I think a lot of people get really uncomfortable when menstruation is mentioned (or even obliquely referenced).

post flagged for being obscene

Good call

fig96 said:

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I guess I don't know why the period scene (which seems be pretty brief and very vague to me) couldn't just be explained as "that's something for older girls" and let go? I suppose it depends on the specific kid, but I can't imagine them dwelling on it that much.

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So why have it at all?

I don't think my kids or I dwelled on it, but we're talking about the film and that's one of the things I didn't like.

It's fine if you got something out of it, but I didn't like it.

Despite my posting style I am not now, nor ever have been a prepubescent girl...but I am going to guess that the entering puberty for girls might be a tad more traumatic than it is for boys. And that an adult woman writing a movie about a 13yr old girl might look back on her experience and think "I would have liked to know that I wasn't alone/a freak/wierd when this happened to me or that my mom really did have the best in mind when she acted the way she did or god looking back by dad was a saint...I should fit that in this movie. I might help comfort/reassure some girl some where"

I'd imagine because

a) it was funny

and

b) as just alluded in the most recent post on this thread is something that half our population deals with, was very relevant for the character at her age, was an experience the writer had and wanted to share, and is something that a lot of women (based on Twitter and other conversations I've seen) related to and appreciated seeing.

I think you're fixating on the period scene more than I am. I just don't think it was a good movie on the spectrum of Pixar films.

Or that the unnecessary addition of a mom busting into the bathroom with an armful of maxi pads and tampons somehow made it a good movie. It didn't strike me as clever or added anything of value. If the writer had a personal experience she wanted to share in a meaningful way there are probably more constructive and genuine ways to convey that than a low brow, cheap, goofy, slapstick scene that really didn't deliver anything to the target audience. I'm not a woman so I can't relate, but that was my takeaway.

Fair enough, I thought it was funny that the mom's thought went there when her daughter was going through an issue and there were a few good lines in the scene. To each their own.

fig96 said:

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I guess I don't know why the period scene (which seems be pretty brief and very vague to me) couldn't just be explained as "that's something for older girls" and let go? I suppose it depends on the specific kid, but I can't imagine them dwelling on it that much.

As far as the main character being disrespectful/rebelling, welcome to Tangled/Onward/Moana/Inside Out/Mulan/Luca/Little Mermaid/almost every animated film ever. In the end the mother and daughter end up closer than they were.

For me it felt like a very personal story with a lot of widely relatable themes.

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Many 10-11 year old girls already have gotten the visit from Aunt Flo

I'm aware, the discussion was about it being an awkward moment for younger kids.

cajunaggie08 said:

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The movie is rated PG, so perhaps a 3 and 6 year old werent the intended audience for this. Not everything animated is meant to entertain a toddler

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Based on the trailer its an animated pixar (usually targeted for 3-8 year olds) about a girl dealing with turning into a red panda in front of everyone. That screams movie for a 6/7 year old to me. Then to kind of pull a bait and switch because its more like a movie for 10-13 year olds. To me, that seems like a weird move by Pixar. But its "silly" so 10-13 year olds may not even be interested in a movie like that. They start to want non-aminated shows.

This movie was bad. And it has nothing to do with the period scene.

Several times my kid and I were asking each other is she literally a panda, or is this like a metaphor for something else.

In our defense, the movie had already lost our priority at that point and we were both multi tasking.

This was the worst Pixar movie. It was the only one I've seen that isn't worth watching.

Thought it was fun! Genuinely surprised to see it so ragged on here. Thought the themes and message were more clear and relatable than, say, Soul from last year. Also thought this was pretty consistently funny with lots of good visual gags throughout.

I want to interrupt the mud throwing for a brief shout out to the magnificent animation during this cooking scene

Fig96 obviously worked on the movie, lol.

Nah, I actually know far fewer folks that worked on this than I normally do.

I just find the unusually harsh criticism surprising for something I genuinely enjoyed. Maybe I'm in the minority, but something has be genuinely bad for me to call it "unwatchable". Even if it's not my cup of tea, the artistry and technical aspects of films like this are far from "bargain bin" as one poster described it (the clip above as one example).

Also interesting that some themes or ideas seem to be highly criticized in some films while totally acceptable in others.

Soul is way better than this movie and the themes are somewhat similar. This film has the same conflict points as Soul and Coco, but the justifications for them are way more shallow.

In Soul the main character fights for his dreams against his mother who is against that pursuit, because of what it did to his dad and how long he has ignored his current life in pursuit of them.

In Coco the kid loves music, but the family was torn apart by it generations before.

In this the counterpoint to the character's pursuit is essentially, we're Asian we don't dream fanciful dreams, go achieve educational success. I want to listen to boy bands is far less relatable, but mom says I can't isn't really a "She's following her passions." moment. Low stakes, low reward.

It's not a bad movie, it's just more Dreamworks than it is Pixar.

