Movie Review: ‘Turning Red’ a Big, Hairy Pixar Delight

Gather ’round, small fry, and let the Walt Disney Company tell you a story about certain bodily changes that occur around age 13. You’ll experience growth spurts. Mood swings. Hair where there was no hair before. And then, one special morning, you will awaken to find you have turned into a ten-foot red panda.

Or so goes Pixar puberty. Turning Red, an inventive and delightful new comedy debuting on Disney Plus, is classic Pixar, making a bouncy comedy out of an adorable fantasy laden with allegorical implications. After 2020’s Onward and Soul, and last summer’s superb Luca, Pixar is on a brilliant run of original stories. It has once again resumed creative supremacy at Mouse Inc. A decade or so ago, Pixar had some creative bumps, but these days it is creatively trouncing its big brother at Disney Animation Studios, which hasn’t released a good movie since Moana six years ago and is riding a four-picture streak of ragged banality (Ralph Breaks the Internet, Frozen 2, Raya and the Last Dragon, and Encanto).

About the Author

Kyle Smith

Kyle Smith is the film critic for the Wall Street Journal.

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Gather ’round, small fry, and let the Walt Disney Company tell you a story about certain bodily changes that occur around age 13. You’ll experience growth spurts. Mood swings. Hair where there was no hair before. And then, one special morning, you will awaken to find you have turned into a ten-foot red panda.

Or so goes Pixar puberty. Turning Red, an inventive and delightful new comedy debuting on Disney Plus, is classic Pixar, making a bouncy comedy out of an adorable fantasy laden with allegorical implications. After 2020’s Onward and Soul, and last summer’s superb Luca, Pixar is on a brilliant run of original stories. It has once again resumed creative supremacy at Mouse Inc. A decade or so ago, Pixar had some creative bumps, but these days it is creatively trouncing its big brother at Disney Animation Studios, which hasn’t released a good movie since Moana six years ago and is riding a four-picture streak of ragged banality (Ralph Breaks the Internet, Frozen 2, Raya and the Last Dragon, and Encanto).