Wish

[Mooky]

It’s not really a plot hole, but more of a plot contrivance. They had the grandfather turning 100 so it would tie into the whole Disney 100 celebration. That’s it, there’s no other reason. For the purpose of the story, it would have made no difference if it was Asha’s mother’s 50th birthday or one of her friend’s 21st instead.

Anyway… The King can’t be more than 45ish and following the opening narration, the Kingdom could not have existed for more than 25 years. So the grandfather was at least 75 when he made the wish. For what it’s worth, the math works. What’s silly is that he didn’t try fulfilling his wish/dream on his own in the preceding 75 years (and from what we’re shown, it wasn’t some elaborate, abstract, complicated wish that would require time or money), but it is what it is.

To me, forgetting your wish upon giving it away is more of a plot hole. What reason would anyone have to look forward to the wish-granting ceremony if you didn’t know what your wish was? The "winner" is not announced in advance so there's really nothing to get you hyped up, you'd just be standing in the crowd waiting for... what exactly? When you forget your wish, you basically lose an important part of yourself, your whole drive. The premise had a great potential, but the execution was half-baked. I’d have liked to see a version where giving away your wish is done in exchange for money or protection, and essentially turns you into a mindless drone over time. The tagline "Be careful what you wish for" would make sense in that context; within the existing one it doesn't.

I know they tried something like that with Simon, but he seemed to be the only kingdom resident affected. I’d have liked to see it on a larger scale, where Asha stumbles upon this whole conspiracy and tries to set the kingdom free. This is why Magnifico starting off as a full-on villain would have been better, imo. It would be similar to the deals merpeople made with Ursula — aaand now I have a vision of people of Rosas oohing and aahing after they get their wishes back.

Anyway, best to not overthink it because the movie’s internal logic is not that sturdy and falls apart easily. Wish is more fun when you don’t overanalyze it.

[Marce82]

Hey Mooky,

I agree with your points, but I find it very strange that a 75 yr old would give away his wish at that stage of life. And that entire kingdom was built in 20-25 years?!?!?! WHAT??? (not questioning Mooky, this is implied in the film)

As for him turning 100 to coincide with the anniversary of the company... THAT is the problem. This film seems more driven by marketing than actual storytelling.

And your final point... this movie can't even stand a very BASIC analysis before falling apart. Forget "overanalyzing"...

[Patricier21]

FFS, just let people like OR dislike the movie as they please, and stop hounding them across the internet. You'd think a few of you here have personal stakes in Disney the way you not only pile up on anyone who expresses any type of legitimate criticism of them and their products, but also jump to defend every questionable storytelling choice. It's annoying and it's getting old. And this is coming from someone who enjoyed Wish for the most part.

First of all, please watch your language, you can’t curse in Disney And it goes without saying that we DO Have a personal stake in this, because first of all it is our lives so it’s always personal in at least some kind of way, Secondly this is something that we truly care about, so again we do truly have a personal stake in this.

These are things that we truly care about, that truly bring value and reasoning into our lives, and truly help us find it outside of itself. We all have different opinions/interpretations towards it, but like it is inferred here, we all need to be able to handle it right. And as much as we don’t want to cause conflict or attacks with it, we have to also truly stand up for what we believe in and truly know is right. And there is such a thing as being misguided and or even manipulative with it. I don’t mean to come off like I’m better than everybody, because I know that I’m not always right and can make mistakes, but at the same time, I can’t allow others whether they be misguided or not go around and ruin what I and others truly love and truly appreciate. Yes, there are valid points to be made and you are truly allowed to feel the way that you do, but the way that some people here and other places are going about it are being more facetious, toxic, and just plain mean-spirited towards others and what they like, hence the reason why we value a lot of these things so well, because It becomes really really hard to say the least to find value in our fellow species When they act like this. I’m not perfect myself, I don’t know everything, people are allowed to feel the way they do, but you have to be able to express it in a sensible immature way. Yes, you can say a lot of things about what I’ve posted, But like everything else in life, there’s always truly a reason for it and or a lack thereof otherwise stating it.

