Pixar Is Done With Animated Series and Streaming Content
Once upon a time, not so very long ago, it seemed like Pixar would be one of the lynchpins of Disney’s streaming strategy.
Not only did Disney choose to release pandemic-era Pixar films, including Soul, Luca, and Turning Red, straight to Disney+, but the studio also announced that it had begun work on its first-ever animated series, Win or Lose, with the expectation that more short-form animation could follow.


Photo: Pixar Post
Since that time, however, things have drastically changed.
Streaming Was a Disaster For Pixar
While Soul, Luca, and Turning Red were well received by critics, Pixar would later find that releasing the films straight to streaming “trained” their audience to forgo theater releases and wait for films to arrive on Disney+.


Photo: Pixar
Win or Lose, meanwhile, still does not have a release date despite the fact that the show has been completed for almost a year.
In a recent interview with TIME, Pixar CCO Pete Docter reflected on Pixar’s early streaming efforts and the studio’s strategy for the future.


Photo: Pixar
“Well, when they first announced Disney+, we immediately jumped in with a bunch of shorts. Turns out the audience didn’t want short little things from Pixar at least. It just didn’t perform as well. It didn’t earn its keep in terms of what we had to put into it to make them. So Disney asked us to pull back on anything that’s not the features,” Docter explained.
Focusing on Making Movies
Eventually, both Pixar and Disney realized that the best thing that the studio could do for Disney+ was to continue to create hit movies.


Photo: IMDB
“We’ve also found the better [a movie] does at the theater, the more successful it has been on Disney+. Initially you’d think if it does really well in the theater, nobody’s going to watch it on Disney+ because we’ve seen it already,” Docter continued.
“It’s actually the opposite, which kind of makes sense. I remember as a kid I had The Muppet Show album, and I played that thing to death. As a kid you want the comfort of watching this one thing over and over and over.”
Theatrical Runs Are Key
To that end, Docter and Pixar believe that it is important to give their films an extended run in theaters before sending them to streaming. In the case of last year’s Elemental, that decision was the difference between the film being a flop (after a bad opening weekend) and a hit (the film would recover and eventually gross almost $500 million).


Photo: Disney
“That’s how long we had for Elemental. When that movie came out we all said, “Oh, no, that didn’t open the way we thought it should!” But as time went on, it just had legs,” Docter explained.
“I don’t know if the marketing was wrong, the space was too crowded, or people thought it didn’t look interesting. But word of mouth made people go check it out. I think that would not have happened if we came out three weeks later on Disney+.”


Photo: Pixar
Elemental would go on to be one of the most streamed films of 2023, further proving Docter’s point. With Pixar set to return to theaters again with Inside Out 2, the mission is clear- the studio needs hit films.
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