How ELEMENTAL Fits Into The Pixar Theory

this show was sponsored by betterhelp healthy boundaries are great but unfortunately they don't set themselves boundaries take a lot of attention time and support and that's where a therapist comes in to help you decide what's most important and build your life around it connect with a therapist and find your boundaries at betterhelp.com just a heads up this video contains spoilers for the movie Elemental Hey Brother guys this past weekend Elemento debuted in theaters which means as usual it is time to add to the ever expanding Pixar Theory the Pixar theory in case you are somehow unaware is the idea that every single Pixar movie exists in the same universe on one giant timeline it all starts way back in the good dinosaur when the asteroid misses the Earth or I suppose you could argue it starts in Seoul depending on your point of view and how you think time works and the great before you're more than welcome to opt out or or now with elemental out it possibly starts with elemental I mean what is the source of life really is it your soul your ability to love is it cosmic energy generated from the base elements honestly never thought these are the questions we'd be tackling when we first started trying to connect just you know Toy Story to Finding Nemo but here we are as ever Pixar's wild imagination has brought us to yet another elements but I will be the first to admit when I first saw the trailer for this movie I was like oh no how on Earth is this gonna fit into the Pixar theory because honestly element City feels as foreign as any new Pixar movie has ever felt in relation to the rest of the timeline but as usual I had nothing to fret it turns out it fits in perfectly and even helps answer one of the most base questions of the Pixar theory which is how does memory power everything get ready you guys because today we explore how Elemental fits into the Pixar theory [Music] okay so when I saw the first trailer for Elemental my immediate thought was okay I bet I bet what we're gonna get here is how the supers got their powers because I mean so many of their powers seem to be sourced from the various elements any anyway Frozone is just frozen water which is also very fluid like Elastigirl Bob is probably strong like Earth right and dash is fast like lightning and honestly that might all still be the case but as I watched Elemental I was surprised to find that the movie at most goes hand in hand with is inside out and that's a big deal because Inside Out is massively important to the Pixar theory because it is the first movie that's showing us the source of all of the power in the Pixar verse memories which as a refresher human memories are what power everything in Pixar or at least what gives life to things it's why the toys can come to life it's what the monsters are harvesting to power their cities heck in Coco we even learn about second death where after you've died you can continue to live on in the afterlife as a skeleton as long as a single memory orb of you exists in some living person but if that final memory orb ever Fades so do you we also know that each memory is colored by a certain emotion or even multiple emotions sometimes and that those memories can be harvested for energy and the color of the memory makes a difference because it helps explain like why in Monsters Inc despite the fact that the two best scarers of all time are working at the same time right next to each other there is somehow a scream shortage but the reason for that is because over on the human side of things at that time there is just less fear in the world so there's less purple orbs for them to be collecting the energy from but as a result Joy is the new more powerful emotion but speaking of the emotions let's pivot back to Elemental now because there are some undeniable parallels between the elements and the emotions out of the gate let's just start with the easiest one water and sadness upon first meeting Wade and Elemental I thought wow maybe this guy is just a really emotional character but no it turns out it's just a water thing in general let me guess try to cry we try not to cry Wade and his entire family are constantly crying about everything good bad beautiful or sad and then over and Inside Out sadness is pretty much crying all the time as well and loves everything to do with it I remember the funny movie where the dog dies next is fire and anger and again this one's pretty obvious all throughout Elemental Ember is constantly losing her temper and just exploding all over the place which ties in perfectly with anger over and inside out who whenever he really loses his temper he also literally catches fire and explodes all over the place but it even goes deeper than that into our next emotion to fear which of course an inside out is represented by the color purple and if you'll recall early on in Elemental one of the customers at the fireplace remarks how Amber almost went full purple and indeed throughout the movie Ember does Go full purple several times and it always looks like Extreme Rage but later in the movie after Ember is trying to run away from Wade after their big touching moment he drops this big truth bomb on her and says wow I thought you were so strong but it turns out you're just afraid oh burn here's the thing though I've seen the movie twice now and if you're aware of this interpretation of the purple fire that it is actually Ember being really afraid you can notice that every single time it happens earlier in the movie this is also the case and so yeah it lines up really well purple and Elemental also equals fear conversely though moving on to the next emotion when Ember is inside the bubble looking at all the vivisteria flowers for the first time and after Wade first tells Ember that he loves her Ember turns a very bright shade of yellow the color of Joy which just