Wish

A studio celebrating its 100th year anniversary should be a moment for appreciation and reflection, but that isn’t what happened for Disney. Once considered one of the prime movie creators in the world, they were at the time plagued with divisive releases which damaged their brand and good-will with most of their audience, even when making content for their acquired properties like Star Wars or Marvel. While their recent releases have put them back on the right track (mostly) and they have been in worse spots in the past, their expanded library has resulted in bigger and more frequent failures and what were once guaranteed money-providers, have now becoming money drainers. The 2023 original animated film, Wish, was the final straw that proved something needed to be done if they ever wanted to get back to normal.

In the fantastical kingdom of Rosas where the ruler, King Magnifico (voiced by Chris Pine) has the ability to grant wishes, a young girl named Asha (voiced by Ariana DeBose) hopes to become his apprentice in order to grant the wish of her grandfather, Sabino (voiced by Victor Garber) for his 100th birthday. However, Magnifico sporadically shows his evil side and refuses to grant wishes that he views as dangerous to his rule, even if the wish is seemingly innocuous. After wishing on a star for things to change, the star literally comes down to her and shows off all kind of magical powers, including giving a voice to her goat pet, Valentino (voiced by Alan Tudyk). Fearing this as a threat to his rule and believing Asha is responsible, Magnifico declares her a traitor to the kingdom and will provide anyone with a wish if they bring her to him. With Magnifico growing more powerful due to tapping into evil magic and with people growing weaker from each crushed dream he consumes, Asha will need the help of Star to overthrow this mad king and return each stolen wish to its original owner.

With weak reviews and a poor box office, Wish acts as a pitiful conclusion to a very sour year for Disney. While the movie is certainly not the worst, the overbearingly safe and uninteresting direction surrounding every component of what should’ve been an interesting new character, premise and world does little favours for itself or the company as a whole.

Beginning development in 2018, but not being disclosed until early 2022, Wish was supposed to represent an encapsulation of every animated Disney project and commemorate what the studio had accomplished throughout its life (couldn’t have come at a worst time, but decent in theory). You can feel this from how many aspects of classic Disney are infuse into this story, including the traditional “Disney heroine’’ formula, a simple fairy-tale premise, classic song sequences, the animal sidekick, even somewhat returning to a traditional style of animation with a mixture of traditional 2D cel animation and computer graphics. For what the film is hoping to be, the premise isn’t too bad, as having a story centred around the very thing Disney is known for pushing (wish granting) is a nice thought, and the opening twenty minutes (though definitely not perfect) are averagely delivered, but as the film continues and this aspect of passable but overwhelmingly mediocre delivery becomes the norm, the problems start to become clear.

While the idea is okay, the actual story written by the film’s directors, Chris Buck and Fawn Veerasunthorn, and screenwriters, Allison Moore, and Jennifer Lee, is distractingly weak, keeping what is already a pretty loose idea as safe and boring as possible, not attempting to expand upon its basic direction or write the characters, conflict or conclusion in a way that feels meaningful or fulfilling. Character decisions don’t make sense or have much build up, any sense of depth or intrigue surrounding the wish granting or certain backstory elements go unexplored and even get retroactively ignored for the plot’s new trajectory, and the direction feels led by people who know Disney, but aren’t willing to experiment with what they have and are comfortable playing things as generically as possible. It’s bland and unmoving, no emotional beat ever hits, there’s a monotonous staleness felt throughout, and come the conclusion, you won’t feel upset, but you’ll leave feeling absolutely hollow, which will sting far harder than any sense of aggressive disappointment. The various call-backs to previous Disney films are also annoyingly frequent and blatant, coming across like a self-congratulatory statement rather than a loving tribute (especially during the credits which feel entirely unearned).

