This video was brought to you by my Patreons. Thanks! Also, if you notice the audio quality of the
voice-over changing throughout the video, it's because my microphone died more than
halfway through the editing process. If you can hear the difference, and it's weird, I'm sorry. I turned 30 at the beginning of last year. A strange yet unremarkable achievement. Something Bo Burnham aptly summarized in his
song 30 from his Netflix special 'Inside.' [Bo Burnham] "God damn it." And as I get older, I find I have a somewhat
contentious relationship with my childhood. While I'm no stranger to those wisps of nostalgia that come with the changing of the
seasons. I can never find it in myself to uncategorically
romanticized my childhood. So many parts of it were painful in ways I
don't want to revisit. And yet there was that sense of joy, of wonder,
of magic in everything. The world was still new to me and that made
exploring it an adventure. Anyways, let's talk about Rise of the Guardians. [Quiet music] Our story starts in darkness, and then light. A boy rises out of the waters of a frozen
lake to discover he possesses the powers of an elemental, the power of winter. We watch as he uncovers his abilities with
a breathless joy. Then he flies into the nearest town, not knowing who he is or where he is, but still full of excitement. And then this happens. [Jack gasps] The voice-over tells us this boy's name is
Jack Frost. [Jack] "How do I know that? The moon told
me so," "And that was all he ever told me." "And that was a long...Long time ago." That is the opening of the film. What follows are the exciting adventures of
Jack Frost teaming up with myths of legend and folklore to fight
the boogeyman, Pitch Black. A simple but fun premise. It's basically fairy tale 'Avengers,' although the film was in production long before
the release of that particular film. But superheroes were definitely in the minds
of the creatives as this film developed. Also, I have to state this, this movie gives me 'Kingdom Hearts' vibes
in the best way. So with that, let's do the rundown. The film was directed by Peter Ramsey, his directorial debut on a feature film by
the way. After this, he would go on to co-direct the
instant classic 'Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse' in 2018
with Bob Persichetti and Rodney Rothman. The screenplay was written by David Lindsay-Abaire
who has had a truly baffling career. He adapted his stage play, 'The Rabbit Hole' for screen. He also wrote the book for the 'Shrek Musical' and wrote screenplays
for films like 'Robots,' 'Inkheart,' 'Oz the Great and Powerful,' and a 'Poltergeist' movie. The film was executive produced by Guillermo
Del Toro. Hey, we know that guy! Del Toro had notable input on a lot of story
points when the film had to be restructured as Peter
Ramsey put it. Also, according to Ramsey, Del Toro was very insistent that Jack Frost
be positively dreamy. [Peter Ramsey] "Jack and Tooth having a little
semi flirtation here," "But Guillermo Del Toro was always like 'come
on we've got to give them a love story,'" "'Jack's got to be a heart throb I URGE you!'" Listen, bless that man. They SUCCEEDED Side note, I just love how this detail is constantly brought up in anything related
to this movie. The artbook describes him as just incredible. Also working as executive producer was William
Joyce, the author of 'The Guardians of Childhood'
books and the originator of this story's concept. He's had a pretty interesting career. He created and worked on the Disney series
'Rolie Polie Olie' and produced the 2005 film 'Robots' and the 2007 Disney
film 'Meet The Robinsons.' He also won an Oscar for his short film, 'The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris
Lessmore' in 2011. We're going to talk more about him later, but it's important to know he was actually set to co-direct The Guardians movie initially, but stepped back from the project after his
daughter Mary Katherine, died of a brain tumor at age 18. The film is dedicated to her and Joyce remained creatively involved as an executive
producer. Roger Deakins worked as a visual consultant
on the film after collaborating on another recent
DreamWorks film, 'How to Train Your Dragon.' And consequently, this film is Gorgeous to
look at. The score was composed by Alexandre Desplat, who might be best known for his collaborations
with Wes Anderson. He did the scores for 'Fantastic Mr. Fox,'
'Moonrise Kingdom,' and 'The Grand Budapest Hotel,' as well as the scores for the last two 'Harry
Potter' films. Now onto the cast for the movie, our main protagonist, Jack Frost is voiced by Chris Pine, giving one of my favorite performances of
his entire career. [Chris Pine as Jack] "It's a snow day!!!!!!" [Laughter] The character of Jack Frost is a bit of a
punk. [Jack] "Am I on the naughty list?" He's careless and reckless. He's got a Peter Pan quality and a sadness
that is centuries old. Then we have Nicholas St. North, our Santa Claus character voiced by, [Crickets] Look, there's no way around this. As I'm writing the script, we still don't entirely know all the details surrounding the death of up-and-coming cinematographer
Halyna Hutchins, whose work on films like 'Darlin'' and 'Arch-Enemy'
were testaments to her talent and her death is
a tragedy. She was fatally shot by Alec Baldwin when
a prop gun misfired on the set of the Western he was
starring in called 'Rust.' And while voicing North might be some of the
best work of Baldwin's career. Authorities are still untangling the circumstances
of Hutchinson's death. And I don't really want to celebrate this
man who to one degree or another ended a human life and I am not going to mention
Alec Baldwin's name again in this video. The character of Nicholas St. North is the
moving definition of bombast. A Cossack inspired Santa Claus with naughty and nice tattoos and a pension for
swearing in Russian composers. [North] "Rimsky- Korsakov!" "Shostakovich!" Then there's our Tooth Fairy, aka Toothiana, voiced by Isla Fisher. [Tooth] "Have you ever seen a more adorable,
lateral incisor in all of your life?" "Look how she flossed!" She's high-energy and high enthusiasm and
her and Jack are definitely into each other. We've got E. Aster Bunnymund, ...E. Aster? His name is Easter Bunny. Good lord. Sometimes I think Bill Joyce is
a menace. Well, he's voiced by Hugh Jackman and his
main character traits are Australian. [Bunny] "Looks like you're a bit of a brumby,
ay mate!" He's a bit of a stubborn jerk at times, but also he's pretty cool. [Bunny] "You might want to duck."
