Originally posted at Disability Visibility Project
On June 25, I saw Finding Dory after reading many positive reviews and recommendations from my disabled friends. I wasn’t disappointed. There was so much to unpack and process when I got home that I decided to write this review/essay.
Continue reading “Finding Dory, Disability Culture, and Collective Access”
by Mayka Mei | Originally posted at The Maykazine
Last week I cried three times. First, the shooting at Emanuel AME Church. Then when I watched Inside Out. Then my friends got married. Adult life is confusing.
Each instance occurred within the span of three days, and though each event has warranted its own inner reflection and the outer two are deserving of their own longwinded meanderings, right now I want to write about the middle one, the kids’ movie. (I’ve also written about the AME shooting. Here are my raw thoughts from the morning after that god-awful Wednesday night.)
Continue reading “Inside Out is Not for Kids, and That’s Exactly Why Your Kids Should See It”
This post is part of a series I’m writing based on my recent visit to Pixar Studios, courtesy of Disney.
On my recent trip behind the scenes at Pixar studios in Emeryville, I met several prominent Asian American and Pacific Islander animators who are playing a big role in the making of the upcoming animated film Inside Out, which opens in theaters June 19. One of them is Patrick Lin, Layout Supervisor for the movie.
Continue reading “Meet Patrick Lin, Layout Supervisor for Inside Out“
A few weeks ago, I was in California on business and stayed in a hotel in Emeryville, just outside Oakland. Emeryville also happens to be home to the most successful animation house in the world: Pixar Studios. Even though the studio headquarters was just a stone’s throw from my hotel, I was unable to go beyond the front gate (which is still cool, by the way) because Pixar isn’t typically open to the general public. However, friend of the NOC Grace Hwang Lynch — the creator of the awesome blog HapaMama — got an all-expenses paid trip to see what life is like on the other side of that gate!
This is a big weekend for nerds. Not only is Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated, IMAX-sized space adventure Interstellar opening on theater screens of all sizes, Disney is also releasing Big Hero 6, its very first animated film based on a Marvel property since the House of Mouse acquired the House of Ideas in 2009. When the deal went down, I know a lot of fanboys salivated over the prospect of a Pixar-produced Marvel movie, and while this isn’t that, it looks pretty close.
We at the NOC have been stoked for Big Hero 6 for a while now. Not only is it the first animated Disney flick with an Asian American male lead, it’s got one of the most diverse cast of characters (and voice talents) of any Disney movie. It’s also Disney’s first post-Frozen vehicle, and just from looking at the merchandising already available, BH6 looks to be just as big, but more on that later.
In this week’s video, I talk about internal/external conflict and decision-making conflict vs. kill-all-the-bad-guys conflict using the BBC America science-fiction series Orphan Black and the Disney/Pixar film Brave as examples.
If you haven’t seen it yet, Disney and Marvel just released the first trailer to this winter’s upcoming Big Hero 6.
I first was introduced to Big Hero 6 while interviewing artist David Nakayama in July 2008 at San Diego Comic Con. I had asked Nakayama what he was working on for his next project, and he told me about the Big Hero 6 mini-series he was working on for Marvel in a story written by one of his all-time heroes, Chris Claremont. Set in Japan featuring a group of Japanese superheroes, Nakayama provided details about how they really wanted to emphasize a lot of Japanese style into the art of the five-issue mini-series. I was excited to hear about Big Hero 6, and picked up issue #1 a few months later when it was released.
