Pixar Theory: The Cloud Atlas Of Animation

What I have deduced from being a minour Pop Culturologist and a huge Pixar fan is this: All Pixar films (With two exceptions) take place in the same Universe, but different time periods and... dimensions. Brave, I don't really count because it's so radically different and doesn't contain the stuff that binds the other films together, so lets just call that where it is: Medieval Scotland. The Toy Story movies, A Bug's Life, Finding Nemo, Ratatouille, and Up all take place in the same universe around the same time. Wall-E is the last in the timeline being 700 years in the future and Earth is abandoned. The Toy Story movies take place in real time due to the maturation of the characters. Toy Story 3 takes place a little while after Up (Not the intro, obviously) because Andy's wall has a postcard from Carl and Ellie Fredrickson on it. Also, Lotso appears in Up, and Rex appears in Wall-E on his rotating shelves. A Bug's Life and Ratatouille can take place basically anytime between these movies, even the years they came out. (1998 and 2007). Finding Nemo can also share this distinction, but just with the addition of taking place in the Ocean. What about Monsters Inc? Different dimensions obviously. It's in the same universe, but in the Monster dimension. Randall becomes trapped in the mobile home that was shown in a Bug's Life, and Jessie, the Luxo Ball, and a Nemo doll are all in Boo's room. This could mean that Boo is really Emily, Jessie's owner, but that's been debated. The Incredibles? It doesn't physically exist, but it's a franchise in their world. In Nemo, there's a kid reading a Mr. Incredible comic in P. Sherman's office. This means that The Incredibles is a huge multimedia franchise (Their Avengers) and we just happened to see one of them. And Cars? Cars doesn't count. They're all Cars. Screw Cars.

Or these could just be a bunch of cameos and one-shot blink-and-you'll-miss-it gags that Pixar puts in the movies to amuse themselves and their fans.

edited 21st Apr '13 2:08:48 PM by 0dd1

Cars is what Hot Wheels experience during playtime along the lines of TS 3's opening.

edited 21st Apr '13 3:27:27 PM by FigmentJedi

Or Cars is what happens after Wall-E. After the crew of the Axiom settles down and rebuilds Earth, they transfer their robots' minds to cars and the cars gradually take over.

Maybe the real apocalypse of Wall-E was that inanimate objects kept coming to life, and now the humans will be fighting the vehicles for control of the planet.

Except Cars is a contemporary setting.

I like the Cars-are-Hot-Wheels-during-playtime theory because it finally allows me to put all of the Pixar films into one universe without making huge accommodations for Cars.

Don't compare Pixar to Cloud Atlas. Pixar's cool, Cloud Atlas is fucking terrible.

I've considered a similar idea. However I have a problem: I REALLY hate the idea of intelligent creatures eating each other as seen in (for example) Finding Nemo, that I really don't want it to be the basis of a specific universe. So I would rather if only those Pixar films and Tv specials that did not involve it were all set in the same universe. (BTW, The Incredibles having merchandise doesn't preclude their being real- the Fantastic Four have their own comics in the Marvel Universe.)

Hell, wasn't there some Incredibles merchandise IN the Incredibles? I thought Bob had some on his wall of glory.

I was actually just thinking about this video today.

edited 21st Apr '13 7:42:20 PM by TParadox

Now wait a minute, if Brave involved magic that turns people into animals, then could the movies about intelligent animals really be about the descendants of people who were turned into animals and never changed back?

I still love how people hate Cars with such vitriol despite it being at worst an average kids movie.

Cars was fine, even enjoyable at parts.

Cars 2 is an abomination of a film on par with Dreamwork's Shark Tale.

At least Cars 2 was entertaining.

...I LIKED Cars 2.

That Cracked video was fun, except for (ironically enough) the human characters in it. Assh*les.

I disagree with what Cars 2 is on several levels, but the story was richer than Brave.

So I'm not alone?

No... Just outnumbered, sadly.

IMHO, Brave SUCKS more...

@CTM, I'm not comparing it to Cloud Atlas quality wise, but just by how their way of stories "connecting" could be similar. As for Cars, I really don't hate it, it's actually very good in some parts, but most of it is just... ehh... As for Cars 2, if you accept the absurdity of the universe and that they thought the best way to continue the story was with Secret Agents, its actually a pretty entertaining movie. It still doesn't change the fact that it's a ridiculous concept, and it begs the question: If Pixar wanted to make a Secret Agent movie, why didn't they make just a Secret Agent movie? Or even better, THE INCREDIBLES 2.

I'm kind of glad they didn't make The Incredibles 2 their spy film. Because if they put Cars 2 levels of effort into it, it presumably would have also sucked, and ruined a good franchise instead of a bad one.

I still don't think an Incredibles sequel is necessary or even a good idea.

We ought to make an Incredibles 2 thread, to prevent every Pixar thread from derailing into that topic.