[Horse neighs] The Sandman, aka Sandy, is not voiced, but he is adorable and I love
him. [Jack] "Tha--That's not really helping, but
thanks, little man." Then we've got our bad guy, Pitch Black, voiced with a playfully velvet menace by Jude
Law. I'll talk about Pitch more later, but he is an excellent villain. Then there's the kids starting with Jamie
Bennett, voiced by Dakota Goyo. Fun fact, Hugh Jackman actually recommended
him for the role after they worked together on 'Real
Steel.' And there's a whole bunch of other kids, but I want to shout out Dominique Grund as
Cupcake. [Cupcake] "I will." And Georgie Grieve as Jamie's little sister
Sophie. [Sophie] "Bunny, hop, hop, hop". So with that, let's all take a deep breath [Inhales] and dive into the books. Before we dig into The Guardians of Childhood,
a few disclaimers. Number one, these books were written for children
aged 7-to 11 years old, and the picture books are literal picture
books for children. While I will concede, the art is beautiful and the writing style
is charming, these books weren't meant to be read by 30-year-olds. If you like The Guardians of Childhood books
or you have a fun nostalgia for them, that's really valid. I did not experience these books in the way
they were meant to be experienced. If I had read these books when I was seven, I might've liked them, but I read them as
an entire adult woman. I'm going to make a lot of jokes about these
books because I think they're bananas. Number 2, William Joyce seems like a well-intentioned person whose bad writing
choices stem from ignorance rather than malice. I know in real life the man has dealt with
a lot of personal tragedy and that really sucks. But I'm going to say a bunch of not nice things
about his writing choices. So I'll say something nice first, which is, he's an incredibly talented artist. I love his drawings. I particularly love his penchant for drawing
puppies with jetpacks. It's a great impulse. I hope he keeps it up. Okay...So. Remember when I said The Rise of the Guardians
gave me 'Kingdom Hearts' vibes. Well, it turns out that was NOTHING compared to The Guardians of Childhood which is truly
working on the level of like 13 Xehanorts and Donald Duck beating the most powerful
wizard in history. I'm going to summarize what I consider to
be the highlights as quickly as possible because I read all of these books
and I think they're hilarious. Okay, so! First off, we've got Manny the Man in the Moon,
[The sound of paper hitting the wall] also just called MIM sometimes, in the books our boy Bill inexplicably decided to just do the Romanovs with him and
his people. No, seriously, this is full-on Anastasia.
[Thump] The Man in the Moon is the son of Tsar and
Tsarina Lunanoff who got killed by Pitch, who is their, I don't know, vizier or knight or something? Baby Lunanoff is saved by Jack Frost who
at this point is called Nightlight. He stabs Pitch with a moon dagger and the
pair are trapped together in some hellish purgatory
for centuries, leaving the Man in the Moon to grow up alone
and watch over earth. And Pitch? The vizier guy? Knight of the Lunanoff's? While he gets tempted by the nightmares and
fearlings who torment him with the voice of his DEAD DAUGHTER and then when
he lets them out of their cages, they consume his soul and possess his body, and then he goes and kills the Tsar of Russia,
I mean the moon. Then in the next book we meet North who will
later be Santa Claus. He was raised by Cossacks and he's a pirate
and a thief. He goes to the town of Santoff Claussen, where he needs Father Time, who was a wizard from Atlantis,
[Thump] who teaches in magic and has an adopted daughter
named Catherine, who will later be Mother Goose.
[Thump] Also, all of his friends got turned into statutes
and he got over that real quick. In later books, he turned them all into his
helper helps because that isn't horrifying. In the next book, we need E. Aster Bunnymund. This inter-dimensional time traveling rabbit,
also called a Pooka, is stuffy mother fucker who just loves anything
egg-shaped, and also the earth used to be shaped like
an egg and Bunny made it round so it didn't topple into
the sun or something.
[Thump] Oh, he has psychic powers to know everybody's
favorite chocolate. But he says chocolate is bad for Pookas and
it makes him "illogical." In case you're wondering, yes, he does eventually get lost in that chocolate
sauce and goes ape shit. By ape shat, I mean, he grows three times
his size and gets SWOLE. Also one time he ate some chocolate and grew
like ten extra arms because I'm in hell. In Book 3, we meet Toothiana who I WILL GET TO IN A BIT But for comedy purposes, I need you to know that Toothiana can like
manifest a hundred tiny tooth fairies from her body like Dracula
turning into cloud of bats or something. [Thump]
Dear God why. Oh, and then Pitch's,daughter isn't dead and
she's mother nature apparently. Then in Book 4 we meet....dear God, Sanderson Mansnoozie AKA Sandy The Sandman, WILLIAM JOYCE GO TO FANTASY JAIL. I can't with these names. I'm sorry. I will say Sandy's backstory is actually kind of cool? He was a star captain back in the day who piloted shooting stars and fought dream pirates. Although he does introduce himself to the
gang by levitating everybody into the air and then
knocking them out, which is a bit wild. Oh! And at one point Bunny and Tooth debate, who was more of an Eldridge creation when
Tooth manifests 10 thousand tooth fairies from her body and
Bunny grows 12 arms. After this, Bunny calculates how much chocolate
he would need to grow 10,000 ARMS. At the end of the book, Jack saves Katherine, AKA Mother Goose, with a magic kiss which is UM....later called
THE EVERLASTING LIP TOUCH, [Thump]
thanks, I hate it. Oh, and did you know Jack has knives made
from human tears? [Me cracking up] Look, all jokes aside, I've enjoyed my fair share of kid lit, but I found Joyce's writing style was not
my cup of tea. I do think his illustrations are lush and
detailed and I can see the influences art had on the visual
style of the film. But on a story level, I found his writing to be kind of bizarre. What's unclear to me is how much of that source material the production team even
had while working on the film, Peter Ramsey and co started developing the
Rise Of The Guardians film somewhere around 2008, 2009? When Joyce optioned the concept of the
series. He didn't publish the first books in the series
until 2011, and the last book wasn't published until 2018. So while I imagine he gave them a lot of his
basic concepts and ideas, like, I imagine he probably gave the team whatever
outline he had delivered to his publishers when he pitched