At the very least, I’m standing up for something that isn’t always truly will be subjective, so therefore people can at least consider what I and it has to offer instead of the smug very bias-based opinions and attitudes that others are expressing; what’s worse if I may ask: standing up for defending something for what it is but allowing others to be considerable about it, or just plain cynical third-party influenced perceptions, regardless of whether they are with the majority or not?

Just watched Wish

The movie is very average, what I expected.

Doesn't deserve to be hated because it's as average as Frozen 2 or Encanto but I understand the hate

The animation was so god damn ugly, some parts looked good but as a whole it looked like unfinished CGI, I hope they delete that art style from DSA for eternity.

The representation was fine, the architecture, diversity, food (I saw a paella, moorish teas, manchego cheese among other dishes) and environment was well made

The clothes were horrible, nothing like the real Al Andalus, just generic and boring medieval outfits, specially the Teens.

In the concept arts Asha has more authentic outfits that fit the Period of time and also her ethnicity (or ethnicities)

I like the king and queen outfits because they're the most close to the real culture (Amaya is basically La Dama De Elche)

I also hate how all actors didn't knew spanish, they pronounced all the spanish words and names with the worst pronunciation possible, except Gabo voice actor (the one from What We Do In The Shadows) who I assume actually speaks Spanish

The city/Kingdom of Rosas suffers from the classic problem of Script demands, sometimes its super big and sometimes its a small town with 300 citizens that you can run from one point to another in 30 minutes, like literally the entire city can fit inside a small plaza, and also Asha runs from the city to her village in not really long, plus the boat ride being so short

I also hate the classic "we are all friends in the end" with the traitor teen, or Amaya not having any royal friend to talk with (like nobody was in the royal court apart from Magnifico and Amaya)

What I would have made to make the movie good:

First the songs, very mediocre

Second the animation, either 2D or the classic good CGI

Third I would have been authentic to the culture instead of just old classic orientalism

And also I would have made the movie longer, make Asha and Valentino go with her grandpa and mom to Spain, make months pass, then have her be 18 and return to Rosas with a plan, then see that Rosas is a dictatorship, then Asha with her plan already made saves the day and so and so

And also make the traitor teen not be forgiven, like in real life, kids need to learn that sometimes you can't forgive people when they do something wrong

Also give Asha a final dress/costume because cmon they were so stupid to not do that to sell more toys

A lot of these criticisms are the same kinds of things you could apply to a lot of other Disney movies, and not just the other ones you mentioned here. That’s how they normally do things, it is Disney after all, for better or for worse that doesn’t mean they can’t improve like you said, but you are being a little picky in some of these complaints, such as your thing about the Spanish words, when it’s not even specifically supposed to be that Spanish. It’s supposed to be an amalgamation from what I’ve heard.

Sure, Simon did betray them, but did you not forget the day did some things That led to him betraying them? It’s all part of the overall moral to be careful what you wish for/think about/say about someone, because that can Have things happen to them and or you that you are not being so careful of;They were quite Disrespectful if not condescending towards him, Much like how magnifico is to the overall kingdom, so very good thematic relevance to him, not to mention that he gets attacked, Kicking it with the rabbits (L O L at the end, so he did get comeuppance at the end after all

And as much as money is their overall game, well it’s actually nicer they didn’t overdo things like you’re suggesting with Asha‘s outfits, simply because of that. There is no real reason in the story For that kind of thing, and ironically in one of the kids really did someone give her a new outfit, people are for whatever reason whine and complain about it, so what you have to say about that (her apparently dressing up with the fairy godmother, which is not even all that noticeable and actually a nice Homage and not executive meddling like some other people unfortunately think so)

It’s not really a plot hole, but more of a plot contrivance. They had the grandfather turning 100 so it would tie into the whole Disney 100 celebration. That’s it, there’s no other reason. For the purpose of the story, it would have made no difference if it was Asha’s mother’s 50th birthday or one of her friend’s 21st instead.