Much like the story before it, the characters are about as bare and generic as they could be. Disney has made characters that will live in animation history (they literally made a cute animated short that celebrated them come out the same year which was far better received), but it’s hard to say that any of these faces will be in that line-up. Like previously stated, none are truly awful, but few really have much of an identity from a writing, design or even voice acting perspective. The only two that have any sense of memorability are the hero and villain, but even they aren’t handled in the best way. Asha as a protagonist is perfectly fine, has a decent design and Ariana DeBose does a good job providing at least a sense of sparky personality, but the role just isn’t written very well. Her motivation and goals change depending on where the story is currently at, her actions are so poorly established within the context of the story that it makes what she does feel almost hypocritical, and she just feels like any other female heroine present in other Disney films, very little is distinct about her. Magnifico could’ve been a good Disney villain and has all the working for it like the potential for an interesting backstory, and a wickedly villainous voice portrayal from Chris Pine, but he also suffers from poor writing that makes him very boring and even pretty pathetic. His motivations and backstory make no sense, his switch to villainy is laughably quick, and the further the movie goes, the less dimensions he seems to have, devolving into a one-note threat that soaks up villainy in such a juvenile manner.

His dialogue is forced and painful, Pine feels like he has no idea what he’s doing or saying, the filmmakers seem to mistake ”character with no chance of redemption” with ”character with no sense of nuance or depth”, and for trying to be a Disney villain (who are often considered some of the best in fiction), he is embarrassingly bad in comparison. The side characters aren’t handled well and just come across as table scraps bound to the film’s odd cameo spree. Asha’s seven human friends with names not worth remembering (voiced by Jennifer Kumiyama, Harvey Guillén, Niko Vargas, Evan Peters, Ramy Youssef and Jon Rudnitsky) are inspired after the Seven Dwarfs from their titular fairy tale and Disney film adaptation, which is obvious due to how little they offer outside of a one note trope. Valentino isn’t as irritating as you’d expect, but his lines are never funny, he contributes nothing to the story, and Alan Tudyk’s voice isn’t distinct enough from his other voice-acting appearances to make it feel like a unique character. This can also be said for Star, who has a cute design but doesn’t do much in the grand scheme of things outside of being a walking merchandising possibility.

The art style was one of the more unique aspects that was presented during the advertising, but it doesn’t feel that striking in the film itself. Whether it was due to budgetary reasons or just a preference for one style over the other, this insistence on combining the two rather than picking one to properly adapt doesn’t result in something noticeably different and feels a little awkward. There’s occasionally a good expression and the backgrounds are quite visually pleasing, but the mixture can feel a little limiting and even a little uncanny with many of its designs. The dim outlines, the odd structures, the disconnect between the foreground and the background, even the pretty blanket and dull color palate leaves most scenes feeling like they are in the early stages of the design process. Other examples of mixing 2D and 3D have used this combo to be experimental and try new things, whereas this film’s unfortunate need to be very straightforward results in none of the shots being dynamic or memorable, none of the colors being that vibrant or eye-catching, and even most of the songs being poorly done and missing that Disney quality and energy.

Most of the music was handled by Benjamin Rice and Julia Michaels, two individuals who have more experience with mainstream radio than musical theatre, and that clashing of styles is apparent when listening to these songs, as they feature elements that feels more like you’re listening to something on the radio rather than experiencing a song-led monologue. The tempo, melodic beat, stylization, vocal flourishes, lyrical flow, even manner of sound arrangement feels more pop based, and it really hurts the songs in general, with tempos that feels too fast for the voice actors to keep up with, melodies that are okay but nothing incredibly memorable, and truly garbage lyrics that seem like they are scrapping the bottom of the barrel to create rhymes and flow. While some aren’t terrible, for something that wanted to be like traditional Disney almost to a regressive level, it’s weird how modern and out-of-place these songs are.

Wish, despite how poorly it has been received, doesn’t instantly feel like one of Disney’s worst flicks on the outset, but people grew so tired of the Disney drama and the abundance of mediocre releases, that something this stale and lacking imagination in a company that should thrive on it, is greatly disappointing. It won’t result in many groans, and for those that are perfectly content with watching a very safe and expected animated movie with no surprises, twists, or changes, this will do fine, but when the concept art for the film features more intriguing and fulfilling ideas than the actual movie, it’s hard not to feel disappointed. They seem to be going on the right track again, but this movie will always be remembered for coming out during one of their dark ages. For what should’ve been a celebration for over a century’s worth of existence, this is a wish that probably shouldn’t have been granted.