re: Are you watching Soul or WW84 first today?

Just finished Soul and loved it. Great animation, great dialogue, the right amount of feels, and fantastic music. I’ll watch this even when the kids aren’t around.

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I didn't care for Soul's ending.

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It could've been better. There wasn't much emotional punch to this one. Pixar at its peak makes me leak like a faucet. But the only time I felt even a faint tug at my heartstrings here was when Joe was in 22's "lost soul" and he was hearing all the "you're nothing" comments, but given how embellished we're led to believe they were (Joe never called 22 an idiot, for example), the raw truth of that scene was lost on me and so was any big emotional payoff.

And I mentioned in my other comment how poorly I think Joe's story resolved. He's a teacher, he kept the one kid from quitting (or at least 22 did in Joe's body, at a moment where they're both clearly undergoing character growth), he gives 22 a reason to live through music, and he was surrounded by the unpolished childish souls whose spark could've been jazz. Would've been excellent to discover that teaching jazz music to others, like his father did for him, was Joe's true calling/spark/whatever (in this life or the next). Alas.

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didn't care for Soul's ending.

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Me either. Needed a better resolution. Joe realizing his passion actually is teaching jazz. Also would like to see what happened with 22

I liked the connection between being in the zone and being obsessed / a lost soul. When you think of all of the genius artists whose lives went on a downward spiral, it makes a lot of sense.

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Would've been excellent to discover that teaching jazz music to others, like his father did for him, was Joe's true calling/spark/whatever (in this life or the next).

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This is what I was waiting for! It looked like that's where they were going, and then they whiffed on the ending. But aside from the very end, I thought it was brilliant overall.

WW84 is garbage, Soul was solid