Anyway… The King can’t be more than 45ish and following the opening narration, the Kingdom could not have existed for more than 25 years. So the grandfather was at least 75 when he made the wish. For what it’s worth, the math works. What’s silly is that he didn’t try fulfilling his wish/dream on his own in the preceding 75 years (and from what we’re shown, it wasn’t some elaborate, abstract, complicated wish that would require time or money), but it is what it is.

To me, forgetting your wish upon giving it away is more of a plot hole. What reason would anyone have to look forward to the wish-granting ceremony if you didn’t know what your wish was? The "winner" is not announced in advance so there's really nothing to get you hyped up, you'd just be standing in the crowd waiting for... what exactly? When you forget your wish, you basically lose an important part of yourself, your whole drive. The premise had a great potential, but the execution was half-baked. I’d have liked to see a version where giving away your wish is done in exchange for money or protection, and essentially turns you into a mindless drone over time. The tagline "Be careful what you wish for" would make sense in that context; within the existing one it doesn't.

I know they tried something like that with Simon, but he seemed to be the only kingdom resident affected. I’d have liked to see it on a larger scale, where Asha stumbles upon this whole conspiracy and tries to set the kingdom free. This is why Magnifico starting off as a full-on villain would have been better, imo. It would be similar to the deals merpeople made with Ursula — aaand now I have a vision of people of Rosas oohing and aahing after they get their wishes back.

Anyway, best to not overthink it because the movie’s internal logic is not that sturdy and falls apart easily. Wish is more fun when you don’t overanalyze it.

Well, it’s made pretty clear that even though they don’t remember what the wish was, they do know they made a wish, that’s The main reason why everyone is so keen on the wish granting ceremony, because they don’t know what their wish specifically was, But they still want to see what it could be and have it fulfilled. It’s like how you don’t tell people what you wish for for your birthday or when you wish upon a star etc. it’s so that way they don’t jinx it etc.

Also in regards to the grandfather wish, well like magnifico says in regards to why he won’t granted, maybe the grandfather is unsure of or doesn’t know if that kind of thing can even happen, And or for similar reasons perhaps maybe didn’t get a chance to have that kind of opportunity happen. I mean even at as young an age of 75, how many of those in our own world do you actually see a successful seniors? Was Tony Bennett like the only one?The Rolling Stones And others like they’re all ready establish before they came to that age etc.

Why do people around that age or even older go on shows like America’s got talent etc.? It’s not as easy as it looks or even seems.

Hey Mooky,

I agree with your points, but I find it very strange that a 75 yr old would give away his wish at that stage of life. And that entire kingdom was built in 20-25 years?!?!?! WHAT??? (not questioning Mooky, this is implied in the film)

As for him turning 100 to coincide with the anniversary of the company... THAT is the problem. This film seems more driven by marketing than actual storytelling.

And your final point... this movie can't even stand a very BASIC analysis before falling apart. Forget "overanalyzing"...

For the record, I can see things like the Percy Jackson books (not the movies which fixed a lot of those issues And even the hunger games falling apart way more like this then Wish. They have a lot of things that don’t make a lot of sense and or lineup, and or or not used as well as they should.

[Patricier21]

To further sum up how I feel about what’s unfortunately going on with wish Jesus Christ, what’s wrong with people? You can tell that more than most of the negative reactions from people’s bias towards Disney. And the sad thing is, they will never ever admit that THEY Themselves are part of the problem; I was literally just reading something where people are now Aligning Disney with failure, to the point where they are now going to use terms like “I accidentally set the oven to 450° instead of 350°, so therefore I Disneyed The cake”;“I didn’t study for the biology test, so I Disneyed it miserably“ Like I said, we must continue to spread the good word and counter argument for wish, including buying as much books and other merchandise for it as much as possible, and tell others to do the same, because it’s not just wanna wish itself but it’s Disney’s overall reputation, and not even because it’s the movie to celebrate the 100th anniversary