I don't mind when movies try to tackle big emotional and/or complicated life problems people go through. In fact there are some great and very important movies that do exactly that… to audiences who are capable of understanding them.

I am however a little exhausted with Pixar trying to do this to audiences of kids who just going to be able to grasp them. It has resulted in them making a lot of unmemorable and awkward movies. I feel like Pixar tries to do this for kids so they find a way to 'resolve' things that are just kind of silly and off base.

And to the guys who didn't like the daughter's disrespect and being an ass to her parents as being a key message… your daughters at 7? Give it 4 years or so and this will be your life. Get ready.

Farmer1906 said:

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cajunaggie08 said:

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The movie is rated PG, so perhaps a 3 and 6 year old werent the intended audience for this. Not everything animated is meant to entertain a toddler

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Based on the trailer its an animated pixar (usually targeted for 3-8 year olds) about a girl dealing with turning into a red panda in front of everyone. That screams movie for a 6/7 year old to me. Then to kind of pull a bait and switch because its more like a movie for 10-13 year olds. To me, that seems like a weird move by Pixar. But its "silly" so 10-13 year olds may not even be interested in a movie like that. They start to want non-aminated shows.

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I'd argue not all pixar movies are geared for 3-8 year olds. My kids could not sit through Soul or Inside Out without their attention spans fading fast. I do agree an animated movie featuring a red panda featured prominantly on Disney+ does look like it would be right up the alley for 3-8 year olds. My wife let my 6 year old watch it last week. He dropped off watching it half way through. At the end of the day, what is appropriate for kids is up to each any every family and that is why it has a PG rating.

ATM9000 said:

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And to the guys who didn't like the daughter's disrespect and being an ass to her parents as being a key message… your daughters at 7? Give it 4 years or so and this will be your life. Get ready.

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I haven't watched the movie, so this is more a general comment...

My wife said a lot of people were talking about the character's disrespect on social media as a reason to not let their kids watch it. I'm not sure what parents want - a fairy tale where the girl only listens and shows deep respect for her parents or a realistic show. Art is merely imitating reality, and I much prefer a show that is willing to be real instead of avoid imperfections.

I Have Spoken said:

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ATM9000 said:

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And to the guys who didn't like the daughter's disrespect and being an ass to her parents as being a key message… your daughters at 7? Give it 4 years or so and this will be your life. Get ready.

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I haven't watched the movie, so this is more a general comment...

My wife said a lot of people were talking about the character's disrespect on social media as a reason to not let their kids watch it. I'm not sure what parents want - a fairy tale where the girl only listens and shows deep respect for her parents or a realistic show. Art is merely imitating reality, and I much prefer a show that is willing to be real instead of avoid imperfections.

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Also worth noting that the mother/daughter relationship in the film had some really unhealthy boundaries, and while the way it played out may not have been pretty (which it is rarely is in real life) conflict was going to be necessary at some point and greatly improved their relationship moving forward.

Not to mention literally almost every Disney/Pixar film involves the child disobeying a parent to go off on a quest/adventure/whatever.

I've seen the movie a few times because my 4 year old actually likes it (I think she just enjoys the panda parts, she doesn't really grasp the concept of the movie). I think it's just okay. I liken it more with Soul, where its clearly meant for an older audience. I actually think Soul is for adults or older teens. Turning Red to me felt like it's for 12-15 year olds.

But also, I think some of you are underthinking the role Asian culture has in this movie. It's the main aspect. If you are unfamiliar with their cultural beliefs around family, I can see how this could be an odd movie and you didn't connect with it. Puberty for an Asian teen is quite different than it was for me as a young white girl in Texas.

Was this movie targeted for me? No. Does that mean it's terrible because I personally didn't resonate completely with it and only certain parts? Also no. I think Pixar did a fantastic job of incorporating a story not widely known, and representing a culture that's been really left in the dust even with all the recent attempts to represent more diverse backgrounds.

Soul, Encanto, Luca, Turning Red. They all expose different lifestyles and cultures. I love it and am glad my daughter can be exposed to such things.

We watched it the weekend it came out and thought it was mostly fine. We just have a 2 year old so he liked when she was a panda and didn't really care about much else. Anybody saying this is the worst Pixar movie hasn't had the displeasure of watching Cars 2.

PDWT_12 said:

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We watched it the weekend it came out and thought it was mostly fine. We just have a 2 year old so he liked when she was a panda and didn't really care about much else. Anybody saying this is the worst Pixar movie hasn't had the displeasure of watching Cars 2.

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Yep that was bad. The cars series in general was pretty awful(Cars was ok). Good dinosaur was up there too.

Audience score for Turning red is sitting around 73% which isn't great for a pixar film. But that probably has a lot more to do with this movie being more of a niche target film. Which isn't typical for Pixar.

Right before the first Panda scene, I commented to my wife how different this movie would be with a male protagonist. Ick…

fig96 said:

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I Have Spoken said:

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ATM9000 said:

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And to the guys who didn't like the daughter's disrespect and being an ass to her parents as being a key message… your daughters at 7? Give it 4 years or so and this will be your life. Get ready.

