A New York Times article dated April 9th, claims toy manufacturers and investors behind Pixar’s tenth feature film Up, are concerned over how the film is going to perform at a commercial level, and how this well effect other Disney businesses.

I.e. spin-off toys (a movie about a cranky old man and a young sidekick won’t rush from the shelves like Wall*E), rides at Disneyland, t-shirts, etc. It’s said that most stores are dismissing the idea of stocking Up related merchandise, with most going for the cautious, limited stock approach and even Thinkway Toys, which has worked on making Pixar-related products since 1995’s Toy Story will not produce a single item this time around.

“We doubt younger boys will be that excited by the main character,” Richard Greenfield wrote recently, citing the lack of a female character or someone the young audience can get behind as a reason for the downgrading of Disney shares in March.

Other insiders are saying Pixar is on a sinking slope and that the last few movies (Cars, Ratatouille in parcitcular) have shown a studio on the way down, with Toy Story 3 being a last grasp of desperation to save a failing company. Which of course is a load of nonsense, as Pixar are the most efficient and successful studio working today. 

Disney’s chief executive Rogert A. Iger responded,

“We seek to make great films first. If a great film gives birth to a franchise, we are the first company to leverage such success. A check-the-boxes approach to creativity is more likely to result in blandness and failure.”

I can kind of see the argument for both sides. On the one-hand, apart from the talking dog Dug, there is a lack of identifable kids merchandise in Up, there’s no doubt. But in terms of box office, Pixar is the master, none of their nine movies to date have not yielded a profit. 

And a quote from the Disney chief telling me that they are looking to make “great films first” shows exactly why Pixar are superior to Dreamworks Animation in every single department.