On a sidenote, peoples overall reactions towards Disney, even with some valid and very reasonable points, help me feel the same way that other people do about a certain someone and what she said about a certain kind of people, Which incidentally is actually what the overall moral of Wish is: not letting others control who and or what you are/truly value

[Sotiris]

‘Wish’ Tried, Disastrously, To Make A Disney Animation Cinematic Universe
https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/ ... e3f8ae4dec

[Pokenonbinary]

Makes total sense the kingdom was built in 25-30 years, Magnifico has magic (so people would go to that kingdom) and also he doesn't have taxes so an extra reason to live there

The money they don't spend in taxes they spend in building the city, also with Magnifico magic he probably built the castle in 1 or 2 days

And also I would have DELETED the teens, except for Dahlia, Simon (traitor) and Gabo (funny character) the other ones didn't served any purpose

I know it will not happen but I would love a spin off show or short film that focuses on the Andalusi culture while showing Asha being a fairy godmother, also giving her another look like the ones from the concept art that are more andalusi

[Disney's Divinity]

To what was talked about a page or two back, yeah, I don't know what could've been in the movie originally that would've caused those reactions. My guess is Star died originally in the climax when Magnifico absorbed him (without coming back, I mean).

Anyway, I haven't fully given up on the film so far. It started out a tad better than Elemental despite rougher competition; if it has the same legs, it could turn out just eking out a very thin profit and at least breaking even. I thought it was much better than that film, tbh. What other original animated films released this year (I know there was How Do You Live?) and what did they make? Trolls 3 and Spider-verse were all sequels. Plus, Spider-verse took the "Paperman"-esque look much farther than this film. This film was pretty, but not as pretty as it is; hopefully Wish is the first step to getting a look closer to that film's, they weren't going to be able to get there in one jump.

Either way, even if Wish does turn out to make slightly less than Elemental in the end, I'm not too worried. I think it's unlikely anything will happen to Jennifer Lee simply because of the Frozen franchise tying her to the studio, although there may end up being budget cuts, animator cuts, etc., unfortunately. And this film did follow Strange World, a Treasure Planet / Black Cauldron-sized flop, that's quite a hill to climb. Perhaps looking back this film may end up being seen as the start of another slow climb upwards, the way TLM and TP&TF both helped jumpstart WDAS' return to success even if those films themselves weren't as big as films that came later (box office-wise).

[PatchofBlue]

Yeah, there is a portion of the internet that is having a field day with Wish's performance, and they're showing the full depths of their intellect with such profound insights as "wORst DIsNey mOVIe Eever?????" With time you do start to get the sense for which voices actually have something to offer and which are just chasing clicks. They never have any surprises, and thankfully I'm long past the days when I'm giving them views just to make sure.

It'd be nice if this were another Elemental situation and it did have a rebound, but I don't know if I want to get my hopes up. Where I felt like the critics were mostly just blowing smoke with Elemental and fixating on flaws that weren't actually there, Wish did have some genuine issues, even if, again, a certain segment of the internet is greatly exaggerating what those actually are. And I just don't know if lightning is going to strike twice in one year.

[DisneyJedi]

‘Wish’ Tried, Disastrously, To Make A Disney Animation Cinematic Universe
https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/ ... e3f8ae4dec

One paragraph and I noticed the article’s words are similar to (if not, exactly the same) posts on Reddit or Twitter about how Wish’s references are “clues” to the Disney Animated Canon being all one big cinematic universe. It’s like they don’t know the difference between a reference/Easter Egg and a prequel/sequel hint.

[UmbrellaFish]

Beauty and the Beast- I'm pretty sure there was a reference but I can't think of it

I just remembered the BATB reference! During the climax there is a carriage that is enchanted to move like the carriage that carries Maurice away at the beginning of BATB.

It has been a week since I watched the movie, so I might have misremembered something. And apologies if I missed someone else posting this!!

[blackcauldron85]

I just remembered the BATB reference!

Yes, you are right! Good memory!!

