Pixar and Disney have been linked together for over 30 years now. Since the release of Toy Story, Pixar has dazzled audiences with memorable characters and amazing stories. They became so valuable to the brand that when Bob Iger became CEO of Disney in 2005, he made it his first priority to mend the strained relationship between Disney and Pixar and acquire the studio.
Since then, Pixar has been a subsidiary of Disney and helped carry the studio through some of its roughest years. In the years since, Walt Disney Animation has picked up, and the two companies have been delivering animated classics for years.
Initially, audiences could tell the difference between the two companies as Walt Disney Animation was 2D animation while Pixar was 3D animated; Disney has primarily moved into 3D animation. This means audiences might sometimes use the name Pixar as a blanket statement for all CGI animated films made by Disney. Do you wonder why films like Encanto and Frozen are not represented at Pixar Fest in California Adventure? Well, because those are Disney Animation.
While on the surface, both Pixar and Disney films seem one and the same, speaking to the company’s overall brand, there are some key differences between what makes a Pixar movie and what makes a traditional Disney animated film. Here are the 7 biggest differences between the two animation studios.
7 Disney Films Are About Wishes and Romance, While Pixar Films Are About Friendship
The biggest key difference between Disney Animated films and Pixar is a common theme that unites their various films, which can be summarized by their most iconic songs. “When You Wish Upon a Star” from Pinocchio has become the uniting theme across Disney as a company, but specifically its animated films.
The idea of something bigger than yourself, a better future ahead of you as an individual, is symbolized by what is referred to as an ‘I want song’ like “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid.
There is often a theme of romance spread across Disney’s canon as symbolized by songs like “Once Upon a Dream”, “A Whole New World” and “Beauty and the Beast”. Wishing is such an important part of Disney they made the film around celebrating their 100th anniversary, Wish, around this central theme.
In contrast, the song most commonly associated with Pixar is “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” from Toy Story. Not only is it their first feature film, but it sets a template for their entire filmography, as Pixar films are often defended by life-changing friendships. Woody and Buzz, Mike and Sully, Joy and Sadness, Luca and Alberto, and Joe Gardner and 22 are just a few examples of this friendship theme.
Both “If I Didn’t Have You” from Monsters Inc. and “Nobody Like U” from Turning Red are at their core similar to “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” in how friendship is the most important. While Pixar has romance films with WALL-E and Elemental and Disney Animation has shifted less towards romance and onto friendships with films like Zootopia and Moana, these are still core elements to their films.
6 Disney and Pixar Have Different Approaches to Musicals
Speaking of music, Disney and Pixar approach musical numbers in different ways. Musical numbers have been part of Dinsey animated films since the beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, but starting with The Little Mermaid in 1989, they adopted their defining style by taking the style and tenor from Broadway musicals.
The characters in the movie sing the songs, but the audience understands that within the movie world, nobody comments on these being musical numbers and are more surreal and symbolic. Elsa singing “Let it Go” in Frozen is less literal and more metaphorical. Disney musicals have almost become a genre of themselves.
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On the other hand, Pixar uses musical numbers as literal parts that exist within the realm of their films to which the characters react. When Toy Story was being developed, Pixar consciously decided not to make a musical despite that being the popular standard for Disney films at the time. The first “musical” number was in Toy Story 2 when Woody watches an old television recording of a Woody doll singing “You’ve Got a Friend in Me.”
Coco was hyped as Pixar’s first musical, but all of the songs are performances in the movie that the other characters can see and react to. Both Coco and Soul are movies that feature music about musicians. Turning Red‘s big musical number is one performed by the film’s fictional boy band 4*Town and the character singing the song. Where Disney musical numbers are more symbolic, Pixar’s are literal parts of the story.
5 Pixar Films Tend to Be Summer Movies, Disney Animation Owns Thanksgiving
Disney is great at release dates, knowing when the optimal time to release a film is, and knowing how to make the best of summer and the holiday movie seasons. Initially, Disney animated movies like Pocahontas, Mulan, and Tarzan were the big summer movies, while Toy Story, A Bug’s Life, and Toy Story 2 were saved for Thanksgiving weekend.
Yet, as Pixar’s popularity began to rise and Disney animation struggled, Disney gave Pixar films the coveted summer release date, while Disney occupied the Thanksgiving weekend release.
Finding Nemo broke the trend by coming out in May, but then starting with the release of Cars, most Pixar films have come out in the summer months, typically in June. The only reason both Coco and The Good Dinosaur were released on Thanksgiving weekend is they were years without a Disney animated movie, and something needed to fill that spot as they released two Pixar films in those years.
Disney Animation has now excelled in the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Frozen‘s incredible staying power over the Thanksgiving weekend through the holidays and into the early part of the following year helped make it the highest-grossing film of 2013.
While recent films like Strange World and Wish bombed over the holiday weekend, they hope Moana 2 will see them rebound in a big way. This has now given the Pixar films a summer movie vibe while Disney Animation is a holiday movie staple.