leaves us with green and disgust and I'll be honest this one definitely gets the least attention in the movie and doesn't have really anything to do with the main characters I mean I guess Ember does turn green as well at one point but that's just because she's standing on the minerals and then she turns like every color at once so yeah I don't really think that counts but instead I think disgust gets represented really well by just all of the earth Elementals I mean the little boy Claude keeps trying to give Ember flowers which is cute Until you realize he's picking them from his armpits Fern down to City Hall mentions how he has to leave work early to get some root rot treatment or something and then don't get me started on these two pruning each other okay wow I thought this was the kids movie nothing weird going on here just a little pruning so yeah I think those are all pretty obvious correlations but it gets even better because not only do I think the elements are the source or possibly even the DNA of the emotions but throughout the movie they're literally making memories and I don't just mean like they're having good times making good memories I mean they are physically creating glass orbs they are also having good times though what's this [Music] foreign guys now we need to take a quick pause to tell you about today's sponsor betterhelp and today I want to talk about boundaries for a second we mentioned them a little bit at the top of the video but I really want to get into them because they're very important to our interpersonal relationships unfortunately there's not really an instruction manual for forming healthy boundaries humans are complicated and messy and oftentimes we have no idea how to navigate these Waters or fires I guess to be on theme with today's video but fortunately we do have therapy which for me feels like the closest thing to an instruction manual because even when there's not a clear answer for a problem sometimes just saying it out loud to a professional can make a huge impact I have personally benefited from therapy in this exact way and while I am nowhere near perfect I have certainly gotten better at setting boundaries and that has made a hugely positive impact on my personal life and my relationships and even if you're not worried about setting boundaries just going to therapy can have tons of other great benefits as well so if you're thinking about trying therapy if you've ever thought about it go ahead and give better help a try it's all online which means it's super convenient and really flexible so find more balance with Better Health visit betterhelp.com super today to get 10 off your first month one more time that's better help help.com super for 10 off your first month link is in the description Down Below in particular there are three big moments in the movie when Wade and Ember make great memories together and in each case there is a circular orb either created physically around them buy them or visually created on screen the first time happens when they're sitting on the beach together trying to gather sand so they can rebuild the wall to stop water coming into the canal Ember is super depressed in this moment and she begins to fade which side note honestly reminds me a lot of Riley's near plight and inside out if you recall as Riley's depression continues throughout the movie Her islands of Personality begin to crumble until she is really no longer herself at all had her core memories actually been lost into the memory dump she no longer would have been the Riley she was before she would have just completely faded away like bing bong and like how Ember looks on the beach anyway in that same scene Ember Burns a lot of the sand that she's sitting on and turns it into glass which she immediately forms into a glass orb and then draws a viviscera flower into the middle of did you draw the right word I don't really know how she does it it looks really cool though and this object becomes the symbol of their relationship moving forward in the movie but it also represents a significant memory from her past but the really important thing is that she physically creates a memory by bonding with Wade the second time it happens is when Wade and Ember take their actual trip to the vivisteria tree a feat which is difficult to accomplish but which they managed to do anyway by forming a giant bubble for Ember to stand inside while Wade floats her through the tree it is the very memory she missed out on having as a kid and is now the new best memory of her entire life and let me tell you it is no coincidence at all that as they do this she is literally inside of an orb just like the memories and it is also no coincidence that once more the memory orb has appeared as the result of bonding with Wade and the third time it happens is just after the scene when they escape the tree and Wade and Ember finally touch it is possibly my favorite shot in the entire movie but Wade and Ember are holding hands and the camera zooms back to show them standing beneath an arched Bridge with element City all lit up behind them which not for nothing but if you ask me element City at night looks a lot like Riley's long-term memory and the City of the Dead so but anyway in this scene the bridge forms a perfect half circle around them and Its Reflection In The Water forms the rest of the final memory orb and honestly it's really poetic like the first two orbs the air bubble and the physical piece of glass that ember makes are very physical while their connections in those moments are non-physical whereas this time they are actually physically touching each other and the orb itself is more metaphorical but that moment in the movie really is the key moment the Catalyst for change Wade says it best when they touched their chemistry changed they caused a reaction in fact that's the tagline for the movie opposites