[DisneyFan09]

I finally saw Wish today and I must say that I liked it. Sure, it wasn`t particularly outstanding, but it was still better than the reviewers gave it credit for and on the same league as Disney`s Revival predecessors, if not better. The visual style looked better than expected, despite that there were some places that it looked paper thin (pardon the intented pun). But otherwise it looked more CGI than hand drawn. In fact, the visuals looked a lot like Puss in Boots franchise (and the storybook at the beginning seemed to come straight from Shrek). Otherwise, as for the characters, Asha was essentially adorkable in the way as Anna and Mirabel and was essentially an example of how flawless a female character gets nowadays to cater to purists (as her arc and want in the movie wasn`t truly hers).
Magnifico was a little disappointing. While he was a good villain and had some complexity, he still wasn`t truly great as he could`ve been. As for how Disney has raved about reintroducing a traditional villain again, it still missed a traditional confrontation between the hero and the villain. The same about Magnifico could`ve been said about Valentino, actually. Star was to a certain degree endearing, though. As for Asha`s obvious Dwarfs-inspired squad, Dario was my favorite and Simon was surprisingly enough given some dimension. As for the story, the premise was overall paper thin, as it essentially just centered around a familiar Disney trope and therefore feeling fan-ficky. Otherwise, aside from the awkward chicken scene, the comedy felt even in the film. Overall, despite some of the Disney references (like the Walt Disney Feature Animation logo that was stolen from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the Bambi and Peter Pan reference) were too much on the nose, Wish was a good film and had it`s magical and moments. I`m not saying that it deserved to be redeemed, but it still didn`t deserve the massive backlash that it`s gotten.

[Jäger-Rose]

Sharing my interviews with Chris Buck, Fawn Veerasunthorn & Peter Del Vecho for anyone that's interested.

We talked about their motivation for animated movies, where the idea for Wish came from, also how the premiere in Germany went and then also Easter Eggs. I tried to let them talk about their involvement for their movies (Frozen, Tarzan) in Kingdom Hearts games. But it seems like they are not involved at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywzcV0sUyIQ

This has been my first interview in a while so I was a bit rusty haha. Feedback is always welcome (as are likes on YT)!

[Patricier21]

Sharing my interviews with Chris Buck, Fawn Veerasunthorn & Peter Del Vecho for anyone that's interested.

We talked about their motivation for animated movies, where the idea for Wish came from, also how the premiere in Germany went and then also Easter Eggs. I tried to let them talk about their involvement for their movies (Frozen, Tarzan) in Kingdom Hearts games. But it seems like they are not involved at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywzcV0sUyIQ

This has been my first interview in a while so I was a bit rusty haha. Feedback is always welcome (as are likes on YT)!

Great job here! You’re not rusty at all in the slightest, very natural genuine actually how did you get to actually interview them? I really truly appreciate you asking them about kingdom hearts, interesting to hear they’re kind of involvement, but either way, Kingdom hearts truly needs to be talked about and brought up a lot more

[Jäger-Rose]

Sharing my interviews with Chris Buck, Fawn Veerasunthorn & Peter Del Vecho for anyone that's interested.

We talked about their motivation for animated movies, where the idea for Wish came from, also how the premiere in Germany went and then also Easter Eggs. I tried to let them talk about their involvement for their movies (Frozen, Tarzan) in Kingdom Hearts games. But it seems like they are not involved at all.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywzcV0sUyIQ

This has been my first interview in a while so I was a bit rusty haha. Feedback is always welcome (as are likes on YT)!

Great job here! You’re not rusty at all in the slightest, very natural genuine actually how did you get to actually interview them? I really truly appreciate you asking them about kingdom hearts, interesting to hear they’re kind of involvement, but either way, Kingdom hearts truly needs to be talked about and brought up a lot more

Thank you so much! I'm fortunate enough to get invited to conduct interviews through Disney Germany's PR department from time to time. I'll always try to ask some questions besides the usual stuff that we've already heard many times (which is hard sometimes haha).

