Category Archives: Pixar Shorts

Pixar Shorts

Mike’s New Car

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Original release date: September 12, 2002.

Rating: TV-G

Length: four minutes

Background:

Outside of their fantastic movies, Pixar is well known for their shorts. “Mike’s New Car” was the first time the two were smashed together.

Not surprisingly, Mike and Sulley were very popular following the release of “Monsters, Inc.” in 2001. When time came for the DVD release, the Pixar crew decided to include a bonus short as a special feature.

For the first time, Pixar decided to dive back into a world they had created – in this case, Monstropolis – and visit with characters we had seen before.

Review:

The first thing that screams – like the children in the movie – is how GREAT Sulley’s fur looks in HD. While the short isn’t full-screen and features the black side panels, everything within those two panels looks fantastic.

So Mike has bought a fancy new yellow car. He lets Sulley in to check it out, which involves lots of hijinks. Sulley takes the seat up and down, ejects Mike and grinds him up a bit in the motor gears. Oops.

Mike finally makes it in and just can’t figure out the 900 buttons on his car console. I can’t even figure out the 24 on mine, I get it.

Various button pressing causes various issues, Mike finally being so angry he throws Sulley out. Mike zooms off and… well, kaboom.

It’s a short short but full of visual gags. The original voices – John Goodman and Billy Crystal – are present.

Extras:

No extras for you.

Should you watch it?

Sure, watch it. The Monsters universe is a fun place that is a visual delight, and that shows in the short time the short runs.

Pixar Shorts

Luxo Jr.

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Original release date: August 17, 1986 at the SIGGRAPH conference and then dusted off to be premiered to the world as the short before “Toy Story 2” debuting on November 24, 1999.

Rating: G

Length: two whole minutes

Background:

“Luxo Jr.” is one of those shorts that has transcended its original placement and has become the icon of Pixar.

The star of “Luxo Jr.” is a little lamp with the same name. That lamp has appeared at the beginning of every Pixar film since. You know the lamp.

Written and directed by John Lasseter, the Hawaiian shirt-wearing estranged mastermind of Pixar fame, the short debuted at the SIGGRAPH conference. It would go on to be the first CGI animation film to receive an Academy Award nomination for “Best Animated Short Film.”

Luxo Jr. now serves as the icon for Pixar, much like the castle for Disney. Giant versions of Luxo Jr. sit on the Pixar campus as well as Disney’s California Adventure, and Lexo Jr. is a playable character in “LEGO The Incredibles” for modern systems.

Review:

This thing is two minutes, so don’t expect a grand review.

We start with the original Pixar logo, un ugly little square that thankfully was replaced with our star.

The iconic red-starred ball seen across the Pixar Multiverse rolls into a giant lamp named Luxo. Luxo rolls it back, only for it to come back… and a diminuative lamp of the Jr. variety appears.

Luxo Jr., playful as ever, jumps on the ball… and it deflates. Sadness emerges, and this is when you really see the lifelike reactions animations were going for.

Luxo Jr. finds a beach ball, ending the short on a happy note, and rolls it right past the dejected parental lamp.

Extras:

No extras for you.

Should you watch it?

It’s a piece of Disney history that introduces Pixar lore… and it is two minutes long. Of course you should watch it.

Pixar Shorts, SparkShorts

Kitbull

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Original release date: February 18, 2019 worldwide on YouTube. It debuted at the SIGGRAPH conference on August 14, 2018, before having a limited release at the El Capitan Theatre on January 18, 2019 with two other shorts.

Rating: PG

Length: nine minutes

Background:

“Kitbull” is one of Pixar’s “SparkShorts.” What’s a SparkShort, you ask?

Besides having great movies (and also the “Cars” series), Pixar is known for their dynamic shorts that typically run before movies. They decided to go in a different direction with the SparkShorts program in 2018, giving employees six months and a limited budget to see what they could create.

Not surprisingly, the Pixar employees knocked it out of the park by creating fun, advanced, and mind-blowing shorts. “Kitbull” might be the most acclaimed of them thus far, scoring an Academy Award nomination for 2020’s ceremony for “Best Animated Short Film,” a category it would lose to the short “Hair Love.”

Review:

“Kitbull” immediately begins with a gorgeous animation style and a little black kitten on the prowl, searching for somewhere to eat the fish it had claimed. The kitten finds a warm box and falls asleep under a stuffed elephant, only to be awoken by a drooling pit bull.

The cat is confrontational and the pit bull just wants to play, which is definitely something I’ve learned from having a pit breed myself. Unfortunately for the pit bull, it gets chained up outside and ignored by its owners.

The curious kitten finds a bottlecap to play with, eventually knocking it to the pit bull. The pit bull knocks it back, scaring the cat. However, the neurotic cat begins a game of knocking it back and forth before becoming scared of the pit bull’s playful ripping of a stuffed animal’s head off. Fair.

Night comes and we see the pit bull’s owners actually kicking it out of the house and into the rain. Heartbreaking. Meanwhile, the cat finds its way stuck in a six-pack of soda can rings.

The pit bull lets helps the cat out, who scratches it because A) cats are mean and B) the cat was intimidated. The poor pit goes back to its house as we see more cuts on the pit, which again is heartbreaking.

Kitty feels sorrow later and tries to pass the bottlecap back to the pit who has fallen asleep. When the pit doesn’t do it, the kitten bravely goes into its kennel and starts kicking its wounds before cuddling up to it and falling asleep, causing the pit to wag and thump its tail.

The pair go out to play as they hear the owner starting to open the door and come out with a chain. The duo escape, freeing the pit from its cruel owner and giving it a friend for life in the kitten.

As the story ends, the pair find two owners who love them for exactly who they are.

Extras:

“The Making of Kitbull” is about four minutes and is exactly as it sounds, featuring footage and interviews of the animators discussing and making their masterpiece.

Should you watch it?

Maybe it is because I have a rescue pit breed dog myself who came from a bad home, but this short hit me HARD. I felt strong emotions of anger at the owners, pity for the poor pup, and I swear my heart grew three sizes bigger at the end. I can’t recommend this short enough. Show it to everybody you know. Watch it.