Pixar’s ‘Onward’ takes one common Disney trope and pushes it further

For 88 years, Disney has released animated films with fantastical stories intended to delight children of all ages, creating a legacy of family entertainment that serves as a canon for its own style. Occasionally, Disney or its competitors release films that imitate that style, but they generally follow the formula first introduced in 1937’s Snow White and 1942’s Bambi: In the past few decades, the stereotype that no matter how many people experience something, they end up with something like this has hardly been dispelled. “Happy moments forever.” Interestingly, Disney’s Onward revisited that trope.

Onward, which hit theaters in 2020, is filled with humor as much as pathos. Teenage elves Ian (Tom Holland) and his older brother Barley (Chris Pratt) live in the fantasy world of Onward, where there is supposed to be little magic. On Ian’s 16th birthday, they learn that their deceased father was secretly a wizard, and that he left behind a way to bring them back to life for just one day. Unfortunately, the spell fails and they must race against time to end the spell and give Ian a chance to greet the father he never knew.

Onward reminds you to feel your own emotions, but don’t forget the feelings of those around you too

Empathy may be an overused buzzword these days, but it’s an important part of emotional intelligence

If Onward had been a traditional Disney movie, the emotional climax would have been paced like this:

Ian and Barley find the magic MacGuffin within minutes. The magic works, and for the first time in years, we see the father’s face as he comes back to life and looks proudly at his sons. Ian barely managed to squeeze out a “Hello, Dad” through his tears. Before the magic is over, the wholesome extended family hugs each other.

But the movie doesn’t end there. Because no one had ever told a story like that to the Onward characters. From the beginning of the film, Ian is repeatedly irritated by his brother’s nerdy obsession with fantasy stories and tropes, but that irritation leads him to believe that Barley is always the one to go to the mat for him. Recognition becomes invisible. Throughout the course of their quest to resurrect his father, Barley learns that he is willing to make any sacrifices necessary, even his beloved Van Guinevere, to ensure that Ian can see his father. demonstrated repeatedly.

In the final moments before sunset, with time running out to complete the spell, Ian realizes that Barley is the one who has supported him all his life, and that Barley is the one who needs closure. I notice. Ian was a newborn when his father died, but Barley was older, so he still remembers him.

Ian may be bearing the weight of never knowing his father in Onward, but it’s Barley who carries the pain of losing him. This is a nuanced interpretation of how grief affects all of us, and healing it means that while our pain can help us make choices, it can also help us make choices. It means we have to accept the idea that we have to alleviate pain by how people who do it respond to it. About.

‘Onward’ had an emotionally difficult ending that more Disney movies should embrace.

“Happily Ever After” is a meaningless concept because all stories inevitably come to an end

Many Disney movies, and family movies in general, play with the idea of ​​”happily ever after” and that at the end of the movie, either everything goes back to the status quo or the protagonist wins. Focused on meaning. Princesses marry Prince Charming, kingdoms are restored to order no matter how much the infrastructure collapses, and evil is always defeated, imprisoned, or killed by falling from a height. But Onward rejects that idea, choosing instead to focus on the emotional discomfort at the heart of the story.

“Nasty” is exactly the word to describe Onward’s climax, and it’s clearly a very deliberate choice on the film’s part. After Ian defeats a concrete and rubble dragon, the final obstacle to his quest, he is separated from Barley by a pile of dragon debris. He tries to watch Burley and his father reunite through the rubble, but just as the sun is about to disappear behind the horizon, he slips and loses sight.

When he returned to his vantage point, he arrived just in time for a few people to exchange final words and one hug. Then his father disappears, leaving Barley to grieve once again. Ian tears up at the sight, but it’s clearly just the worst kind of bittersweet thing. Because he succeeded in his quest. Because he helped Burley find closure he never would have had otherwise.

Sometimes we lose loved ones in tragedies or accidents. Sometimes they don’t die, they are simply forever changed by fateful circumstances, and sometimes people just leave. Whatever the event that caused the loss, the grief becomes a burden around our necks, and each year it grows heavier with the addition of regrets and painful memories. Ian begins the film obsessed with finding a way to connect with the father he never knew, only to realize that his own pain over missed opportunities is not the same as his brother’s lifelong grief. Finish the movie.

Ian had a loving and supportive presence throughout his childhood who taught him how to swim and drive, but it was Barley, not his father. Barley has lived a life weighed down by grief, so he must be the one who gets the chance to close his heart for a moment to say the final goodbye that was taken from him at a young age.

Onward was Dan Scanlon’s second directorial effort, and it was a deeply personal film.

When writing about this kind of grief, you can’t whitewash your way through it.

Onward was Dan Scanlon’s pet project. He began his career in animation in 2000 by working on several of Disney’s direct-to-video sequels, and joined Pixar in 2001 as a storyboard artist, directing the short films Meter and Meter. It has become. Following “Ghost Light”, he made an independent film titled “Tracy,” before landing his first feature directorial credit at Pixar with 2013’s “Monsters University.” After this film, he was encouraged to take on more personal projects, and that’s when he began working on the script that would become Onward.

Scanlon’s idea came from his own experiences, which became the blueprint for Ian’s character arc. When Scanlon was just one year old, his father died, leaving him to wonder for the rest of his life what kind of person his father was. Scanlon also has an older brother who was three years old at the time of his tragic death. Scanlon announced Onward at the 2017 D23 conference and talked about how the film was inspired by that fundamental experience, as well as hearing from relatives that Scanlon’s father said “hello” and “goodbye.” He talked about how he was given a cassette tape in which he could hear him saying two words. ”

The true pain and loss of his own father clearly influenced Scanlon’s creation of Onward. Even though he was a director and screenwriter, both his lived experience of grief and years of experience as a storyboard artist helped him create the film’s tight, emotionally intense shots, especially the emotional climax. It’s shining brightly. Burley’s tearful encounter with his father.

Unfortunately, Onward didn’t receive the recognition and box office success it deserved. Due to the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), theaters across the United States were forced to close within two weeks of its release. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, but lost to Pixar’s 2020 film Soul. He was nominated for dozens of other awards that year, but did not win most of them. But critical acclaim aside, Onward is an incredibly important journey for its characters, its creators, and for all viewers who are willing to take the time to sit in the discomfort necessary to heal. be.