For Kingdom Hearts, I'm a HUGE fan myself (like, it's my #1 Disney property I think). However, I'm part of the group of people that were disappointed with KH. And especially Arendelle is the worst world imo. So I was kinda hoping to find out the process (because clearly, there must have been so many restrictions that the developer faced). But it seems like whoever Square Enix gets to talk to would mainly be a property watching (maybe even legal) department and not the actual film makers. Which is a shame...
Hopefully, reminding the creators that those awesome games exist, will make them more present also at WDAS. I asked someone else a similar question in an interview last year but I can't recall right now who it was... haha

[Farerb]

"On the sad side of affairs, Thanksgiving releases Disney’s Wish and Apple Original Production’s Napoleon dropped like a rock respectively, with -64% (estimated $7M) and -65% ($7.2M). Both results being front-loaded are rather eyebrow-raising. While Wish was soft out of the gate, Disney’s return to princess movies is posting a second frame percent drop that’s worse than last year’s bomb, Strange World (-58%, $5M)."

https://deadline.com/2023/12/box-office ... C%20%245M).

[DisneyJedi]

Maybe it's just me, but I can't help but feel that the public is letting Wish flop on purpose.

[Patricier21]

Maybe it's just me, but I can't help but feel that the public is letting Wish flop on purpose.

It’s not just you, it’s an unfortunate fact just goes to show you that there’s something wrong with our species, and like I said, THEY Need to change. Another thing that I’ve always known is that people don’t like something because it reminds them about something that they don’t like no matter what no matter how otherwise it may seem. And you can look at that fact in very different ways in regards to Wish.

[Sotiris]

A theater owner in Michigan claims that moviegoers were asking him if Wish was a "safe" movie for kids. He also said Disney was expecting it to perform much better than it did.

We own a movie theater and talk to everyone who comes in. People do not trust Disney. I got more "is this movie safe to bring my children to" question for this movie than I have with any other movie. It is a lack of trust, the economy and streaming. Migration will tell us more.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 8238595571

People are losing trust in Disney. We showed Wish to big crowds this weekend but I have had more people ask me if it was safe to bring their children or grandchildren to, than any other movie we have shown. People use to never ask that with a Disney movie.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 2656693288

It is a lack of trust in Disney. I was asked often if Wish was safe to bring their children or grandchildren.
It is a Disney animated movie, there was a day people didn't feel the need to ask. Now I get that question a few times a day.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 9921509819

Wish is good movie with horrible animation. We screened the movie today. The animation does not appear to be from Disney. I asked our Disney rep who explained it was done in this style to be nostalgic since it is being released during Disney's 100th Anniv. I missed the connection and thought the studio was trying to save money. Most of the songs don't stand out, the animation looks like it comes from a small studio with a small budget but the story is good and as long as you don't have high expectations, it is an enjoyable film. Not going to be a classic but it will likely be a good time with the family or grand kids.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 8668252185

We did well with it at the theater. As a business, it was not the best Disney movie we have played but far from the worse.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 1929657718

We did well with this movie.. not great but better than Disney will do. This movie is on the path to lose a lot of money.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 4586797189

Having talked to people within Disney, I know they were expecting much better numbers. They thought it was going to be #1... it was actually #3.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 1397425389

Disney was expected Wish to be #1 over this past weekend. This has to be disappointing news for them.

Source: https://twitter.com/MarkCBott/status/17 ... 2168896863

[UmbrellaFish]

Um… I think a quick cursory glance of this man’s Twitter feed reveals he is not exactly an unbiased source lol

Also… I just have to push back against this idea that conservative audiences have always trusted Disney until this moment in time. That’s patently not true. In the 90’s there was a lot of evangelical pushback against Disney.

I’m sure I travel in much different circles than this dude, but when people ask me about my experience with Wish, they ask “is it worth the money?” And I can’t really in good conscience recommend they see it in theaters since A) despite my personal enjoyment as a huge Disney fan, it’s a mid-tier movie, and B) it will be out on Disney+ in a few months.