Pixar’s “HOPPERS” Is Their Best Original In Years
Creatively, many have had their doubts with Pixar’s output throughout the 2020’s. I personally fell in love with Soul, and remember Luca having its following around when it released. Though, the wider majority of their original releases this decade haven’t had the best reputation. Turning Red often serves as the talking point many bring up when trying to pinpoint a definitive downturn, though I personally feel Lightyear was the beginning of the studio having a harder time gathering an audience. The studio often swapped between releasing 1-2 movies a year, but since Lightyear underperforming they’ve kept it strictly to once a year. This change in timeframe makes their fans hope for a more focused production pipeline and more developed narratives/animation as a result, and while Elemental was a success commercially, the studio went back to underperforming with last year’s Elio. Now, though, it seems Pixar is onto something again both critically AND commercially with Daniel Chong’s Hoppers.
Since the broadcast of Cartoon Network’s We Bare Bears and its prequel series, those following animation have known Daniel Chong knows his way around a talking animal or two (or three—there are three bears). Talking animals have long been a staple of animated features, especially for Disney, with talking critters even getting nominated for Academy Awards as recent as Dreamworks’ The Wild Robot. Hoppers does have similar pacing and plot beats to The Wild Robot, but clearly dances to the beat of a different drummer. While Roz successfully integrates herself into nature and serves as an orphaned duck’s mother in the heartwarming Dreamworks film, Hoppers chronicles Mabel Tanaka’s journey as she tries to do the same thing, shaking up all nature’s means of production in the process.
The chaos that snowballs in Hoppers keeps the film engaging from start to finish. Mabel being introduced as a rebellious, unruly girl passionate about nature sets the perfect tone for how the tale will unfold, but even then the film surprises you in ways I haven’t seen a Pixar film do in a while, maybe ever. The way the meeting with “the council” of the animal kingdoms unfurls is a beautiful example of all the film’s moving parts, and that’s all I can say without major spoilers.
The fast-paced chases throughout ponds and pines reminded me of The Son of Bigfoot, a title you can watch on our sister website Galxy. The kinship Mabel feels with nature also feels similar, a passion so infectious the viewer wants her to get everything she wanted and more. While the film does sway away from what a full win for Mabel would be, rumors from a while back suggested this was how the film originally was meant to end before studio intervention. However, director Daniel Chong insists Hoppers still gets its point across in its final form. In said final form, I found a movie that was at once cute, emotional, silly, and confident. I highly recommend it to anyone interested, as it’s one of the first movies of the year I can tell will be an Academy Award contender in at least one category.
Hoppers is now playing in theaters worldwide. If you like films about humanity mixing with nature, make sure to check out The Son of Bigfoot on our sister site, Galxy!