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I haven't watched the movie, so this is more a general comment...

My wife said a lot of people were talking about the character's disrespect on social media as a reason to not let their kids watch it. I'm not sure what parents want - a fairy tale where the girl only listens and shows deep respect for her parents or a realistic show. Art is merely imitating reality, and I much prefer a show that is willing to be real instead of avoid imperfections.

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Also worth noting that the mother/daughter relationship in the film had some really unhealthy boundaries, and while the way it played out may not have been pretty (which it is rarely is in real life) conflict was going to be necessary at some point and greatly improved their relationship moving forward.

Not to mention literally almost every Disney/Pixar film involves the child disobeying a parent to go off on a quest/adventure/whatever.

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I didn't think the parent child conflict really any more substantial than any other dinsey "I need to test my boundaries" parent/child conflict?

I get that the source of that conflict was different but not the significance and certainly not in regards to the possible danger to the kid.

PDWT_12 said:

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We watched it the weekend it came out and thought it was mostly fine. We just have a 2 year old so he liked when she was a panda and didn't really care about much else. Anybody saying this is the worst Pixar movie hasn't had the displeasure of watching Cars 2.

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Not close to the worst Pixar movie ever. Cars generally is the worst Pixar as it is about as blatant of a toy sales play that's happened over the last 25 years or so. I don't like the way their movies are trending though in terms of themes and what they seem genuinely after trying to resolve with their stories.

There's way more good with Pixar than bad. I think it is great they are hell bent on original stories and that they don't write movies with a tone (like most Disney movies for example) that kids are just stupider people. But in the same breath, what I don't like is that they seem really tone deaf lately about who their real audience is so they are now churning out lots of ok movies such as Turning Red that ultimately just aren't very memorable unless you are in a very specific set of circumstances in that moment of your life and I think it does them such a disservice given how creative their stories really can be.

Duncan Idaho said:

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fig96 said:

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I Have Spoken said:

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ATM9000 said:

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And to the guys who didn't like the daughter's disrespect and being an ass to her parents as being a key message… your daughters at 7? Give it 4 years or so and this will be your life. Get ready.

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I haven't watched the movie, so this is more a general comment...

My wife said a lot of people were talking about the character's disrespect on social media as a reason to not let their kids watch it. I'm not sure what parents want - a fairy tale where the girl only listens and shows deep respect for her parents or a realistic show. Art is merely imitating reality, and I much prefer a show that is willing to be real instead of avoid imperfections.

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Also worth noting that the mother/daughter relationship in the film had some really unhealthy boundaries, and while the way it played out may not have been pretty (which it is rarely is in real life) conflict was going to be necessary at some point and greatly improved their relationship moving forward.

Not to mention literally almost every Disney/Pixar film involves the child disobeying a parent to go off on a quest/adventure/whatever.

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I didn't think the parent child conflict really any more substantial than any other dinsey "I need to test my boundaries" parent/child conflict?

I get that the source of that conflict was different but not the significance and certainly not in regards to the possible danger to the kid.

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Yup, same, hence my confusion with people being upset about this but ok that Ariel makes a deal with a witch to become a different species because she has a crush on a boy, Mulan lies to her dad and pretends to be male to go off and joins a war, Merida publicly defies her dad (the king) and fights with her mom before making a deal with a witch that turns her mom into a bear, etc.

But this has rebellion AND periods. Totally different (and worse).

Don't forget boy bands.

Which of those movies has the penultimate conflict as child vs parent? Brave might be the closest, but generally speaking every one of those films has a parent-child conflict that results in the child being regretful about their actions. In this film the child spends the entire film lying to and disobeying their mom and then ultimately fights her mom, proving to her mom that the child was right all along.


All of those films are conflict -> consequence -> repair.

This film is conflict -> repair.

I think I'm fine with that. The parent isn't always right - especially when we see that the mom is living in fear of the grandma, and is following in those same mistakes of over-parenting and having unreasonable expectations.

Mom and daughter also get a little resolution during that little ceremony portal world - and their relationship is better for it in the end. So it's not like mom defeats daughter and dances on her grave or anything.

I actually may like it better than, say, Little Mermaid king going "oops I was wrong, thanks for saving my kingdom." Instead it's learning how to speak up for yourself. Remember that even up to the ~2/3 point that the kid lets her friends take the blame for something that was her fault. Because the kid is afraid of losing her mother too.

That's also just a few examples though. Most of Disney/Pixar's (and other studios) animated films involve the kid disobeying the parent with varying levels of resolution. Luca, Finding Nemo, Onward, Pocohontas, Moana, Ratatouille, Peter Pan, Cinderella, Aladdin, How To Train Your Dragon, etc.

It's almost like rebelling against and gaining independence from your parents is some sort of rite of passage in the journey of life.