In March 2012 Pixar maestro Andrew Stanton's first foray into live-action, John Carter, turned up in cinemas dead on arrival, losing Disney millions of dollars. In July 2012 Andrew Stanton started work on a sequel to Finding Nemo, his biggest box office hit, creatively titled Finding Dory. Although the he would like to suggest otherwise, it's clear these two events are related. Stanton is a talented director, bagging Oscars for the original Finding Nemo and Wall-E and, in all fairness, John Carter's central issues don't stem from his part in events. But that should cover the fact that after his Edgar Rice Burroughs' adaptation tanked all he's done is immediately run back to the safety of the nest. Good movies can come out of bad beginnings, but we're yet to hear anything about Finding Dory that gets us excited. The plot, which involves Dory reuniting with her parents, is far from the knee-slappingly great idea of the Toy Story sequels. If anything just another example of that common animation sequel trick; bumping an entertaining secondary character up to the lead. And, as with the likes of Mater in Cars, we just can't see Dory working as a protagonist. As it stands Pixar have more sequels in their upcoming slate than they do original concepts. It may have been hard for Stanton after the Carter fiasco, but the best thing for him would have been to stride forward and do something new. Are there any of these movies you're holding out hope for? Which other upcoming animated movies do you think will suck? Join the discussion and let us know in the comments below.
