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Big Hero 6 is getting closer to release every day, and I cannot wait for you guys to see it. I saw it last week and then sat in on roundtable discussions with the directors and members of the cast. They spoke candidly about the process of making the film.
Scott Adsit, who voices Baymax, was asked about the changes their characters went through in development. He replied,
“I don’t think their relationship changed that much. I think it became more central as the process went on and became more of the heart of the film. I think originally it was part of the film, but the focus was more on the superhero team and its formation and all that. And I think after they started recording and restorying everything we took more of a center stage.”
Ryan Potter, the voice of Hiro, added, “They changed the relationships of certain characters around, and when they did, it made the story that much more impactful. I wish I could tell you what it is, maybe John will say it one day…” Adsit asked him, “Are you talking about Maya?” and Potter replied, “Yeah Maya’s character, and um, the way they changed her relationship to Hiro, it makes Baymax’s relationship that much more important to Hiro, and Hiro’s relationship to Baymax that much more important when they lose Tadashi.”
Maya Rudolph plays Hiro and Tadashi’s aunt and guardian. She has raised them since their parents died when Hiro was three. I am guessing that she was initially their mom (or possibly their sister, but probably their mom), but since Potter didn’t tell us, that is mere guesswork. While Adsit didn’t see much change in Hiro and Baymax’s relationship, the story went through a lot of changes. Director Don Hall explained,
It was a difficult one to crack from a story perspective because we knew we had an abundance of wealth and that comes with the challenge of making it all play together thematically and cohesively, in a 90 minute, which is relatively short, you know, we don’t have a two hour movie to do subplots and all that kind of stuff, and so we had to make choices and that was a lot of our the challenge was trying to get the idea— The stake in the ground was this was going to be a movie about a kid 14 year old super genius who loses his older brother. We’re going to deal with it head on, directly and not pull punches, and that the brother’s robot was going to be an agent of healing for this kid. It was going to take him on this journey of dealing with this loss and especially the idea that acceptance comes when you realize that those who pass on live on through you. So that was the spine. The difficulty is that you also have a superhero origin story. And so how do you make those things play together?
He goes on to answer his own rhetorical question, but I’m not going to give you that quite yet. It’s not exactly a spoiler, but I think sometimes it’s better to go into a movie knowing less. Director Chris Williams gave a couple of concrete examples of changes that had been made and storylines that had been cast aside.
“There was a point earlier on, years ago now, where there was more emphasis on following the villain and his plot, and that ultimately didn’t serve the emotional storyline, the main story between Hiro and Baymax and then the team, and so that was jettisoned but yeah, we’re constantly changing things. There was a point when the wind turbine scene that follows the first flight scene where it’s Hiro and Baymax up on the turbine used to have the entire team up there.”
Adsit also let slip that the filmmakers barely made their deadline, “John Lasseter [Chief Creative Officer of Pixar, Disney Animation, and DisneyToons] had a very nice dinner and cocktail party screening here in this building [the Disney Animation building].” Potter interjected, “It was the first one they did,” and Adsit said, “Yeah, the cast and some of the crew about two hours after they completed the film.”
When the filmmakers were asked about it, Hall said, “Yeah, they kind of ripped it out of our hands.” Williams cut in, “Yeah, we’re tired. [Laughs] Yeah, we really just finished the movie. It was always going to be an ambitious, emotionally complex, plotwise more complex than most animated movies. It was huge in scope, and so it was always going to be an ambitious one, and we will take every opportunity to make the movie better. And so we’re always pushing the schedule back further and further and further, and I think we found the outer limit of what’s possible… That’s just a credit to a team that wants to do whatever they can to make the movie better.”
Whatever they could was more than enough. We'll publish a full review soon, but Big Hero 6 is going to be a Disney classic, I promise.
Big Hero 6 is a heartfelt comedy adventure about robotics prodigy Hiro Hamada, who learns to harness his genius—thanks to his brilliant brother Tadashi and their like-minded friends. When a devastating turn of events catapults them into the midst of a dangerous plot unfolding in the streets of San Fransokyo, Hiro turns to his closest companion—a cutting-edge robot named Baymax—and transforms the group into a band of high-tech heroes determined to solve the mystery. Inspired by the Marvel comics of the same name, and featuring comic-book style action and all the heart and humor audiences expect from Walt Disney Animation Studios, Big Hero 6 is directed by Don Hall (Winnie the Pooh) and Chris Williams (Bolt), and produced by Roy Conli (Tangled). The film hits theaters in 3D on November 7, 2014.
