give us reason to root for the character. What happens if they don't succeed? Stack the odds against them. In Soul, if Joe doesn't get back to life, he'll never achieve his lifelongdream of being a professional jazz musician, making his life a waste! OK, cool, he made it- Oh, no, he's in the body of his cat! Aw, man, what next? CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 5 Simplify. Focus. Combine characters. Hop over detours. You'll feel like you're losing valuable stuff but it sets you free. Complicated plots and a large cast aren't always necessary for quality work. Pixar won an Academy Award for Geri's Game, a short that's a simple story about a man playing chess against himself. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 9 When you're stuck, make a list of what WOULDN'T happen next. Lots of times the material to get you unstuck will show up. You can find narrative solutions by eliminating the negative, or you can prevent predictable outcomes by asking That wouldn't happen, but if it did, what would it be like? Like What if scary monsters made you laugh instead of scream? for Monsters, Inc. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 20 Exercise: Take the building blocks of a movie you dislike. How do you rearrange them into what you DO like? Back when Brave was titled The Bear and the Bow, final director Mark Andrews disliked it for its generic European setting and its romantic subplot. Не took the building blocks of the original script and rearranged them so the movie would focus on Merida's relationship with her mother, and would be set specifically in Scotland. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Delicious!

Pixar Rules of Storytelling 21 You gotta identify with your situation/ characters, can't just write 'cool.' What would make YOU act that way? Coco cannot exist without focusing on the genuine human feelings of love, memory, loss, and death. The characters feel real because they are being drawn from the real feelings and reactions the creators had toward how death affected their lives. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling What is your 6 character good at, comfortable with? Throw the polar opposite at them. Challenge them. How do they deal? Sully in Monsters Inc. is an expert at scaring human kids, so what's a better challenge for him than to babysit and nurture one? CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 1 You admire a character for trying more than for their successes. In Up, Carl tried to be an adventurer, to be a father, to go on a trip with his wife - and his life didn't go as planned. Because GRAPE JARA of this, we root for the curmudgeon when he balloons up his house to keep his promise to Ellie. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar

Pixar Rules of Storytelling 8 Finish your story, let go even if it's not perfect. In an ideal world you have both, but move on. Do better next time. Jan Pinkava's Ratatouille juggled Remy's life as a chef while living with his rodent family, along with other things that made the movie too scattered. Eventually, he would have to finish that story, let it go, and hand it over to Brad Bird to refine it. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 4 Once upon a time there was Every day, One day Because of that, Because of that, Until finally Once upon a time there was a lonely trash compactor robot. Every day, he collected trash and interesting objects. One day, his routine was interrupted by a flying robot who found a plant. Because of that, the flying robot was abducted by a probe. Because of that, the trash compactor robot chased after the flying robot. Until finally, you have WALL-E. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling LASER LIGHTYEAR brase 3 Trying for theme is important, but you won't see what the story is actually about till you're at the end of it. Now rewrite. The original Toy Story script had Woody as an abusive, tyrannical villain because the crew wasn't sure what the real story was yet. In rewrites, the movie we saw came to form, and so did the themes along with it. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 18 You have to know yourself: The difference between doing your best and fussing. Story is testing, OOR not refining. Imagine if director Pete Docter put his foot down and said, No, Up will be about two alien princes living on a floating city, just as we first imagined. That fussiness would have robbed us all. CRACKED COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 19 Coincidences to get characters into trouble are great; coincidences to get them out of it are cheating. The toys being coincidentally saved from the incinerator by the alien squeak toys and the industrial claw in Toy Story 3 was an exception, but that was to spare an entire generation of kids (and adults) the trauma. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 13 Give your characters opinions. Passive/malleable might seem likable to you as you write, but it's poison to the audience. Joy in Inside Out believes that chasing happiness and quelling sadness is the best way to live, so she makes bold moves and choices based on that opinion. She learns a lesson about that belief at the end, but there's no journey without her having it to begin with. CRACKED COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 14 Why must you tell THIS story? What's the belief burning within you that your story feeds off of? That's the heart of it. Turning Red was based on the feelings, experiences, struggles, and beliefs of director Domee Shi. The story has nothing solid to stand on without her feeling the need to share herself within the tale. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar

Pixar Rules of Storytelling Pull apart the stories you like. 10 What you like in them is a part of you; you've got to recognize it before you can use it. Seven Samurai is about a village elder rounding up warriors to defend their village against bandits. A Bug's Life is about an ant rounding up other insects to defend their colony against grasshoppers. The Pixar writers took what they liked from the Kurosawa film, and made it their own. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling You gotta keep in mind what's 2 interesting to you as an audience, not what's fun to do as a writer. They can be very different. Fla Sure, a flashing gag in Cars is a fun wink for writers and some parents, but doing stuff like that without service to the story and the wider audience is one of the reasons why the Cars movies aren't exactly Pixar's most appreciated. 10 FORM REAS END 95 95 CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling SPAGE RANGER LIGHTYEAR 11 Putting it on paper lets you start fixing it. If it stays in your head, a perfect idea, you'll never share it with anyone. If Lunar Larry was never drawn, we never would have eventually gotten to Buzz Lightyear. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 7 Come up with your ending before you figure out your middle. Seriously. Endings are hard, get yours working up front. If the title of your movie is Finding Nemo, you're gonna have to know how Nemo is going to be found. CRACKED.COM — Source

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Pixar Rules of Storytelling 12 SPACE RANGER LIGHTYEAR Discount the first thing that comes to mind. And the second, third, fourth, fifth... Get the obvious out of the way. Surprise yourself. Toy Story was originally about a tin toy teaming up with a ventriloquist dummy. Then it was about an astronaut toy teaming with the dummy. Then that dummy became a cowboy, and was evil. The movie we know resulted from many ideas being scrapped. CRACKED.COM — Source

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