“I think it is atrocious!!!… Since I am no longer with the company, I’m sure they could care less what I think on the matter. But they have betrayed the essence of what we were trying to do with Merida—give young girls and women a better stronger role model. She’s strong inside and out—she’s not just a simpering pretty face waiting around for romance! She was created to turn that whole ideal on it’s [sic] head! Oh yeah… that’s why I created her… they’re just in it for the money… not the integrity. They don’t care what message they send about women, as long as it makes them a buck.” — Brenda Chapman on Disney’s Merida redesign.

I don’t object to anything she says here… but should Disney being in it for the money, as opposed to the artistic integrity, really come as a surprise? Granted, Merida is Chapman’s baby, so she has every right to be angry. But I’d say the problem is less in Merida specifically than in how Disney presents their princesses in general. Regardless of how they appear in the movies, the “official public image” of the characters are all kind of shiny and generic (a “simpering pretty face”), and Merida is but one part of that.

Though she may be a more important part, because Merida was so different from most other Disney princesses to begin with. What do you think?

(via: Boing Boing)

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Yesterday the Internet flipped out in response to the news that Disney had filed several applications to trademark the Mexican holiday Día de los Muertos, which is the subject of an upcoming Pixar film. The freak out-age is completely justified: Trademarking Día de los Muertos would be exploitative, appropriative, and disrespectful of Mexican culture, plus it’s just downright insane (owning trademark to a holiday? C’mon, Disney).

Luckily the massive amount of criticism got Disney to back off. We did it! We climbed this whole mountain.

DeviantArtist Hyung86 says he took inspiration from Pixar’s upcoming Monsters University to create collegiate versions of some classic Disney characters. We’ve collected the ladies for you here but if you’d like to see how he dressed Aladdin, Hercules, and more, check out his page.

On May 11th Brave‘s Merida will be officially crowned as the 11th Disney Princess, the impact of which is that Disney will be selling more stuff with her on it, I guess? Anyway. Along with the “coronation ceremony,” to be held at Walt Disney World, Merida’s gotten a new redesign, which will be used on merch along with the 3D version.

For comparison, two pictures of the original Merida (one with each of the dresses her new outfit is based on) is behind the jump. What do you think of the new version? I wish they’d kept to her non-ceremonial dress, but the tartan’s a nice touch.

With Monsters University imminent, Pixar has been rolling out some of the voice acting cameos they’ve peppered throughout the movie’s cast, including Steve Buscemi, John Krasinski, Alfred Molina, Frank Oz, and Captain Tightpants himself, Nathan Fillion. I’m pretty sure he’s the lettermans jacketed monster who tells Mike he should hang out with someone “a little more your speed,” but I could be wrong. Maybe he’s actually the giant football monster.

Disney’s been making all kinds of announcements lately about the future of their various brands, and while everybody is understandably flipping their wookiee wigs over Star Wars news, there’s another somewhat smaller project that we’ve also got our eyes on. That’s Pete Docter‘s Inside Out, a long gestating Pixar project about the inside of the human mind, which was tentatively revealed a few months ago to focus specifically on the mind of a little girl.

… and to stay single, of course.

Check out POP!’s versions of Carl from Up and the Rocketeer (Heh. POP! Rocketeer.) under the jump.

When Disney/Pixar’s sequel to Finding Nemo was announced, there was a lot of speculation on who was going to get lost this time. It seems, to borrow a joke from Jill, that Dory may have just kept swimming a bit too far this time. In actuality, the film, which will premiere on November 25th, 2015, seeks to answer the question of just how Dory wound up swimming alone in the Great Barrier Reef, and to reunite her with her family. We’re certain that Ellen DeGeneres is suitably excited.

The photoshop work of Phil Postma is really capturing our attention lately. And with Star Trek characters redesigned in the style of Pixar’s recent fare, well. I don’t think you can blame us.

Philip Postma remade Marvel and DC characters as Pixar characters. Or Pixar characters as Marvel and DC characters. Whatever. They’re a few months old, but we just saw ‘em today and couldn’t resist the opportunity to share with you. You can check out the others here.