the series to them. He clearly worked with the production team
to some degree, but I don't know how much of this stuff they
had going in. Like Jack's secret adopted family and a pack
of friendly werewolves from Book 5 may not have really been on anybody's minds while they were breaking down
the screenplay. And you know how I didn't really mention Tooth
that much while describing the books. Well, let's see, there's a Maharaja that was turned into a
monkey in a ship made from human teeth. Good God! So let's strap in for a trip to the land of Punjam
Hy Loo to talk about some messy stuff. So I mostly didn't get into the storyline of
Toothiana in the books because it gets messy. Specifically, it leans into a concept that
Edwards Said, professor of literature at Columbia University
defined as Orientalism in his 1978 book of the same name. According to Said, orientalism is how the
West conceptualizes the East, formerly referred to as 'The Orient' by Westerners. These depictions and art literature and so
on essentialize and exaggerate the differences of the East with
a presumption of Western superiority. It is a prejudice view of "The East" by outsiders and was shaped by the European imperialism
of the 18th and 19th century. As Rudyard Kipling once wrote in his poem, The Ballad of East and West, "East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet." Orientalism in practice has changed somewhat
over the centuries. It's been used to demonize, fetishize, and essentialize whole swaths of Eastern cultures. For recent examples, go watch 'The Isle of Dogs' or 'The Darjeeling Limited' by Wes Anderson
or better yet, go watch BroeyDeschanel's video on those movies. But curiously, William Joyce's Guardians of
Childhood series leans a lot more into, let's call it 'classic Orientalism?' While Punjam is a real town in India, Hy Loo is gibberish as far as I can tell. But the whole tale of the maharaja breaking
into Punjam Hy Loo to kill a flying elephant only to get turned
into a monkey by the Sisters of Flight is let's say it would fit in right
next to Rudyard Kipling's 'Jungle Book' or Frances Hodgson
Burnett's 'A Little Princess.' Or even Lewis Carroll's hookah, smoking caterpillar in 'Alice in Wonderland.' In fact, I think Punjam Hy Loo would fit quite comfortably next to C.S. Lewis's 'The Horse and
His Boy,' the third in 'The Chronicles of Narnia' series, which tells us a lot about the Calormen Empire, the people of this land, the Calormens, are dark-skinned with the men
mostly bearded. They wear flowing robes, turbans, and wooden shoes within upturned point at
the toe. And their preferred weapon is the Calormen scimitar. In Perry Nodelman's 1992 article for the Children's Literature Association Quarterly
titled The Other: Orientalism, Colonialism, and Children's Literature. He posits that the commonality of Orientalist
tendencies in children's literature might come from a Western
view of superiority, viewing the East as inherently lesser and
childlike on some level. That might be part of it. But I think Noura Awadh Shafie and Faiza Aljohani might have gotten closer in their 2019 article for the Arab world English journal titled 'Orientalism
and Children's Literature:' 'Representations of Egyptian and Jordanian
Families and Elsa Marston's Stories.' They state that children's literature in the 19th century was a form of colonial discourse. Children's literature of the Golden Age featured
the adventures of the child character to reflect the colonial
expansion and the discovery of the unknown. Basically, children's literature was a way
to intentionally or unintentionally pass on colonialist ideas
to the next generation. But then there's also the fantasy element. And boy oh boy, do fantasy and science fiction writers love to
pull from this concept of the East. Whether it's the Calormen Empire or Frank
Herbert's Dune with its Muslim coded Fremen. Watch this great video by youtuber Tazzy Phe. For more info on that, I'll have it linked in the description. But anyways, it's a thing. Writers do it all the time. Author and Academic, Brian Attebery, suggested in his book, 'Stories About Stories: Fantasy and the Remaking
of Myth,' that it's tempting for authors to look further
than Celtic, Arthurian, or Eddic myths for inspiration, if only for the sake of originality as well
as These might all be factors that contributed
to William Joyce's particular brand of yikes. I spoke to a couple of folk of East, Southeast, and South Asian descent, mostly because, while parts of Toothiana's backstory in the book feel specific to India, the scope gets a little broader in the film. And the pretty unanimous response I got was that
it was definitely yikes, but too garbled and unspecific to be actively
offensive. It's just weird, and weirder still because while there are traditions surrounding baby
teeth around the world, the Tooth Fairy is a purely Western concept. So making Tooth Asian inspired really is ten
kinds of strange. And that strangeness did leak into the film where
they kept to the honest, vaguely Asian roots and expanded on them. Head of story, Hamish Grieve said in the art
book, Production designer Patrick Hannenberger states
that their take on the Tooth fairy was inspired
by the half-bird, half-human gods of ancient Buddhist and Hindu
cultures. The inspiration for the overall concept of
the Tooth palace came from a trip Hannenberger took to Thailand
in the spring of 2008. he says. But the art book also states that the Tooth
palace is tucked away deep inside a mountain range that is reminiscent
of China's Huangshan Mountains. The artbook ALSO states that in the imagery
and glyphs around the Tooth palace, there are hints at Tooth's parentage with
some images hinting at a romantic love between an Indian Maharaja
and a magical bird. So they did draw a lot on the source material, clearly trying to make something a bit more
based on real cultural elements. They nixed the ship made of human teeth, thank
God, but also after all that Toothiana is, well,
white-ish. There were actually discussions back when
this movie came out about Toothiana being whitewashed given her
backstory. Her book was the one released on October 2nd, 2012, about a month before the film came out. What's frustrating is that the creative team
were clearly debating how to handle Tooth's ethnicity. There was a lot of gorgeous concept art of
a Toothiana who was clearly more inspired by her South and Southeast
Asian roots. They even debated what color to make her skin. notes Hanennberger, But apparently, when they decided to give
her human skin, they kept it white and just stepped away from
