Pixar boss Pete Docter acknowledges it's a "weird time" for studio but is still "super excited" about making original movies – including sequels

EntertainmentMoviesAnimation MoviesInside Out 2Pixar boss Pete Docter acknowledges it’s a “weird time” for studio but is still “super excited” about making original movies – including sequelsWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. EntertainmentMoviesAnimation MoviesInside Out 2Pixar boss Pete Docter acknowledges it’s a “weird time” for studio but is still “super excited” about making original movies – including sequelsWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. (Image credit: Disney/Pixar) Pete Docter is the chief creative officer atPixarand he has also been the director of several of the animation studio’s most original (and best) films, and he serves as a producer on Inside Out 2 (having directed and co-written the film). In an interview for this week’s episode of theInside Total Film podcast, Docter unpacked that statement. “We always start with something [as on Inside Out 2] that is true for us,” said Docter of selecting Pixar stories. “But we don’t want it to be autobiographical. We want it to be personal. And if you chase too many of these specific details, you can kind of get stuck with a sense of like, ‘No, no, that’s not right, because that’s not the way it happened to me.’ And these films have to be universal. So we talk about specificity as being a gateway to the universal.” (Image credit: Disney/Pixar) Docter also highlights how this plays into the creation of a protagonist. “If you start with a character who’s very generic, just thinking, ‘Oh, he or she will stand in for everybody, it ends up being nobody.’ But if you specifically say [as in Soul], ‘OK, he’s a Black musician who lives in New York who grew up in Brooklyn [and so on]’… you make choices, then suddenly, you start to feel he’s actually more universal, the more specific you get.” So, he says, it’s important for them to play with that specificity and personality “but not to the detriment of where the story needs to go”. The Bloomberg article also highlighted a renewed focus on sequels and spin-offs, so Total Film also asked about the ideal balance of between originals and spin-offs at Pixar going forward. Sign up for the Total Film Newsletter Bringing all the latest movie news, features, and reviews to your inbox Inside Out 2 director Kelsey Mann also adds, “If you asked me to make a list of my favorite movies, there’s going to be sequels on there.” Mann also remembers having qualms when he first heard that Pixar was going to make a Toy Story 2. “I’m like, ‘OK, they can do original movies, what are they gonna do with the sequel here? Are they just gonna phone it in?’ And [they] did not. I was like, ‘They are not messing around,’ because they’re treating the sequel with as much love and care as they do an original. And I’ve really tried to do that with [Inside Out 2] too.” Wrapping it up, Docter says, “I think it’ll be a balance going forward of, ‘How do we still bring original stuff and find new ideas and new voices, and then also deliver on new aspects of things that people we know that people love?'” Inside Out 2 opens in cinemas on Friday, June 14.Early reactions to the film have been very positive, and you can hear more from Docter and Mann when theInside Total Film podcastdrops later this week. 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