Big Hero 6

This is the first animated film based on a Marvel comic book to be released theatrically. The idea of taking little known comic books from the Marvel library and adapting them as feature films proved fruitful for Disney in 2014. "Guardians of the Galaxy" was the highest grossing original film of 2014 and "Big Hero 6" also had a successful run at the box office. There is a nice blend between the influence of Marvel and the feeling of a Disney film in the latter movie. "Big Hero 6" also features computer animation that resembles 2D animation; a look that was first introduced to us with the release of "Tangled". Every successful Disney film has a great story but great characters must support the story and great characters are something that Marvel does really well. Disney handled most of the production and I prefer that because the older comic book fans have "The Avengers" for example while those who are young at heart can enjoy "Big Hero 6".

The story pattern of "The Hero's Journey" is very reliable if applied properly. The neat coincidence is that the original comic book features a character named Hiro. In the opening scene, it is established Hiro has aspirations just like the rest of us. Then the hero of "The Hero's Journey" is called to adventure by a mentor, which in this case is Hiro's older brother Tadashi. As with Obi-wan Kenobi and Mufasa, the mentor is taken from our protagonist. Before arriving at the robotics lab, Hiro doesn't want to go to university and thereby is rejecting his call to adventure. In order to help change his mind, the mentor gives the main character supernatural aid in the form of Baymax. Just like in "The Hero's Journey", Hiro has friends to assist him on his quest: GoGo Tomago, Wasabi, Honey Lemon and Fred. I always thought that Fredzilla (whom Fred is based on) was invented by Colin Mochrie but he probably didn't know about "Big Hero 6" the comic book. Every hero on this kind of mission must cross the threshold of his familiar world and Hiro takes this step when he presents his invention at the exhibition. On the path to achieving complete victory, Hiro encounters various hurdles and experiences progression at each one. The villain in this film must be quite obsessed with revenge because if he had been smarter, he could have thought up much easier ways to steal Hiro's microbots. Tadashi's death becomes more tragic as a result. "Big Hero 6" uses "The Hero's Journey" story pattern sincerely but not perfectly. It was borderline on feeling cliche but didn't cross the line thankfully. The story twist was a surprise but it has the same flaws that the story twist of "Frozen" had in that the foreshadowing could have been better. What I mean is they kept the secret from the audience a little too well. The song "Love is an Open Door" did that on "Frozen" and in "Big Hero 6", there should have been more allusions to the twist ending at the start of the film so that the surprise makes more sense. "Wreck-It Ralph" was able to pull its story twist off just fine. Establishing a whole team of superheroes perfectly requires a slighly longer running time that an hour and a half. "The Incredibles" for example was 30 minutes longer than this movie, allowing us to get to know all of the characters better. The characters that make up the team in "Big Hero 6" were great but it would have been nice to have more time with them. Finally, I was bothered by the fact that Hiro doesn't have a superpower suit like his teammates. He may have brains but so does Bruce Wayne and Batman knows how to fight. Baymax was over emphasized in the previews in my opinion. He is a great character but not as fun to watch as Fred or Wasabi. I almost thought that there was a plot hole during the climax but then I realized that Baymax has two memory cards. We are shown earlier in the movie that Baymax is still his caring self without his health care chip and this allows him to save Hiro's life.

"Big Hero 6" was originally created by Man of Action, which is a creative group working with Marvel. Man of Action also brought us "Ben 10" and I can see a few similarities even after Disney made their changes. I have only seen Scott Adsit in very small roles at the start of his career but Baymax's fist bump as performed by Adsit is hilarious. Another funny story moment comes when Fred is revealed to be rich. I liked T.J. Miller in his feature film debut in "Cloverfield" and he has been making me laugh ever since. He was a great choice for Fred. James Cromwell was also a great addition to the cast. This was Alan Tudyk's third role in a row for Disney Feature Animation and he may very well become the John Ratzenberger of the studio. Tudyk's casting is important for the story twist when you think about it. Now for a really cool coincidence: in the live action movie "I, Robot", James Cromwell's character invents Alan Tudyk's character. Both of them play very different characters in "Big Hero 6" from those past roles. It is always expected that Stan Lee will have a cameo in a Marvel film but I was still quite surprised this time considering that Disney did most of the work on this film adaptation. I thought the visual design of all the characters was noteworthy. Honey Lemon and GoGo Tomago stood out to me and Aunt Cass was well designed, animated & voiced. By the way, some original members of the comic book team do not appear in this film because they are owned by 20th Century Fox as part of the X-men. Chris Williams has been a co-director for Disney before as well as his counterpart Don Hall. They did their jobs well.

I think "Big Hero 6" is more faithful to its source than "Frozen" is to "The Snow Queen", the characters in particular. Speaking of characters, they were the best element of this show. "Big Hero 6" is just as good the second time and seems to be getting better upon multiple viewings. It was not a surprise when the show received an Oscar nomination for Best Animated Film but this was one year where DreamWorks had the highest probability of taking home the prize and I was okay with that. "How to Train Your Dragon 2" was a little better in my opinion. It was the biggest surprise of Oscar night when "Big Hero 6" won because "How To Train Your Dragon 2" did better at the Annies and Golden Globes. Probably the only person who didn't care which film won was T.J. Miller because he voiced characters in both movies. I see potential for a sequel to "Big Hero 6" but the Walt Disney Animation Studios in the past has only created two sequels out of more than 50 films: "The Rescuers Down Under" and "Fantasia 2000". The company's third sequel will feature Wreck-It Ralph and I can dig that but I still desire a sequel for this new superhero team.

4 Stars