making her look too human, instead going in a more bird-like direction. Of the people I spoke to, about half wishes they had kept to these earlier
designs, while half doesn't mind because she's so far removed from being human in her final iteration. But everybody agrees book Tooth is weird as
shit. There's also a little weirdness in the film
version only because book Bunny was a stuffy scholar
type. But casting Hugh Jackman led them to this
more warrior-like, distinctly Australian Bunny. [Jack] "No, the kangaroo's, right." The artbook makes several references to the indigenous cultures of Australia in inspirations
for Bunny's design. For example, Patrick Hannenberger said they A lot of these details might not immediately
come across in the final film, so I'm not really going to weigh in on if
this sucks or not. Indigenous people of Australia, please feel free to weigh in in the comments
section. From where I'm standing as an outsider, I think it seems kinda sus?? Also, while William Joyce isn't actively a
part of any hate groups, a low bar for fantasy authors I know, but listen, he made it. But he does like to post on Instagram. While a lot of it is as previously stated,
puppies with jetpacks, which I love, some of it is his personal headcanons about various story elements. A lot of that is harmless, but occasionally you get some really weird
shit like real-life woman, Isadora Duncan, who was a real person who existed, who, according
to Joyce, was at one point so in love with Jack Frost, she threatened to throw herself into a volcano
if he didn't marry her, which is weird. Then there's the weird stuff like saying Jack's
magical staff Twiner is made from wood from a Mohican burial
ground? Just weird, unnecessary shit like that which
doesn't seem particularly well thought out or researched
with any amount of sensitivity. Thankfully, that shit isn't in the movie, but it is a thing that exists on the Internet
for reasons that baffle me. So now let's talk about, [Jack] "What makes you think I want to be a guardian." [North laughing for way too long] "Of course, you do." After we meet Jack in that opening sequence, the movie very efficiently introduces us to
our heroes and our villain. First, we meet North in his workshop at the
North Pole where by the way he's listening to the Firebird Suite by Igor Stravinsky,
another Russian composer. [North humming along with 'The Firebird Suite'] Just great touch. We also meet his helpers, the Yetis. [North] "Paint it red!"
[Yeti replies in consternation in their Yeti language] We also meet his not so helpful helpers, The
Elves. [Jack] "Very nice. Keep up good work." The Elves are like if Minions were funny. [Comical honking sound] I know DreamWorks was definitely trying to capitalize on the Minions trend with these
guys, but the elves actually make me laugh. Also concept artist, Gabe Hordos describes them as such. Incredible.
[The sound of bells hitting the floor] And almost immediately after that, we get our first hint of the Villain, the Boogeyman, Pitch Black when a shadow of him appears at
the North Pole. [Evil laughing] It's a really cool bit. Because of that, North knows something is
afoot and summons the other guardians using the northern lights!! God, I love this movie. From there we get quick sequences of Bunny, Tooth and Sandy in their elements. We see that Bunny is cool and Australian. [Bunny] "Oh it's Freezing!" Tooth has ADHD and Sandy is just adorable
and I love everything he does. Once they convene at the North Pole, we get to see them all interacting as Santa
explains that something is up. [North] "I feel it in my belly." Finally, the Man in the Moon tells The Guardians that Pitch is back and they needed new guardian. [Tooth] "I wonder who it's going to be." [Bunny] "Please not the Grendel. Please not the Grendel." The Moon tells them that the new member they
need for their team, the one who must be their new guardian is. [North] "Jack Frost." For anybody who knows me in real life or has
heard about how I relate to The Grinch on an almost spiritual
level, [Long high pitch scream] then you might know that I hate Christmas
movies. [Rizzo from The Pink Popcast] "HO HO HO" The stranglehold that Christmas has on our
culture is hell. [That girl from vine] "Merry crisis." It annoys the crap out of me when stores start
playing Christmas carols on November 1st and everything
is red and green and Christmas. But some people like to say that a war on
Christmas exists. Meanwhile, Chanukah gets a pity endcap at Target and one entire Adam Sandler movie that
I hate, but I'm not bitter or anything. Basically, I avoid Christmas movies. I haven't seen 'Miracle on 34th Street' or 'White
Christmas' or 'A Christmas Story.' Why should I? These movies are peddling a
holiday that I don't celebrate as a universal experience. For years I avoided Nightmare Before Christmas
because it had Christmas and nightmare in the title and I
didn't like either of those things. When I say, I like a movie that stars the
Santa man himself, this is, well for me? it's kind of exceptional I guess. What I find appealing is that religion is
largely removed from both Easter and Christmas in
these movie. There is an area mention of Mr. J. Santa Claus
and the Easter Bunny are only shown in relation to the basic iconography
you could see at a Hallmark store. Easter has eggs and bunnies, and Santa Claus has elves, a sleigh, trees with lights on them, just the basics. Better still, the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus
are placed at the same level as folkloric figures like The
Sandman, The Tooth Fairy and Jack Frost. Although Bunny and North may bicker about
who's holiday is more important, it is very removed from any sort of religious
iconography. It's just painted eggs and candy canes. I understand that this might not be an element
of the film that appeals to everybody, but it's certainly made the movie more fun
for me. Now let's talk about animation. I am not an expert in CGI animation. A lot of my information on this comes from
the art book and the behind the scenes, but it is an interesting process to be sure. The art book actually features a somewhat wild looking flowchart for the
animation process. But in basic terms, it starts the way all animation starts with
storyboarding and the scripting process as well as concept artists finalizing designs for characters and settings. Beneath all their flourishes in details, the designs for each of the guardians and their realms are rooted in simple shapes and
colors. North is square and red, Bunny is a green
triangle, Sandy is a yellow circle, and Tooth is a pink
diamond. Once you've got your concept art, your storyboards, your script, we move on to modeling, which is basically sculpting everything in
