A Brave New Adventure
For more than sixteen years, Pixar Animation Studios has dominated 3-D animation, releasing eleven bona fide critical smash hits (and a twelfth film, Cars 2, the only Pixar feature to score a rotten tomato). Pixar’s Toy Story and Cars franchises are huge moneymakers, and the studio is looking to score again with the prequel to Monsters, Inc., Monsters University, which is set for release on June 21st, 2013.
Poster for Pixar's Brave (2012), image copyright Disney
But nestled between the recent run of prequels and sequels is this year’s Brave, a fairy tale set in ancient Scotland, and Pixar’s first original feature since 2009′s Up. Brave is also Pixar’s first feature to star a female character (see Pixar’s greatest female characters here) and is the studio’s answer to the Disney’s “Princess” franchise. In true Disney fashion, Princess Merida is a spunky redhead who defies her parents and refuses to follow tradition – sound familiar?