react water and fire come together like they never have before and cause a new change to occur and surprise surprise this is exactly what happens with the emotions and inside out in fact it even happens in the same way see throughout Elemental one line keeps popping up over and over from Wade he says when my temper flares it's me trying to tell me something I'm not ready to hear and he's referring to Ember going purple but the thing Ember is not ready to hear from herself is that she doesn't want to actually take over her dad's shop and keeping that Knowledge from herself is what's causing her to be in so much fear throughout the movie that by even considering that option she's being a bad daughter selfish and an overall disappointment not just to her father but basically all of fire culture and their various struggles Riley goes through Bay basically the exact same thing just with sadness instead of fear after the move sadness suddenly becomes more powerful and is able to change any of Riley's memories blue and although they don't realize it at the time this is sadness's way of letting Riley know that she doesn't have to be her parents happy little girl all the time you've stayed well you've stayed our happy girl that she does need the support of others and that she does Miss Minnesota and that she's not totally okay with the move Ember tries to avoid her fear Riley tries to avoid her sadness but in the end it's the acceptance of both of these things that lead to resolution in Elemental Ember and Wade finally touch and change their chemistry and inside out a brand new core memory is formed by Riley made up of not just one but two emotions sadness and joy but at this point I'm sure you're wondering that despite all these amazing parallels I mean who drew all these parallels that is really well done good job guys wow how exactly does that make the elements responsible for the power generated by the emotions but it all comes back to that line change their chemistry and the reaction that occurs when Wade and Ember touch theirs is more like this it must have a clap they didn't really high five that would have been cool too but not as cool look I'm no science whiz but if you don't know what a chemical reaction is I did search on Google for like 20 seconds and this is what it told me a chemical reaction is a process in which one or more substances the reactants are converted into one or more different substances the products chemical reactions are an integral part of Technology culture and indeed of life itself so the real question is when they touch what are they producing well at least in our fun little metaphysical Pixar Universe where memories power everything what they create is pure energy we said it before but in a way the elements are the source material for the energy and kind of the DNA of the emotions in fact when Wade and Ember get their love reading from ember's Mom the smoke literally intertwines like a double helix even the flowers on the vivisteria tree unfurl in the form of a double helix but so on that note it really goes on to suggest that at a base Elemental level it is love that creates the energy that makes memories that power everything in Pixar but also if you ask me it still feels perfectly reasonable if you had like a particular surplus of one element in your your body that would give you superpowers but also also more seriously I can't claim to know whether or not Wade and Ember are actually the first time ever that water and fire have touched it very much seems like an element City or at least during the brief Glimpse we get of it that it is extremely uncommon if it is happening but if we want to assume for a moment that they are in fact the first people to touch in this way and like change each other's chemistry then it almost has to make Elemental the new origin point for the rest of Pixar because this would be the literal start of elements coming together to create energy and therefore everything however it's also possible that we're only seeing a single story happening alongside trillions of other similar happenings in a very like every snowflake has a Whoville kind of way like maybe Wades are meaning Embers all around us all the time and always personally I prefer the latter because it's just way more adorable and it makes this movie way more meaningful in the grand scale of the entire Pixar Theory uh but it also seems like maybe the latter is more likely but I don't know what do you think is this like one tiny example of what's Happening all around us all the time whereas this it this is the origin point that we just got to see and it's like whoa that's so cool let me know your thoughts on the towel section down below [Music] but guys that's how Elemental fits into the Pixar theory if you want to see the rest of the entire Pixar Theory all of the movies and how they fit together leading up to this movie you can check out this video right here it is the complete Pixar Theory and if you're wondering like man that was a catchy song at the beginning of this video you can check out the full song right here it's available on iTunes and everything or you can just listen to it on YouTube whatever you know the Pixar theory anyway then until next time I will see you in another life brother

Channel: SuperCarlinBrothers

Views: 59,337

Keywords: SuperCarlinBrothers, jonathan carlin, ben carlin, j carlin, film theory, film theorists, pixar, pixar theory, elemental, how elemental fits into the pixar theory, the pixar theory, jon negroni, peter sohn, leah lewis, ember lumin, wade water, elemental trailer, elemental review, pixar movie, elemental full movie, carlin bros pixar theory, the pixar theory song, pete doctor, does elemental break the pixar theory, disney pixar, elemental movie, inside out

Id: 42GFMlQfN_8

Length: 16min 30sec (990 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 23 2023