the 3D space and rigging, which is what makes things move in set 3D
space. Character supervisor Arthur Gregory says, Apparently Toothiana's rigging was quite complex since on top of the usual facial and
body setup, there were all of her tail and head feathers
as well as her wings. Her tail alone apparently required five separate
systems, plus two extra ones called, 'fancy feathers' that all had to work in a layered
animation system. Surfacing is another important aspect here
and the name is pretty self-explanatory. It's adding layers of detail and texture on
the surface of everything. An important aspect in creating texture is how all of these individual surfaces react
to light. For example, the texture of Sandy was described
as being like marzipan, while the texture of Pitch was almost satiny, apparently inspired by the underbelly of manta
rays. Then as the editorial department is continuing
to nail down the story, I'm fairly sure this is when all the actors
record their voice-overs, but that's some guesswork on my end. As that part goes on, the animation department starts the rough
layout of things like simulations for how North's Sleigh will fly or how Pitch's
nightmares navigated space. Basically focusing on how characters are going to move around and be placed within an area, Damon O'Beirne who was the head of layout said, Then there are the crowd effects managing
all the secondary characters, thousands of Tooth's baby teeth fairies and
all the nightmares and bunnies, little eggs, all the yetis and the elves, and any group of background characters had
to have a variety of animation cycles made for
them. The matte painting department works to further finalize and flesh out backgrounds in every
scene, and the character effects department works
on various special effects for each individual
character, like North's beard, Bunny's fur, or Tooth's translucent wings. There's also a visual effects department that
came up with things like the look of Sandy's dream sand and the look of Pitch's
twist on it with the nightmare sand, which compared to the soft sugary weigh the
dream sand moves. The nightmare sand has an almost oily motion to it.They also design the effect for Jack's
Frost, which rides a line between the fractal effective
snowflakes as well as that of lightening bolts.Then the
lighting team comes into, well, do the lighting. The lighting team's job is to pull all these
different elements together so that I can move on to get scored and sound
designed and color graded. Of course, it's not a straight A to Z process, but a cyclical one where teams continually
go in and rework and retool things as departments continue to refine their work over the course of making
the film. Production Supervisor Kara Oropallo said there
was a spirit of collaboration on the film that
The Guardians themselves would approve of. One of the little details that I'm particularly
fond of is the specific physicality brought to each of
our characters, something that was entirely built from the
ground up by all of these digital artists. Tooth and her baby, two fairies move like
hummingbirds, Sandy floats around like a cloud and Jack
flies around within athletic grace. Animators apparently took inspiration for his physicality from seeing kids skateboarding,
which I love. It's a little thing but it's so distinct. I love watching Jack fly around the town of
Burgess, which is where he meets Jamie. [Jack] "That looks interesting. Is it a book?" When we catch up with Jack in the present-day, he's being a chaotic little scamp and ends
up sending this child on a wild ride that ends like this. [Jack] "Whoops." [Jamie] "Cool a tooth!"
[Other kid] "Tooth fair money!" [Jack] "Oh no. No!" Jack is still lonely and bereft and frustrated
at being ignored. [Jack] "What's a guy got to do to get a little attention around
here." And I love the scene where he monologues to the Man in the Moon asking why he's been put here like
this with no memory of his life before he was Jack Frost unable to be seen by anybody except the guardians
who mostly ignore him. That is until they kidnap him and drag him
to the North' Pole. [Jack] "I loved being shoved in a sack and tossed
through magic portal." [North] "Oh good. That was my idea." It's around here that we get our first real
glimpse of Pitch Black. He comes into the room of a child having a
dream about a unicorn and Pitch is able to twist her dream
into a nightmare. [Pitch] "My nightmares are finally ready, are your
guardians?" Meanwhile, Jack's been brought to the North
Pole to be made a Guardian. And here's where the movie explains some rules; in order to exist and be seen by humans, they need to be believed in. Essentially, the more kids believe in them, the more powerful they are.This globe tracks
all of the children who believe and all the children
the guardians are supposed to protect. But if children stop believing the guardians
lose their power and eventually they could even
cease to exist. Jack doesn't even want to be a Guardian. [Jack] "To spend eternity like you guys cooped up
in some hideout" "Thinking of new ways to bribe kids? That's not for me!
No offense. Jack and Bunny have this argument. [Jack] "The kangaroos, right?" [Bunny] "I'm not a kangaroo mate, I'm a bunny." "The Easter Bunny." "People believe in me." And North takes Jack aside for a little chat. On the way we meet Phil the Yeti who Jack
apparently knows By Nname since apparently he's been trying to
sneak into the North pole for years. [North] "What do you mean 'bust in?'" [Jack] "Don't worry, just never go past the yetis," [Yeti grunts]
[Jack] "Oh hey Phil." When they reach North's workshop Jack is offered
some fruit cake and then. [North] "Now we get down to tax of brass." North wants to know what is Jack center, all of the Guardians have one, he explains. He has a series of Russian nesting dolls to
illustrate his many layers until we see North center
is. [Jack] "There's a tiny wooden baby." No that's not it, it's wonder! North is all about bringing wonder to children
that is his center and Jack needs to figure out what
he has to offer the Guardians. North even gives him the littlest nesting
doll as some reminder and encouragement, and it's a really lovely sequence. But all of that gets cut short when there's
trouble at Tooth's Palace, we get a great sleigh ride sequence to get
there. [North] "Everyone love the sleigh." It's really fun and should have been a ride
at universal or something. Then at Tooth's Palace we see what Pitch is
up to. [Jack] "They are taking the Tooth Fairies." Pitch is capturing all of Toothiana's fairies, although Jack is able to save one. [Jack] "Hi, little Baby Tooth, are you okay?"
