while 2023 has been a slow burn in terms of animated releases, it has been anything but in the world of animation talking points. There is so much to talk about in regards to the medium, that it is kind of funny to me that I'm getting some writer's block about it. Yeah, I've never really been good at talking about events, in regards to the writer's strike, all I really have to say is, "It's going on and people should be paid for their work". It is amusing to me, like that line from Kevin Smith's Dogma, but I'm getting ahead of myself here. One of the talking points that sticks out to me is that Disney extended Elemental's theatrical run, and in doing so turned in a very profitable feature, while simultaneously, DreamWorks had an embarrassing box office result to their animated feature, Ruby Gillman Teenage Kraken.
I find this interesting, because looking critically at them, neither film are very strong. They both have fairly familiar plots, characters that aren't really anything new, and have many similarities to other animated features, Zootopia and Turning Red namely. Yet, it seemed that audiences, for want of a better term, warmed up to Elemental, while Ruby Gillman would sink, usage of the word intentional. What made audiences, eventually, go see Elemental while Ruby Gillman flopped and was pulled before it was really given a chance?
I don't know, and I will not claim to know, but I thought this would be a good reason to really compare these two films, because like I said, they both have similar problems, but they also have their own strengths. But maybe I will get close to why Elemental became a sleeper hit while Ruby Gillman just became a sleeper.
I think the first thing to really talk about is their stories, because this is where most of both films weaknesses lie. Elemental follows Ember, the daughter of fire immigrants to Element City as she struggles to find her own way in life, while also repaying her parents for the sacrifices she made, and also falling in love with Wade, a water elemental. Immediately, the issue is that Elemental focuses on the wrong aspects of the story, while a good amount of time is set developing Ember and Wade's relationship, the stuff about her father's store was the next biggest part of the story, and while it wasn't bad, it wasn't the interesting part. The interesting part of Elemental was Ember and Wade's relationship, which they did focus a lot of time on. They also didn't really do a whole lot with the prejudice angle, and I'm kind of mixed on that, like I didn't want or need this to be another Zootopia, but when it was brought up, beyond the opening scene, it lead to a very poignant moment. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, Elemental is a weak story with a very strong element to it.
The same... can't really be said for Ruby Gillman. It has some strong elements to its story, but these elements aren't as strong as the strong stuff in Elemental. Ruby Gillman follows the titular teenaged kraken as she, A) tries to blend in with human life, B) learns that she is actually royalty, C) befriends a mermaid and tries to put an end to the mermaid/kraken war and D) wants to ask a boy out to prom. Again, they really misjudged what the strong stuff of this story was, if this movie was just Ruby trying to balance her human life with her family, while also exploring her Kraken life, that would have been so much more interesting. At least with Elemental, the parts of the story that weren't as strong, still were part of the story that was strong. Ember having to decide on her happiness with Wade or repaying her father's sacrifice at his store was kind of key in their relationship. If Ruby Gillman dropped the stuff about Ruby being a princess, the mermaids and the war, the stuff about her blending in with human life and wanting to go to prom would be predominately unchanged,.
Simply put, the weak stuff in Elemental was in service to the strong stuff, while the weak stuff in Ruby Gillman was not, and that's because at its core, Elemental was about Ember and Wade's relationship, while Ruby Gillman was not about a kraken blending into human society.
I can't remember who brought this up, I think it might have been Toon4Thought, but I could be wrong, but someone brought up the idea that Ruby Gillman was potentially a multimedia franchise pilot, like if Ruby Gillman did well, it could have had a TV series, or comics, or sequels, which is a great idea because I do love these characters and I would like to see more of them, but if this is true than someone at DreamWorks really forgot the key thing about starting a franchise, you need a good starting point. I'm not going to say Ruby Gillman was bad, but whether you liked it or not, we can agree that, this is a rocky way to start a franchise. Consider Aladdin or Lilo & Stitch, both of them spawned sequels and TV series', but you can go back to both of those movies and appreciate them on their own, because the movies are the main course, everything else is dessert and snacks. It's kind of the same with starting a cinematic universe, the MCU wouldn't be a thing if Iron Man wasn't a good movie.
I think the main reason that Elemental became a sleeper hit was because the movie did have a really strong element to it, so when people talked about Elemental, they would talk about that aspect of the movie. Word of mouth is a very powerful thing in marketing. It also helped a lot that, someone at Disney or Pixar had a lot of faith in this movie, extending it's theatrical run. Elemental has a Domestic Box Office Gross of over one hundred fifty million dollars [source], with a domestic opening of over twenty-nine million. Ruby Gillman earned a domestic gross of over fifteen million dollars [source], with a domestic opening of over five million, so it's clear that the faith was not misplaced in Elemental.
Ruby Gillman is not a bad movie, honestly I don't even know if I actually dislike it, but it isn't a very strong movie. When compared to Elemental, the weaknesses just become more apparent. Elemental has its problems, but it is saved by the strength of the relationship between Wade and Ember, while Ruby Gillman couldn't really be saved by the strength of anything, because nothing was really given much time to become stronger. Whatever the case, it is clear that Ruby Gillman just wasn't enough to take down Elemental's throne. It probably also doesn't help that at the end of June, Ruby Gillman's release month, a highly anticipated feature was released that was also a subversive look at monsters and society that featured a monster girl who could shapeshift. I'm not saying Nimona was a death knell for Ruby Gillman, I'm just saying it probably did not help in the slightest.
No comments:
Post a Comment