WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 12:44:39 GMT

Zzzzzzzzzzz .... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz .... zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz .... zzzzzzzzzzzzz ...

Huh?? Wuh?? Wazzat?? Oh ... another Meet the Robinsons story ... guess I can go back to sleep now ...

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 12:45:17 GMT

It's always amazing to me how Jim is never wrong.

Perhaps the word "rumors" should be added to the moniker "News, reviews, history and commentary about the entertainment industry (But mostly about the Mouse).

Back-pedaling would be so much easier then.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 13:19:39 GMT

I'm starting to believe that the best case scenerio is that "culture of the mouse" won't damage Pixar. It's starting to look like Pixar is going to be ineffective--from the theme parks (except for making more Pixar rides), to 2d animation, to Disney's own Pixar knock-off films--to improve Burbank and Glendale. The mediocre mouse culture is just too strong. Maybe it is time for Jobs to rethink Iger situation? What does everyone else think?

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 13:59:03 GMT

It looks like the chorus should sing "he's Mr Heat Miser" whenever bowler hat guy enters.

I noticed here's what was written about Stainton in an earlier "Why For?" : "A guy who really understands how important it is to nuture and protect artists, not abuse and neglect them."
- but it wasn't that my original (posting) was wrong....

Alright, alright, I know stories are based on the info available at the time.

Frankly, I think artists will listen to the Pixar crew, since Pixar has had - what's the word I'm looking for? - oh, success. Let's see, Lassetter has written and directed a few successful films. Stainton has - what's the word I'm looking for? - not. Besides, many of us have "groaned with disgust" over what WDFA has been putting out recently - I can't really fault Stainton there.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 14:08:02 GMT

I personally don't care if it is rumor. I appreciate that Jim keeps us as in the loop as much as possible. The news media is always partially rumor, I don't think you even need to say it anymore. Your comments are not interesting or enlightening, and are certainly not fair to the work that Jim puts in. Thanks for your work Jim! Cool pictures in this article too.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 14:09:51 GMT

Oh, and "Mr Heat Miser" is definately Syndrome...

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 14:37:06 GMT

Great insider insight as usual. Its interesting to see that PIXAR is allowing WDFA freedom to develop their own story, rather than coming in and PIXARizing the product.
This is real world film production that sounds like a win-win situation for a rather tricky merging of product lines.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:10:12 GMT

Well, how could Jim ever be wrong when the comments are always so right?

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:10:48 GMT

Does anyone know what's become of the songs Rob Thomas and Rufus Wainwright wrote for the Meet the Robinsons? Are they still in the film?

Also, any word on how Disney feels with Robinsons going up against TMNT (the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie)?

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:13:54 GMT

You know what they could do is rework the second act of this movie to have the Bowler Hat guy yodel a song and round up all of their pets to sell them off to a fast food company...

...wait....no......that's been done already.....

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:43:15 GMT

Wow, Jim writes a positive article and people still find something to b*tch about.

Anywho, I am very happy Bowler Hat Guy is going to stay in the movie (does he have a name yet?). Besides the musical & prince/princess aspects, every Disney film since Tarzan (with the small exception of Home on the Range) lacked a solid villain. And I do find it quite ironic that the Pixar guys are trying to better the villain when only three of their movies had solid villains imo (Randall, Syndrome & Hopper). Sid was such a small character, TS2 had two weak villains (Al & Pete) and both Nemo & Cars barely had anything close to a villain.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 15:52:23 GMT

Okay, so he's still in. Darn.
Still, even if it was too late to change horses in mid-flood, at least it's a good sign (yes, I'm being positive, askmike) that they're focusing on WHY David Stainton's movies went wrong. Which has to do with that "focus on story" thing Lasseter was talking about when he came on board.
Even if nothing resembling the BHG--or a plot--was ever in the Wm. Joyce children's book, at least they're realizing that we go to a Disney/Pixar for characters we actually have some reason to care about, not "hip" coffee jokes that we'll laugh at if they're pitched hyperactively enough.

Now, all they need left to do is get rid of that craze for letting the animators keep voicing the main "funny" characters--
Not that I have anything against Chris Sanders' Stitch or Brad Bird's Edna, but it's left over from the days when nobody at the studio could tell a director "no" on his weird little pet project, which's how all the trouble started in the first place.