4 Disney Is Famous for Their Villains
Just as famous as Disney heroes are Disney villains. Maleficent, Jafar, Cruella de Vil, Ursulla, and Captain Hook are some of the biggest names in the Dinsey, so much so that there is an entire Disney Channel original series of films based on their kids called The Descendants. Disney villains are larger than life and are one of the most merchandise elements. Audiences love them because they are evil and relish in it. The Disney villain songs like “Poor Unfortunate Soul,” “Be Prepared,” and “Hellfire” are a beloved part of the franchise.
Pixar, on the other hand, has a smaller number of stable villains. This is partly because they are a much younger studio with fewer films, but also, the villains in Pixar films are rarely the ones that stand out. With a few exceptions, like Syndrome from The Incredibles or Randal from Monsters Inc., the villains in the Pixar canon are secondary.
The Prospector from Toy Story 2 and Lots-O-Huggin Bear in Toy Story 3 are good antagonists, but they have not captured the audience the way the Disney villains have. Fans love villains like Ernesto de la Cruz in Coco and Hopper from A Bug’s Life, but they are not the main thing audiences come out of Pixar films talking about.
3 Pixar Films Focus More on Character’s Own Struggles Rather Than Villains
One of the reasons Pixar villains might not seem as memorable is that the obstacles characters in those films need to overcome are character-centric rather than an outside factor. While Sid is a threat in Toy Story, the main conflict is between Woody and Buzz and their journey to becoming friends.
There is no “villain” in Inside Out, it is Joy’s internal flaw she needs to overcome. Elemental main conflict is whether society will allow Wade and Ember to be together, while the conflict in Turning Red is a generational one between mother and daughter that does not conclude with a fight but an understanding.
This shift away from villains and more to internal conflicts stemming from a character flaw or societal issue has started to bleed into Disney Animation. There has been a lot of talk about how Disney villains as a concept seemed to vanish, with King Manificeo in Wish being marketed as a return to form.
Disney films like Wreck-It-Ralph, Frozen, and Zootopia opted for the villain twist reveal like from Toy Story 2 or Monsters Inc.Moana, Ralph Breaks the Internet, and Strange Worldopt out of not having a villain, and more a misunderstanding that needs to be overcome.
2 Pixar Films Are More Contemporary, While Disney Is Classical
One key thing that separates Pixar films and Disney movies is their aesthetics. With the exception of Brave, every Pixar film has been in a 20th-century or future setting and often has contemporary elements. Franchises like Toy Story, Monsters Inc., and Inside Out all examine the high-concept world through the lens of modern-day work/office culture.
Elemental, Onward, and Cars feature unique spins on 21st-century living that the audience can recognize. Science fiction films like The Incredibles, WALL-E, and Lightyear are different types of pulp sci-fi, while Ratatouille, Up, and Turning Red are contemporary worlds that look like that of the viewers.
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Disney Animation, on the other hand, is more classical. There is a reason why many of the classic films fit in the theme park area of Fantasyland. Not just Disney’s classic canon but even recent films like Frozen, Moana, and Tangled are clearly styled after the fairy tale pre-20th century work that inspired Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, Peter Pan, and Robin Hood.
Disney Animation has dipped its toe into contemporary worlds like Lilo and Stitch and Oliver and Company, while Zootopia has a lot in common with the Pixar template, and Wreck-It-Ralph is Toy Story for video game characters, but these are outliers to the trend. It shows how Pixar has started to influence Walt Disney’s animation, where people can sometimes get the two studios mixed up.
1 Disney Tends to Favor Adaptations, While Pixar Is All Original Ideas
Easily, the biggest key difference between Disney and Pixar is the types of stories they tell. Walt Disney Animation is famously known for fairy tale adaptations that started with Snow White and the Seven Dwarves and since went on to include Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast, just to name a few.
Disney has put their spin on classic literature (The Hunchback of Notre Damn, Tarzan, The Jungle Book), folklore (Mulan, Hercules), and even Marvel Comics (Big Hero 6). The studio does have its fair share of original stories like Lilo and Stitch, Zootopia, and Wish, but they are primarily known for putting spins on classic tales that become the default reference point for people.
The only reason the low-budget slasher film Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey has any impact is because it plays off people’s familiarity with the family-friendly Winnie the Pooh, which has been a staple for years.
Pixar, on the other hand, is all original films, excluding their sequels, which are still ones for original films with no pre-existing source material to draw from. In a cinematic landscape dominated by sequels, prequels, remakes, and adaptations, Pixar is one of the few studios making big-budget original films that can draw audiences out to the theater.
The three-year run of Ratatouille, WALL-E, and Up were some of Pixar’s most experimental, and these original concepts became blockbuster films and Academy Award winners. While Pixar has certainly embraced sequels more in recent years, and Disney dumped a lot of their original films on Disney+, the company is still committed to making original stories.
The sequels like Inside Out 2 help pay for original films like the upcoming Elio. Disney gives its own unique vision of iconic stories, while Pixar introduces you to new stories.
