Line #21 Trivia/TheEmojiMovie


1	! Trivia Tropes:
2	* AllStarCast:
3	** The film contains some pretty big-name actors in it, including Creator/TJMiller, Creator/JamesCorden, Creator/PatrickStewart, Music/ChristinaAguilera, Creator/AnnaFaris, Creator/MayaRudolph, and Creator/StevenWright.
4	** The Japanese dub sports quite a surprising cast of well-known {{Anime}} voice actors: We have Creator/TakahiroSakurai as Gene, Creator/TomokazuSugita as Hi-5, Creator/TakehitoKoyasu as Poop, Creator/JojiNakata as Mel, Creator/ShinichiroMiki as Steven, plus Creator/KojiYusa and Creator/RikakoAikawa as well.
5	* ChristmasRushed:
6	** Because Sony didn't want other animation studios to create their take on emojis ahead of them, the film was produced in just two years, which is a rather short amount of time as far as animated films from major studios go.
7	** [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjwJTVaaJzA#t=11m57s They also wanted to avoid the movie being seen as a dated joke, desperately trying to be relevant.]]
8	* CompletelyDifferentTitle: Titled ''Emoji no Kuni no Gene'' (Gene in Emoji-land) in Japanese, as a reference of ''Literature/AliceInWonderland'' (Fushigi no Kuni no Alice).
9	* CreatorBacklash:
10	** David Feiss (''WesternAnimation/CowAndChicken'') worked on the film as a storyboard artist. At his request, he was not named in the credits.
11	** The film slowly became this for Creator/SonyPicturesAnimation since late 2018, as press releases from the studio made little mention of ''The Emoji Movie'' in their resume, and no posts regarding the film have been made on their social media accounts after August of that year. Furthermore, when ''WesternAnimation/HotelTransylvania3SummerVacation'' and ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManIntoTheSpiderVerse'' were both released to much better reviews and box office receipts[[note]]''Film/PeterRabbit'' and ''Film/Goosebumps2HauntedHalloween'' both having been only released under the company's name; SPA was otherwise uninvolved with either film[[/note]] (the latter of which was released to universal acclaim, including an Oscar win), SPA decided to make sequels out of those films instead.
12	* CreatorKiller: Tony Leondis' career was irreparably damaged by the movie's universal thrashing, with no other planned projects in the pipeline since its release. A film he had been planning at Creator/DreamWorksAnimation, ''B.O.O.: Bureau of Otherworldly Operations'', remains indefinitely shelved (though DWA's sale to [=NBCUniversal=] and eventual regime change didn't help matters, either).
13	* FollowTheLeader:
14	** Many saw similarities to this film and ''WesternAnimation/TheLEGOMovie'', which some argue is ''the'' reason the movie was conceived in the first place. However, others argue that it has more in common with ''WesternAnimation/InsideOut'' or ''WesternAnimation/WreckItRalph''.
15	** According to director Tony Leondis, the film took inspiration from ''Franchise/ToyStory'', claiming that he wanted to create a movie based on ''Toy Story'''s concept with something that hasn't been done yet (in this case, emojis).
16	* InternationalCoproduction: Not the movie itself, but the Latin American Spanish dub, albeit with a very odd twist: Besides including Mexican voice actors (including "startalents", the name in Mexican voice acting for {{Celebrity Voice Actor}}s), the dub also features celebrity voice actors from Argentina, Dominican Republic, Panama, and Guatemala, countries that (with the sole exception of Argentina) have ''no voice acting industry to speak of''.
17	* NotScreenedForCritics:
18	** An embargo was placed on any sort of reviews for the movie until release day. It's widely speculated that this was because of... pretty much ''everything'' about the movie garnering an almost unanimously-negative reception from the get-go. Sure enough, upon release [[https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_emoji_movie the film]] got a '''6%''' Tomatometer rating on Website/RottenTomatoes,[[note]]and initially, it was a '''''0%'''''[[/note]] and an average rating of 2.9/10.
19	--->"Critics Consensus: 🚫"
20	** It was [[http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/studios-fight-back-withering-rotten-tomatoes-scores-1025575 later revealed]] that they had done so to prevent Rotten Tomatoes from ruining their chances to make a profit, which didn't work out very well as the film was only barely profitable.
21	** For bonus points, Sony denied critics test screenings of the movie, just to be sure no bad reviews were staving off profits on the opening weekend. Unfortunately for them, many theaters saw this as the writing on the wall and released the film early anyway to try and recoup some of the money before the bad reviews caught up. [[GoneHorriblyWrong The result was that critics got to watch and review the movie early anyway.]]
22	* TheOtherMarty: Creator/TomKane voiced Poop in the teaser trailer before the character was officially cast as Creator/PatrickStewart.
23	* PopCultureUrbanLegends:
24	** A rare example of this occurring '''before the film even came out'''. A click-bait post on Tumblr (whose "source" leads to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VPbIe3eX68 this video]]) announced that the movie was canceled due to negative feedback from the trailer. However, people legitimately actually thought the post was being serious and many were glad that the movie was canceled, despite there being no official sources to back this claim up. It's extremely rare for this to happen (even those who fall under this are canceled due to controversy rather than bad reception).
25	** Shortly after the film's release, word spread that Sony announced they would be making a new "X movie" about memes. Which comes from a [[https://twitter.com/tanukiitales/status/891659869933248512 parodic image edit]].
26	* ReleaseDateChange: Originally set for release on August 4, it was moved up to July 28. The UK gets it on the former date.