Oh, and "Tom Brokaw" wrote:
---
Also, any word on how Disney feels with Robinsons going up against TMNT (the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie)?
---
Two words, actually: "Weinsteins". "Doogal". :)

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 17:19:09 GMT

Quote from Derek J: "Now, all they need left to do is get rid of that craze for letting the animators keep voicing the main "funny" characters--
Not that I have anything against Chris Sanders' Stitch or Brad Bird's Edna, but it's left over from the days when nobody at the studio could tell a director "no" on his weird little pet project, which's how all the trouble started in the first place."
---
I have nothing against the directors contributing a voice to any characters in their movies. They are usually the ones the bring about the best performance in the flick to begin with. It's just the idea of having a non name person, (director or otherwise) doing a voice of a character that will be talked about. The fact that a celebrity is doing a voice will not overshadow this character, thus, it will give this character a certain purity because the audience will be asking "Who did the voice of the Bowler Hat Guy? He was awesome!" It's very much like the late, great Joe Ranft doing the voice of Heimlich and Wheezy in Bug's LIfe and Toyu Story respectively. Those were the two characters that truly stuck in my mind after seeing those two movies...

----
Personally, I will be seeing three movies the weekend that Robinsons opens. Obviously, "Meet the Robinsons", "TMNT" would have to be the next one, and then the Tarantino/Rodriguez double feature "Grindhouse" which I believe opens that same weekend which is promising to be full of geeky fun. April 2007 can't come soon enough...

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 17:23:28 GMT

Somehow, I don't get the whole "characters too eccentric" angle. The characters in "Nightmare before Christmas" weren't normal, although I guess it could be said that "Nightmare's" story dictated their being quirky. But what about that grand old Capra movie, "You Can't Take It With You." Every time I see that movie with all the eccentric people living in Grandpa's house (dancing, singing, wrestling, playing harmonicas, playing xylophones, building fireworks in the basement) -- you gotta have a heart of iron to not come away thinking, "That's one nutty, but FUN, place."

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 18:34:06 GMT

"The news media is always partially rumor, I don't think you even need to say it anymore. Your comments are not interesting or enlightening, and are certainly not fair to the work that Jim puts in."

Argue semantics all you like. News is based on fact. Rumor is based on hearsay. I don't care what you think of my comments. And how about we see Jim put some work into finishing those long promised audio CDs?

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 19:10:27 GMT

NubtheSquirrel, I completely agree with you. With the exception of sidekick-type-characters, I think no-names (or at least not-very-well-known-names) are the best choices (and from the looks of it, a large portion of MTR's main cast are no-names). I also like that unlike Chicken Little and various other movies, the kids' voices will be done by.......kids.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 20:05:26 GMT

I do agree with you, Mike, about celeb voices ... they've become (in some cases) a totally overrated way to generate hype about otherwise dull movies.

No matter what I think of MTR, I can't argue the fact that they're going with (largely) unknown voice talent.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 20:35:44 GMT

Well, I see it like this. You could have a big name actor do the voice of the character in an animated movie. Will it work? Possibly. It can be hit or miss. The big name actor could do an excellent job OR the voice could be so distinct and recognizable that it kind of detracts from the movie itself.

Doogal is a perfect example of an extreme where the movie failed despite having big names. They over did it with the big name people in the movie, possibly because the story wasn't all that good. I don't know. I have it on my queue with Netflix to see why the movie was not as successful as it should have been. However, Over the Hedge had a all star cast but the story was great the writing very clever and no one can beat Steve Carrell as Hammy the Squirrel.

I applaud Disney for getting a mostly unknown voice cast for Robinsons. That means there is still a chance for me to get into the voice over business doing stuff for Disney...

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Mon, 07 Aug 2006 23:59:34 GMT

"Anywho, I am very happy Bowler Hat Guy is going to stay in the movie (does he have a name yet?)."

Yes. His name is Bowler Hat Guy (first, middle, and last name respectively). :)

This sounds like it's going to be a fun movie. Before Pixar came along, I didn't give much thought to the film at all.