[Baby Tooth squeaks in reply] Then the five of them face off against Pitch
who explains that he wants what they have. [Pitch] "To be believed in." He's tired of being trapped under children's
beds, he wants to be seen...just like Jack! But eventually Pitch vanishes and the Guardians
are panicking as children are beginning to stop
believing in the Tooth Fairy. Without her helpers she can't keep up with
children losing their baby teeth, and the disappointment is putting out lights
all across the globe. We also learned that Tooth protects children's
memories, which are stored in their baby teeth. I know that's really weird. When children need to be reminded of what's
important, that's what she does, and she apparently had Jack's memories too, the memories from when Jack was human, the memories that might explain why Jack is
here and what his life was like before, but Pitch has them now. [Jack] "Then we have to get them back." And the whole thing is taking its toll on Tooth. Until North has the idea for them to
collect all of the teeth. [North] "You know how many toys I deliver in one night." [Bunny] "And eggs I hide in one day." The gang all agree to help and we have another
incredible, adorably fun sequence with all the Guardians
trying to one-up each other. It's just great. At the end of the night, Tooth and Jack end up in Jamie's room to pick
up a tooth lost in a freak sliding accident. [Jack] "Kids huh?" Eventually the other Guardians barge in and
wake up Jamie and we get a reminder that he can't see Jack and it's
heartbreaking. [Jack] "He can see us?" [Bunny] "Most of us." But the Guardians don't really know what to
do with an actual away kids. [Bunny] "Sandy knock him out. With the dream Sandy
a gumby!" What was Sandy going to DO!?" But anyway the whole thing goes awry and Sandy accidentally knocks out all the guardians
except Jack. Then the pair of them chase after a nightmare
and end up facing Pitch. [Jack] "Remind me to not to get on your bad side." Initially it looks like they're handling things
until. [Pitch] "It was stupid of me to mess with your dreams," "so I'll tell you what." "You can have them back." Then there's this amazing really cool fight
sequence that has a lot of little beats that I love, but it ends tragically when Pitch takes out
Sandy. [Jack] "NO!" Jack is the first one who can successfully
lash back out at Pitch, but he wasn't able to do it in time to save
his friend. When talking about Rise of the Guardians one
has to talk about how this movie was received because on the
one hand there was a rabid Tumblr fanbase that loved Jack Frost
and a few other recent animated films to the point that a popular crossover began called
Rise of the Brave Tangled Dragons. Yes this is real. It was mostly about watching these four adorable
teens interacting in various alternate universes
and a lot of shipping. I wasn't super active in this fandom but I
saw the appeal of shipping Hiccup from 'How to Train your Dragon'
and Meredith from 'Brave,' and I thought some of the GIF sets in edits
were pretty cute. The following year 'Frozen' came out and fans started shipping Jack and Elsa because ice
powers, the ship name was 'Jelsa' and it was popular
enough that William Joyce is aware of this and has said
this on the subject. [Joyce] "The biggest fanbase of all if the people who
worship Elsa from Frozen," "desperately want Jack Frost and Elsa to get
together." [Other person] "I want that." "I do too." "They call it Jelsa" If you want a deeper dive on the Tumblr side
of things Izzyzzz actually came out with a whole video about
it while I was making this essay. I'll leave a link to that in the description. But while teenagers using 20-somethings on
Tumblr latched on to this movie with a vengeance, it did badly at the box office with a budget
of 145 million and the total box office return
of 306.9 million. Despite making back the cost of the film and
another 150 million, it was the lowest opening weekend since 'Flushed
Away,' and DreamWorks ended up touting an $83 million loss due to production and
marketing costs. This led to a company-wide restructuring and
the firing of around 350 employees. Now, I'm not a money person but I'm pretty
sure Jeffrey Katzenberg could have just taken a pay cut and not fired all those people who
had worked their asses off, but whatever. Numbers aside, I do think it's interesting
to look into why this movie did so poorly despite a rabid fan base and
by all accounts, massive plans for a long-running franchise. I think it comes down to audience expectations because it's not a failure
of marketing per se. I think they very smartly advertised the action
elements in the trailers but you can still see some of
these scarier sequences. The movie was rated PG but I think parents
saw a movie with Santa Claus that looked too scary for their
three-year-olds and that was that. What's absolutely maddening is that parents
took children to see 'The Avengers' movie that same year but
for some reason, animation has to either be super adult like 'Sausage Party' or for three-year-olds like
'PAW Patrol.' I think Rise of the Guardians would've hit
really well with that 7-13 year old demographic that the books were
aimed at. It depends on the kid mind you. I probably wouldn't have been able to handle
this movie until I was around 11 and some of the sequences are genuinely
scary, but I think this movie would have been a hit
with preteens who unfortunately don't usually have the disposable income to go see movies and
are generally reliant on their parents for that
thing. I do suspect that it's parents who saw a movie
with this and didn't take their little kids and
then those same parents saw a movie with Santa
Claus and the Easter Bunny and thought the movie was probably too immature
for their older kids. So while the movie succeeded enough to garner
a following, it didn't succeed enough to generate box office returns but it did do really well
on home video. Although that wasn't enough to get people
their jobs back or revive the franchise. I'll be honest personally I'm more sad for the people losing their jobs that I am for
the lack of an entire franchise given the diminishing returns of the 'How to Train
Your Dragon' franchise. I'm perfectly happy to enjoy this singular
excellent film. But that's just me. But speaking of how this movie's audience
is difficult to pin down. This is a movie that does not pull its punches. The death of Sandy at the hands of Pitch is
the scene that would absolutely make little kids cry because
this movie, it is not screw around. After Sandy's death, we get an honest to God
funeral sequence that wrecks me. Although full disclosure, I think the elves
mournfully ringing their little hat bells is unintentionally
hilarious but after that Jack and North have a conversation
where Jack regrets not doing more to save Sandy and North tries to comfort him saying
he did more than any of them were able to do
against Pitch. [North] "I don't know who you want in your past life
but in this life you are guardian." [Jack] "How can I know who I am but I find out who
I was." And North says he'll figure it out. [North] "I feel it...in my belly." And it's here that we get to the Easter sequence. As lights are going off across the globe,
