As I was clicking over to the Wall-E trailer (thanks Tom!), I was thinking about what Pixar does best. It isn't just the great stories and whizzbang tech, but rather, their spot-on ability to engender emotion in ways that Disney never did for me.

Then I see this promo and it strikes me that I see the character for maybe 15 seconds...and already I'm broken.

It's been said...they are geniuses.

I look at that character and think of the film that most broke my heart as a young adult... E.T. and the things that that transfix little boys (and some girls...hey, I had a Tonka Truck as a tot)... construction equipment. To see the combination of the two and not in a Number Five sort of way. Makes me nearly swoon. That one is going to rake in the box office even more than the cooking rat...which is also going to be big.

That team? Genius!

Happy Happy Watchmen casting news!

Random movie-related notes:

1) I didn't know a movie had been made of the book "Flatland." Come to find out, THREE Flatland movies exist.

2) I'm reading NightWatch, and while the movie got the feel right, I'm already crabby at a lot of the changes and think the book is much better.

3) There's a place near me advertising Wu-Shu Tai Chi, which makes me laugh and laugh (given that I use "wu-shu" mostly as gamer slang).

What does "wu-shu" mean in gamer slang?

It means a character build with the ability to do martial arts stuff in a fantasy way, like flying or knocking down millions of arrows with your bare hands. Think Crouching Tiger or Hero.

Not really the focused exercise of Tai Chi.

Not really the focused exercise of Tai Chi.

Well, crud. I'm off to cancel my Tai Chi lessons now.

Pshaw. You have to pay your dues, man. You don't start by being able to dance on top of bamboo. Takes lots of gliding over grass to get there.

They promised me I could dance on sword blades by week 3.

Oh, you can do that right NOW, dude. Just have plenty of Bactine handy.

More future Pixar projects, including a live-action film directed by Brad Bird.