This, along with the upcoming animated shorts program, and the return of 2-D animation is sure to make Disney a dominant player in feature animation again.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 00:01:42 GMT

hey!
Was I mistaken or wasnt the original intent of the changes in ROBINSON supposed to make it more like the book?
Or did that fall by the wayside?
Oh well, at least it wasnt another article about how much CARS isnt making money.
Yep.
Oh, and Bowler Hat Guy? Expect a call from both Snidely Whiplash and Dishonest Johns attorneys REAL soon.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 03:16:50 GMT

Well, ANY version is going to be "getting away from the book"--
The original book [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0064433390/sr=8-1/qid=1155017328 ] is just an extended Far Side cartoon about our hero's next-door best friend's family being a -little- more technologically advanced (with the flying saucer in the back yard, etc.), just in time for the relatives to show up. Um....that's it.
Obviously, like "Ant Bully", it needed a little artificial screenwriter fleshing-out for 90 minutes, with the whole BHG and "Lewis wants a family" subplot--But, unlike other CGI'ed Barnes & Noble favorites, Lasseter wanted to get back to the POINT of Joyce's book...Namely, as it says on the back cover, "(Wilbur's) house is the neatest place to visit!"
And they weren't accomplishing that on hyperactively funny villains or Grampa looking for his dentures 'cause, like, he's really old.

And even though Pixar hasn't yet done a book adaptation (or even a "take the title and run" adaptation), it's proof that Lasseter can see what the good Disney/Pixar animators do best is stay focused on what the story should be -about-.
That's what seems to have been missing, back while Stainton was groaning and trying to "fix" the projects to make them more sellable.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 04:49:51 GMT

Is it just me or does this plot line seem like something from Jimmy Neutron?

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 08:39:18 GMT

I'd be worried about TMNT. You think that since Weinsteins are involved it's not going to be good, but they just front the money. It's made with influence by the original creater who wanted to take TMNT back to it's 80's darker roots. The buzz from Comic Con was great among the fans.

BTW....

Sid was too a small (minor) of a character to be a great villian?!? Sid wasn't a minor character. He was a great villian. He represented everything the toys feared. He was a great villian.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 11:15:01 GMT

"Which perhaps explain all of the optimistic news that I hear coming out of WDFA these days. With lots of folks there talking about how they think that this division of the Walt Disney Company has really turned a corner. How the dark days are over, how WDFA may now finally be on its way back."

Wait, I thought John Lasseter was the devil? Did somebody kidnap Jim and replace him with clone? :-)

Would be nice if Bowler Hat Guy had a real name. Though, as according to semaj86 said, if Mrs. and Mrs. Guy really named their son "Bowler Hat," what if he had chosen to wear a fedora? Or a baseball cap? Didn't they pre-ordain what type of hat he would wear? I think it was Jerry Seinfeld who said that if you name your kid "Jeeves," you've pretty much determined his career choice.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 11:16:32 GMT

"CapnSkip said:
Is it just me or does this plot line seem like something from Jimmy Neutron?"

That and Phil of the Future. Looking forward to seeing more of this, though.

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 12:13:46 GMT

Catching up after a couple of days - the thread brings up several questions:

1) If Bowler Hat Guy was influenced by Heat Miser, Dishonest John, and Snidely Whiplash - but they were influenced by Captain Hook - should Disney eliminate the middleman and simply sue itself?

2) If the villain's name is Bowler Hat Guy, but the Bowler Hat is named Doris, could the villain be referred to as Doris Guy?

3) If fans want Jim to research / document all facts before publishing a story, does this indicate support for his treatment of the Star Tours series?

re: WDFA hopes that movie-goers will be bowled over when they finally "Meet the Robinsons" villain, the Bowler Hat Guy

Jim Hill — Wed, 09 Aug 2006 12:38:58 GMT

It's a shame that Lasseter & co.'s changes got lowered to "minor improvements" just because they were afraid of stepping on a few toes. Seems like Bowler Hat Guy is still little more than a Snidley Whiplash CG test.

"But what I really find fascinating about all this is ... Well, the tact and restraint that was used in this particular situation. After years of hearing about how badly David Stainton treated WDFA staffers, how -- in the middle of a pitch session -- the former president of Walt Disney Feature Animation would put his head down on the table and literally groan with disgust if he disliked your idea ... I can't tell you how refreshing it is to hear that the artists & technicians who work at Disney Feature Animation are now actually being treated like adults."

Well, sorry, but being an adult doesn't mean you can't make a crappy cartoon. Someone should have given the "Robinsons" crew a serious dose of reality much earlier on. I have no doubt that Bowler Hat Guy would have been completely excised from the picture if someone with an outside perspective had seriously looked at "Robinsons" in the storyboard or pre-viz stages. It seems that one reason they're leaving him in is just because a lot of work's been put into animating him well, and they don't want to break anyone's heart. Well, sometimes making quality features means tough cuts. It doesn't matter how fluidly-animated the character is if he's a boring one-dimensional stereotype. I doubt the "few new lines" really add much depth to the character.