Digging deeper into the Disney universe.
Meet the Robinsons (Good Idea) – By Becky Hollada
Meet the Robinsons is hardly the most bankable name in the Disney vault. The film received mixed critical reviews upon its release and there isn’t even a trace of its characters or story in Disney’s stores and parks. It has gone the way of a number of Disney films and fallen by the wayside in lieu of more popular household names. But for Disney Infinity’s purposes, Meet the Robinsons is a trove of great material that could stand up well against the more popular films that already appear in the game.
Power Discs are where it’s at this time. All kinds of wacky inventions and futuristic gadgets can be pulled from this movie and fit perfectly into Disney Infinity’s Toy Box. Players could race around on a bowler hat controlled T-Rex instead of a boring old horse, or in Wilbur Robinson’s time machine. Obviously time travel probably wouldn’t be a feature, but it still looks cool, flies, and turns invisible.
Single handedly best weapon ever? Bowler hat mind control device. In the movie, Bowler Hat guy is able to recruit several minions with the help of his robotic bowler hat, Doris and her Mini-Doris. As part of this Power Disc, Mini-Doris could be an item used to take control of an enemy to aid the player against its former companions. Obviously, since there’s only one Mini-Doris it would be limited to single enemies, but still incredibly useful and unique.
Evil, yet stylish.
The caffeine patch would be a great ability disc, like Bolt’s super strength, giving a boost to a character’s stats like speed or strength to equal a rush of energy. It could dwarf other stat boosts, given that it would be temporary, and give characters some potentially hilarious side effects.
And Power Disc possibilities don’t even end there! Things like a meatball gun and mobster frogs making appearances in this movie as well. This is a world ripe with opportunities for the Toy Box.
The characters from Meet the Robinsons would fit seamlessly into the integrated world. Given that some of them time travel and the rest are just bizarre, not a one of them would be out of place next to the Incredibles or Wreck-It Ralph. Not to mention there are tons of them. Wilbur, Franny, Lewis, Bud, and Lucille could make the cut for good guys, and Bowler Hat guy and Doris for the baddies. Bowler Hat guy is essentially the Wiley Coyote of the Disney universe, but with an extremely evil hat. They would make an interesting combination if thrown in for a two part boss fight.
The home world for this play set would be no less interesting than what would go on in the Toy Box. The Robinson family home in the future is a world in and of itself with rooms beyond rooms, a famous inventor’s lab, and a family with no shortage of quirks and craziness. Players could find themselves doing quests pertaining to each family member, or inventing something in Cornelius’s lab. Maybe they could even learn to conduct Franny’s frogs. In short, there’s almost too much that could be done here. It might be difficult to pick just a few.
Meet the Robinsons has one of the most whimsical worlds ever created in a Disney film, and one with some of the most possibilities. Exploring possibilities is even one of the film’s core themes! Though this movie didn’t get as much love at the box office it perhaps deserved, Disney would be silly to completely overlook it when planning out new play sets for Disney Infinity.
Captain EO (Bad Idea) – by Kimberly Keller
Captain EO, the insane 1986 4D Disney Park film from the minds of Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas, returned to the parks in 2010 as a tribute to Michael Jackson and for some reason hasn’t left since. Although it contains less effects than the original run, the tribute does feature bouncing audience seats that sync with 1980’s pop beats in a way that’s enough to make anyone motion sick. Basically, if I have to sit through one more showing, I am going to scream.
Disney, however, loves this thing. When it first came out it was the most expensive film made for the length, almost averaging $2 million per minute. Although there is never a line to see the film at Disneyland, enough people buy the merchandise, sarcastically or not, for me to see it constantly around town. This, of course, instills the fear that people just might buy a figure for it in Disney Infinity, even if it is just for laughs.
And it doesn’t have to be a Michael Jackson figurine either. I’m not really sure about the licensing rights here, but it could be any number of the other characters. Examples include the borderline retarded Hooter or the creepy machine-like Supreme Leader, played by Anjelica Huston (yup, watch it again, that is absolutely her, hissing and leering behind the makeup).
This will be in Jack Sparrow's nightmares.
Their troubled world is full of countless gray junk piles that transform into an ancient Greek paradise. I guess the play set would be the entire 17-minute movie played over again, or maybe Captain EO bringing the magic of music to other trashed out worlds. Honestly though, I don’t know and I don’t want to find out. Seriously, why on Earth would the nameless Galactic Federation send a traveling band around the galaxy to sing at people? And I mean sing at them in a threatening way with a horde of super on point 80’s dancers. I don’t care if it gets the job done, it’s an embarrassing tactic.
Back in the Toy Box, I don’t see them fairing much better. The weird little puppets characters are not as happy and playful looking as their Muppet counterparts, so I don’t see many kids favoring them. Their only power in the film was to literally transform into an instrument, if they were a robot, or to play said instruments. True, Captain EO can shoot multicolored music lasers from his fingers to transform enemies into more dancers, but just throw that onto a Power Disc if you really want the ability to give your villains the power of expression through movement.
Images courtesy of Kimberly Keller.
