Just another day at work.
Partly Cloudy is a 2009 animated short film from Pixar, one of the Pixar Shorts. It was written and directed by Peter Sohn.
A flock of delivery storks are tasked with delivering baby animals and humans to new parents, which are created by sentient cloud people living in the skies. A storm cloud named Gus is in charge of creating the dangerous baby animals, which results in repeated Amusing Injuries for his partner, a stork named Peck. As Gus' creations get more and more dangerous, Peck has to find a way to handle them without getting himself maimed or worse.
Played in theaters in advance of the Pixar feature Up.
Partly Cloudy is associated with:
- All of the Other Reindeer: Visually implied. Gus, the only cloud that makes dangerous baby animals instead of cute ones, is shown floating far beneath the other clouds, all by himself, and his Only Friend is Peck, his delivery stork.
- All There in the Manual: The storm cloud is named Gus, and his stork friend is named Peck.
- Amusing Injuries: Poor Peck suffers various injuries from the dangerous baby animals it must deliver, getting headbutted by a goat, bitten by an alligator, shocked by an electric eel, and spiked by a porcupine.
- Bait-and-Switch:
- After being battered and bruised from Gus's previous deliveries, Peck calms down when he sees Gus's next creation is seemingly a fluffy sheep. As he reaches out to pet it, Gus brings it to life, revealing it's actually a spiky porcupine.
- With Gus making dangerous animals, Peck seemingly leaves him for another cloud that makes cute and harmless animals instead when the former makes a shark, making Gus very upset. Then it's revealed Peck didn't abandon him, he just went to ask for protective gear so the creations of Gus wouldn't hurt him anymore.
- Butt-Monkey: Peck, the stork tasked with delivering the babies created by Gus.
- Chekhov's Gun: Early on a cloud is seen making a football and helmet for a newborn baby. This turns out to be useful when Peck asks for armor to protect himself from Gus’s creations.
- Chekhov's Gunman: The cloud with the three puffs on the top of his head shows up near the beginning. He is the one who Peck asks for a football helmet and padding so he can protect himself when delivering Gus's baby animals.
- Cute Kitten: A few of them show up near the beginning, being delivered by the storks to new parents.
- Dark Is Not Evil: Gus, a dark storm cloud, despite only making dangerous baby creatures such as alligators, wild sheep, porcupines, knifefish, etc. is merely trying to do his best and is eager for companionship.
- Delivery Stork: In this short, babies are made by cloud people and delivered by storks to new parents. Most of the storks have it easy, receiving adorable puppies, kittens, and human babies to deliver...and then there's Peck, the stork assigned to Gus, a storm cloud in charge of creating baby alligators, electric eels, sharks, porcupines, and more. Lord help him.
- Empathic Environment: Gus is the empathic environment. When he thinks Peck is abandoning him for another cloud who makes safer, cuter baby animals, he starts making thunder and lightning when he gets angry, and then makes it rain when he starts to cry.
- Feel No Pain: Being made of water vapor rather than flesh, Gus can handle alligator bites and porcupine spines without them hurting him. Too bad the same isn't true for Peck.
- Gag Nose: The clouds have large, bulbous noses.
- Lightning Can Do Anything: The clouds creating life (and inanimate objects as well) by shaping fluffy bits of cloud and zapping them with lightning.
- Mime and Music-Only Cartoon: Like almost every other Pixar short, aside from noises made by the animals and gibberish spoken by our two main characters.
- Mood Whiplash: While watching the short, you go from laughing at the stork's amusing injuries to sniffling when Gus thinks his friend has abandoned him.
- Never Smile at a Crocodile: Peck has to pick up and deliver a baby alligator, which turns out to already have a full set of teeth. It promptly bites him.
- Nightmare Fetishist: Gus seems genuinely excited to show his stork the baby animals he's making. Too bad they're all Killer Rabbits.
- Poor Communication Kills: Gus is saddened when Peck seemingly leaves him and is seen taking a delivery for another cloud, after being asked to deliver a baby shark. It turns out that the stork was just getting a football helmet and vest so he could protect himself while delivering Gus's babies.
- Psycho Electric Eel: One of the animals Peck has to deliver is a baby knifefish, which immediately gives him a bad shock.
- Punny Name: Subtly, but the grey cloud's name is "Gus" (as in a gust of wind).
- Ridiculously Cute Critter: All of the baby animals, even the dangerous ones.
- The Sacred Darkness: Gus can't seem to make anything but dangerous baby animals that tend to maul their handler, but he's just doing his job. Dangerous wild animals need their babies delivered too...
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Subverted. When Gus reveals his next creation is a shark, Peck seemingly panics and flees to another cloud. Gus bursts into tears, thinking he's been abandoned, but a moment later Peck returns wearing football gear, revealing he hadn't ditched his partner and was just getting some armor first.
- Three-Month-Old Newborn: The baby animals (and humans), including a kitten and puppy with their eyes already open and a ram with horns already the size of its own head. Then again, considering they were made by sentient cloud people...
- Undying Loyalty: No matter how badly he gets hurt by Gus' baby animals, Peck is determined to keep delivering for him.
- What Measure Is a Non-Cute?: Averted. The various dangerous animals we see are just as adorable as the safe ones.