Bunny is like. [Bunny] "We can still turn this around. Easter
is tomorrow." "I say we pull out all the stops and we get
those little lights flickering again." So they go to Bunny's Warren for an absolutely bonkers sequence with these
tiny little walking eggs. [North] That's little strange"
[Bunny] "Naw man, that's adorable." I love how weird this is. Also Jamie's sister Sophie accidentally ended
up at the Warren and it's here we learned the Guardians are out of touch
when it comes to kids. [North] "We are very busy bringing joy to children." "We don't have time...for children." But with a little encouragement from Jack, everybody ends up having a great day prepping
all the eggs and stuff. By the end of the day, Bunny and Jack have reached a bit of mutual
respect and maybe even friendship. [Jack] "Look, I'm sorry about whole, the kangaroo
thing." [Bunny] "Its the accent isn't it?" And it's adorable! When it's time to get Sophie home, Jack volunteers to take her. Everybody is like what if Pitch does something
but Jack says not to worry. [Jack] "I'll be quick as a bunny." I do have to quick shout out the utterly charming big brother energy Jack is serving in the sequence as he puts
Sophie to bed, but on the way back Jack hears a voice calling his name and despite Baby Tooth being like
[Protesting squeaky sounds] Don't worry there's still time. Jack follows the voice to Pitch's lair which
is underneath a really creepy bed in the forest!!!!! This movie is perfect and also would've scared
me senseless as a kid, but in Pitch's lair we see all the baby teeth, fairies and also God this is an upsetting
sequence. All the baby teeth Pitch stole are there too and it's here where Pitch shows up to tempt Jack with
his lost memories. [Pitch] "You make a mess wherever you go while you're
doing it right now." He preys on Jackson insecurities and torments
him long enough that when Jack finds his way back,
it's too late. [Bunny] "they don't see me." "they don't see me." When Jack shows up with his memories and Baby
Tooth gone, the Guardians immediately jumped to the worst
conclusion. [North] "You were with Pitch?" [Bunny] "We should never have trusted you!" Jack responds in kind, throwing Santa's little nesting doll into
the dirt and flying away. He ends up alone in Antarctica where Pitch
finds him. [Pitch] "I thought this might happen." He tries appealing to Jack because they both
just want to be seen and believed in. He tries to prey on Jack's loneliness and
suggests that they work together. [Pitch] "What goes together better than cold and dark?" But Jack isn't having it, And in a moment that is fascinating to me. I think to some degree, Pitch is genuinely hurt to be turned down. So he turns to threats and cruelty. He's got Baby Tooth and he says he'll give
her to Jack in exchange for his staff. [Pitch] "You have a bad habit of interfering." And when Jack gives it to him. [Jack] "Now let her go." [Jack] "No." Pitch breaks the staff and throws the pair
of them in a hole. [Jack cries out] And you know, I really do think Pitch is one of the more interesting villains I've seen in
a children's film. I suspect his intensity is a big part of what
scared away family audiences preventing the movie's
success. But I think he's a great character. And I'm saying this as somebody who mostly views
villains as a vehicle to make the story go. Like if they're well-written, cool, but if they're Idris Elba in 'Star Trek Beyond'
or Guy Pierce in 'Iron Man 3.' That doesn't really lessen my viewing experience. But Pitch is so interesting because what makes
him evil in the eyes of the Guardians is just inherent
to who he is. Pitch loves scaring children, he loves darkness. These are antithetical to the good guys, but it makes Pitch almost sympathetic because
in his own way, he wants to be accepted for who he is. He wants to be seen and believed in. Sure, he's also a manipulative jerk, but there's more going on than just a big
scary dude. In the words of Frankenstein's monster, But that complexity was maybe lost on audiences who wanted to take their little
kids to see a movie with Santa Claus in it. At this point in the film, Jack is at his lowest, lying at the bottom of a ravine, his staff in pieces. He's all alone except for little Baby Tooth
who he tries to protect from the cold. [Jack] "Sorry. All I can do is keep your cold." I haven't talked about the relationship between
Jack and Baby Tooth, but it is genuinely one of my favorite bits
of the film. As Jack despairs, she climbs into the pocket
of his jacket. At first we assume it's to keep warm, but then she comes back out with Jack's memories, the memories he got from Pitch. And in a beautiful bit of nonverbal animation, she gently encourages Jack, telling him it's okay to see the memories
he's been searching for this whole time, and so we all get to see that Jack was once
a regular boy. He had a family and a sister. One day the pair of them were out on the ice
and it was cracking. His sister was about to fall in and so he
did his best to save her. [Jack] "You're going to be all right. You're not going
to fall in." "We're going to have a little fun instead." In the process of saving her, Jack fell in the freezing water and drowned, which is a really DARK BEAT in the middle
of this adorable little movie!!! This movie does Not pull its punches, I swear to God! But it seems that in the moment Jack saved
his sister, the Man in the Moon saw his heroic deed
and decided he was a Guardian. When Jack wakes up from his memories, he's
ecstatic. [Jack] "I had a family, I had a sister, I saved her!" With his newfound confidence, he picks up the pieces of his staff and tries
to repair it. Initially, he's just mashing the pieces of
wood together. But when he closes his eyes and believes, his staff reforms and he's able to fly away
to try and save the day! Meanwhile, Pitch at the height of his victory, comes to the North Pole to gloat. It's amazing. Some of his moves are inspired by Fred Astaire
and he relishes as lights of little children's beliefs are
going out across the globe. [Pitch] "Four, three, two..." All except for one.
[Pitch snapping his fingers] Meanwhile, Jack returns to Pitch's lair and his globe and sees that same little light
and knows instantly. [Jack] "Jamie!" Jamie sits alone in his bedroom staring at
a stuffed rabbit. He's at an impasse. All of his friends have stopped believing
in the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy, and Santa Claus, but Jamie still wants to believe. [Jamie] "So you kind of owe me now." Jack Frost comes through the boy's window, and hears as he asks for some kind of sign
that the Easter Bunny is real. And Jack makes a rabbit out of frost and animates
it running around the room. When it bursts into a flurry of snow, Jamie in a moment of pure magic says. [Jamie] "Snow? Jack Frost?" He turns and sees Jack, who is still in shock that this boy said his
name. [Jack] "Can you hear me? Can--can you...can you see me?" I love this scene so much, I can never watch it without smiling. [Jack] "He sees me!' Jack's joy at just being seen is infectious, and their collective excitement over Jack
making it snow in Jamie's room is so sweet. [Jamie] "You just made it snow." [Jack] "I know." [Jamie] "In my room!"