27	* Rule34: In a somewhat ironic sense, the film has spawned ''tons'' of rule 34, particularly of Addie and Jailbreak. Most infamous of these ironic artists is Shadman, who has dedicated many pieces dedicated to lewding the two ladies.
28	* StarDerailingRole:
29	** Inadvertent and a rare self-inflicted example with Creator/JordanPeele. He was so insulted when Sony offered him the role of Poop that it inspired him to briefly retire from acting and focus on film directing.
30	** Played straight with Creator/TJMiller, being his lowest rated movie. Not helping matters was that he was later accused of sexually assaulting a woman, which was revealed a few months after the film's release. Miller [[Film/ReadyPlayerOne2018 had]] [[Film/Deadpool2 three]] [[Film/{{Underwater}} other]] movies that were still in production at the time his sexual harassment allegations were revealed, but he hasn't had any major roles since then.
31	* StillbornFranchise: [[ImpliedTrope Judging by the statement from Mel in the teaser]]: "It's my pleasure to announce our ''first'' movie.", this movie was intended to be the start of a franchise. However, its overwhelmingly negative reception means that any sequels will be ''very'' unlikely to happen.
32	* TroubledProduction:
33	** [[DownplayedTrope While things generally went smoothly during production]], it was extremely [[ChristmasRushed rushed]], being produced in just two years to stop other animation studios from making their movies featuring emojis. On top of that, Sony only greenlit the movie out of desperation: the studio was still struggling from the fallout of the 2014 hack, and since they had brokered a deal to share the film rights to ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'', their most lucrative asset, with Creator/MarvelStudios that year, the studio was desperate to produce '''anything''' that could potentially attract audiences.
34	** T.J. Miller, who voiced Gene, was reluctant to join the production, and only did so when director Tony Leondis revealed the plot outline to him.
35	* WhatCouldHaveBeen:
36	** Creator/IlanaGlazer was originally cast as Jailbreak rather than Anna Faris.
37	** Patrick Stewart's character was called Poop Daddy at one point before simply being shortened to Poop.
38	** According to Creator/JordanPeele, he was originally [[https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2018/02/jordan-peele-quit-acting-because-of-the-emoji-movie offered the role of Poop]]. Not only did he turn the role down, he decided to ''[[ScrewThisImOuttaHere go into early retirement from acting]]'' and focus exclusively on directing and producing movies because of how insulting the offer was. Though [[TenMinuteRetirement this ultimately ended up being a short break]], as he'd appear in ''WesternAnimation/ToyStory4'' as Bunny two years later (and was the voice of Melvin in ''WesternAnimation/CaptainUnderpantsTheFirstEpicMovie'', which released the same year as ''The Emoji Movie'').
39	** The DVD commentary mentions that Smiler's robots were originally stopsigns, which was changed because stopsigns aren't scary.
40	* WordOfGod: The DVD commentary addresses several events not spelled out in the film itself, such as Jailbreak being half-princess and half-hacker at the end and the Dropbox plug being a narrative device to explain why the robots couldn't access it.
41	* WorkingTitle: The film's original title was "Emojimovie: Express Yourself".
42	!Assorted Trivia:
43	* Of the four Creator/SonyPicturesAnimation films released in 2017 (counting the DTV release, ''WesternAnimation/SurfsUp2Wavemania''), ''The Emoji Movie'' is the only one not to be a co-production. The aforementioned [=WaveMania=] was co-produced with [[Creator/{{WWE}} WWE Studios]]. ''WesternAnimation/SmurfsTheLostVillage'' was produced with The Kerner Entertainment Company. ''WesternAnimation/TheStar'' was co-produced with Creator/WaldenMedia and The Jim Henson Company.
44	* Michael Lynton, an executive at Sony, left the company before the film was released to focus all of his efforts at working for Snap Inc., the owner of Snapchat (which he was already involved with before becoming chairman). Since Snapchat is one of the apps featured in the film, the use of ProductPlacement was likely very deliberate in this case.
45	* The film became the first animated feature to be nominated for the UsefulNotes/GoldenRaspberryAward for Worst Picture, Worst Screenplay, Worst Screen Combo (any two obnoxious emojis) and Worst Director, and the first to be nominated for a Razzie in general since the ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars'' movie ("Worst Prequel, Remake, Rip-off or Sequel"), [[MedalofDishonor winning all four awards]]. Interestingly, none of the voice actors received any Razzie nominations.
46	** It is also the second animated movie to win a Razzie ever, period, the first being ''WesternAnimation/{{Thumbelina\|1994}}'' (in the "Worst Song" category for "Marry the Mole").
47	* ''The Emoji Movie'' was selected as [[https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/emoji-movie-saudi-arabia-cinemas-theatres-ban-35-years-a8161401.html one of the first movies to be screened publicly in Saudi Arabia in 35 years]] following Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman lifting a ban on cinemas (Creator/DreamWorksAnimation's ''WesternAnimation/CaptainUnderpantsTheFirstEpicMovie'' was the other film). Due to the mere fact of ''The Emoji Movie'' being selected, this attracted several comments to the effect that they were trying to ensure it would be another 35 years until the next one.
48	* Sony thought that this movie would be so critically beloved that they ''[[http://screencrush.com/best-animated-oscars-2018-submitted-list/ submitted it for Best Animated Feature consideration]]''. Unsurprisingly, the film didn't even get nominated.
49	* Patrick Stewart was ecstatic to be asked to play Poop since he never gets asked to do weird [[{{Pun}} shit]]. They would have asked him around when he was coming off of filming the notoriously depressing ''Film/{{Logan}}''.

Context Trivia / TheEmojiMovie