Disney/Pixar In General

Yeah, that was such an interesting line, and it was never commented on again! It also parses with the idea that Iago seems a lot smarter than people expect, and that Iago pretends to be a normal parrot whenever around others, at least in the first movie. By the time of the TV series, everyone seems to just sort of accept that Iago is a parrot with human intelligence.

On the other hand, Abu is also much smarter than a real monkey, and can even talk somewhat, although not very clearly.

This is what the wiki has to say about it:

I'd still say Abu is more human than his species usually is in actions and instincts, or at least is remarkably tame. The scene where Abu shares his bread with some kids would be one of the clearest examples of this, as a real monkey would just not do that.

Edited by Redmess on Apr 22nd 2024 at 10:40:25 AM

Hoo boy. Making a bold statement, but I think this is the best version of this song I've ever heard (it's Colors of the Wind, but in French for their version of the "We Love Disney" album), including the original version.

Computer, file that cover under "very kickass".

Sometimes I listen to foreign language covers of different Disney songs myself, pretty much out of curiosity over how they sound. Some of the ones I’ve heard are really awesome.

The video was removed but thank you for giving context, I will look for it on my own.

Abu being sapient is less of a stretch than a bird having sapience.

Man, RIP Gilbert.

Not really, parrots are famously intelligent.

And monkeys, despite being humanlike, are not significantly more intelligent than the smartest birds like parrots and crows.

Something I noticed recently: the main characters of Toy Story share first names with Walter Lantz's most iconic characters: Woody Woodpecker, Buzz Buzzard and Andy Panda. Do you think this was done on purpose, either as an homage or as low-key plagiarism, or is it a complete coincidence?

Probably either a tribute or a coincidence, because as hot of a word as it might be nowadays, that's not what plagiarism is (especially given they bear zero similarity otherwise). Moreover, Buzz at least was explicitly named after the astronaut Buzz Aldrin.

Edited by Chortleous on Apr 23rd 2024 at 6:50:33 AM

Yeah, that is not what plagiarism means. If it's intentional, it's a subtle shout-out. It could be that they decided to name Buzz after Aldrin and named Woody and Andy after the Woody Woodpecker characters after noticing how neatly those blocks would fall into place.

I always thought it was funny how Tim Allen co-starred in Wild Hogs, and John Travolta's character is named Woody.

Besides Buzz, I figured that the character names were just what sounded right. Woody sounds like a regular name you'd see on cowboys and Andy is a fairly common name.

Woody started as a ventriloquist dummy iirc before they settled on a cowboy.

Maybe because they realized that no child in the nineties would own a ventriloquist dummy.

But it seems that the name was there before the cowboy motif was.

wonder over yonder not being on UK Disney plus is such bullshit

It's probably a coincidence, but it's definitely possible it isn't one.

> Maybe because they realized that no child in the nineties would own a ventriloquist dummy.

it could have been Andy's dad that previously owned the dummy..

IIRC, didn't it turn out to be Word of God (or at least Word of Saint Paul or even Word of Dante) that Woody was indeed a hand-me-down from Andy's late father? Granted, the ventriloquist dummy thing might be more because those things tend to be (or come off as) creepy, and that wasn't what the filmmakers wanted for Woody.

Edited by TrashJack on Apr 23rd 2024 at 12:30:14 PM

Woody is described as an “old family toy” in 2. I don’t believe we ever learn what happened to Andy’s dad, though his mom evidently had a man in her life shortly before the first movie since Molly is one or two.

There’s an old fan theory that Andy’s father was also named Andy and Woody legitimately can’t tell the difference between Senior and Junior, but I don’t personally think it holds up.

I'm gonna have to binge The Weekenders on DVD (it's still not on D+, had to order both volumes from the Disney Movie Club as one of my final purchases before the site goes under next month) and see if there's any Lampshade Hanging on the pizza place changing its theme every episode.

Apart from a ventriloquist dummy being creepy, the whole cowboys to spacemen transition seems Two Decades Behind. The Western had its last gasp in the 1970s, and Star Wars took over totally in 1977.

According to Stinky Pete in the second movie, it happened a bit earlier thanks to the Space Race.

The transition didn't happen while Andy was a kid, yeah, he just personally liked cowboy stuff on his own without it being a popular thing anymore, and there's no evidence (beyond using Jessie and Bullseye's proper names and characterizations at the end of 3) that he ever knew anything about the Woody's Roundup show. Space stuff became popular after Sputnik (though if you pay attention, you realize Pete was lying about the show being immediately cancelled after its launch) and continued to be popular into 1995 with the release of Lightyear (and, via Word of God, the Star Command cartoon, which is still the toyline the Buzz and Zurg we know came from).

I was thinking about the original development and first film. After people brought up the issue of a kid playing cowboy in the 1990s they felt they had to explain it in the second movie. But I really think it was modeled on the writers' own experience in the 1970s.

Edited by alanh on Apr 23rd 2024 at 10:42:52 AM

if you pay attention, you realize Pete was lying about the show being immediately cancelled after its launch

What evidence is there?

Edited by MightyMatilda on Apr 23rd 2024 at 1:41:15 PM

It doesn't seem like something he would even lie bother to lie about.