[Jack] "I know!!" Jack assures him that Santa, and the Tooth
Fairy, and the Easter Bunny are all real, right as the Guardians arrive. But all of them are thoroughly weakened by all the children who no longer believe in
them. Bunny was apparently hit hardest by it all. [Jaime] "That's the Easter Bunny?" [Bunny] "Now, somebody sees me where we're
about an hour ago." That's when Pitch shows up, gleefully telling them that they look awful. Jack tries to fight him, but he's too powerful now. He corners the five of them in an alley. Jamie tells Jack that he's scared, and it's right then that Jack remembers how
he saved his sister. [Jack] "We're going to have a little fun, instead." Jack interrupts Pitch's villain monologue
with a snowball, and then the Guardians go and get all of Jamie's
friends to help them out. It's really adorable as they go sledding down
the streets telling children Happy Easter and don't forget
to floss. One by one, all of Jamie's friends start believing
again, and not just in the guardians, but Jack Frost as well. [Jamie's friend] "Is that...?"
[Jamie's other friend] "Jack Frost!" Once they're altogether, the Guardian say they'll protect the children. [Pitch] "You think a few children can help
you against this?" "but who will protect you?" It's Jamie who steps forward, and says, he'll protect the Guardians. [Jamie] "I will." One by one, the other children step forward
as well. [Cupcake] "I will." [The twins] "I will!"
"I will!" "And me." "I'll try." As a wave of darkness and Pitch's nightmares
bear down on them. Jamie says. [Jamie] "I do believe in you." "I'm just not afraid of you." And that is enough to stop the dark tide. Everything turns into that golden sand we
saw before. Suddenly, Pitch's power is undone by children
just not being scared of him. Suddenly, the Guardians' power returns to
them, and with the help of the children, they fight back the nightmares! And Sandy comes back from the dead. [Jamie] "Sandman?" [Kids cheering and laughing] Look, I know it's not that surprising that a character in a children's film did not stay
dead, but Sandy's death scene did not pull punches. So I'm glad Sandy is back. The children just start having fun. They start a snowball fight. It's great. [The twins] "Oh! Oh!"
[North laughs] [North] "You're all are on naughty list! Bunny,
think fast!" Jack tells North that he found his center. It's fun, and with the children no longer
fearing him, Pitch is invisible to them again. And while this is a victory, it's not entirely one that the Guardians can
enjoy. They corner Pitch on a frozen lake, which, by the way, according to the art book, is the lake that Jack died in. I cannot even believe this movie sometimes. Also, it's a subtle thing, but this is the first time that we see Pitch
in daylight where there are no shadows for him to hide in and
when he's at his weakest point. It's here that Pitch tries to turn the tables
on them, but all the nightmares that have gathered
around them aren't their nightmares because they're not
afraid. And in a sequence that is sure to give children
nightmares, the shades converge on Pitch, dragging him down into a hole in the ground
and presumably to his death. And with Pitch gone and Jack having learned his
center, it's time to officially induct him as one
of the Guardians. The oath he takes is the one taken directly
from William Joyce's books. [North] "Will you, Jack Frost," "vow to watch over the children of the world," "to guard them with your life," "their hopes, their wishes and their dreams?" [Jack] "I will." Then it's time to say goodbye. Jamie worries about what might happen if he
stops believing again. Jack tells him that they will always be with
him, and in a way, that makes him a Guardian too. Jamie gives him a hug, and it's the cutest thing. After that final farewell, North's sleigh takes flight, and a voiceover from Jack tells us. [Jack] "My name is Jack Frost." "And I'm a guardian." He says if the moon tells you something Believe it. And that's the movie. There's also a really cute
post-credit sequence of all the children being put to bed by the yetis and the tooth fairies and the elves, it's
great. But yeah, that's the movie. And I love the message about finding your center, which is something that I do think is applicable
to us in the real world. I think it's a little empowering to take a
moment and look inward and consider what we have to offer
the world, whether it's stories or art or just friendship
and a non-judgmental ear. It might not be as straightforward as fun
or wonder, but everybody has something to offer, and even more than that, I love what this movie says about magic and
belief. You know that scene in Peter Pan where Tinker
Bell ends up drinking poison to save Peter? When it was originally performed on stage, the actress playing Peter Pan, Nina Boucicault, would run to the edge of the stage and appeal
to the audience, 'if you believe in fairies, clap your hands.' J.M. Barrie was concerned that an audience
of mostly adults wouldn't clap to save Tinker
Bell. He had actually instructed the orchestra to
put down their instruments and clap if the audience
didn't respond, but he needn't have worried because when Nina
asked the audience to believe in fairies and clap
their hands, the uproarious applause was so surprising, the actress bursts into tears. You see, everybody wants to believe in magic. When I was a child, I had imaginary fairy friends and pretended
with my best friend that we were mermaid seeking
potion under the ocean. But when we grow up and our rational minds gain a better understanding
of how the world works, we're expected to put magic aside. Maybe as an adult, I don't personally expect to find a fairy
in my garden, but that doesn't mean that magic doesn't exist. It's just a different kind of magic. I may understand what makes the sun rise or
the wind blow, but that doesn't make it any less magical
to watch a sunrise or go outside and feel the wind
on your face. In Neil Gaiman's American Gods, the protagonist, Shadow Moon, gives a long speech about all
the things he believes in. And Jeanette Winterson once wrote, There is magic in you. It might not be the kind that involves a wand
and saying abracadabra, but every scientific thing we understand can still be magical even while we grasp how it
works. There is magic in the stars and the trees
and the neurons firing that keep our lungs pumping
and our hearts beating. It's mundane, and explainable, and rational, and magical. It's ridiculous this video took as long to
make as it did, but between my mic dying halfway through editing
and a bunch of other stuff, it just took awhile. I am working on my next essay now, so don't you worry. Thank you, as always, to patrons who are sticking around even though
I've got a day job now and it's making these videos
take a little longer. I appreciate you. That's all for now. Thank you-all for watching, and I'll see you on the next one.
