The History of "Robots"

This edition of The History of... is about an animated movie that I have a pretty complicated history with.

I first found out about Blue Sky Studios' Robots when my family went to see Shark Tale in theaters. In the lobby, there was a banner featuring the characters from the movie. And... uh, to be honest, the characters freaked me out*. Not the villains, who are supposed to be a bit creepy, I mean the good guys. I'm not sure why, they just DID. So as a result, I avoided the film for years. Learning that the DVD had a short film starring the character with a large posterior called Aunt Fanny's Tour of Booty didn't exactly put the film on my "to-watch" list either.

I started warming up to the film after hearing people praise it online and watching the Blockbuster Buster's (extremely negative) review of it. That was, I think, 2014. It took me until 2022 to actually sit down and watch the film for myself. And y'know what? It was pretty good! It's no Ice Age, but what is? I feel silly for avoiding the film for so long now, honestly.

So, to make up for my misjudging the movie, let's take a deep dive into its production process and history. I normally only do this for films that were box office bombs, which Robots wasn't, but apparently there's a lot of behind-the-scenes stuff to talk about and the film's a Cult Classic, so what the heck?

Concept art of Rodney's parents building him.

So how did Robots get started? Well, instrumental in the film's creation was its producer, William Joyce - no stranger to working with animated robots, as he also created Rolie Polie Olie. He first became aware of Blue Sky Studios' work when he saw Joe's Apartment. Remember that movie? It wasn't animated. It was about a guy named Joe who moves into an apartment that he discovers is filled with friendly talking cockroaches. Blue Sky Studios animated the cockroaches for the movie.

In the book The Art of Robots, William Joyce said, "They created a Busby Berkeley-style dance number featuring cockroaches. It was incredibly inventive and broad, yet completely believable, and I thought, 'If these guys can be this original, funny, and clever, I've got to see what else they can do.'" Thus, he met up with Chris Wedge and they began developing an adaptation of his 1993 book Santa Calls. A test animation of that was produced, but nothing came out of it.

I think I've actually read this book. I found it at a local library.

So instead, they started thinking about robots. They didn't have an idea for a story and characters yet, they just thought it'd be cool to have a film with an all-robot cast. "When we started to draw them, or even look at the pop culture history of robots, the only robot that was really interesting to look at was the robot from Metropolis. Everything else was basically a soup can," William Joyce said. They went to the Brooklyn Museum of Art, which was having an exhibition about robots, and that gave them the inspiration not to do "what everybody thinks as the [look of the] future", but something "deeper" and "simpler". They started looking at machines.

Here's the best way I could put it: y'know how, in my Did You Know? post about WALL-E, I mentioned that Andrew Stanton said they wanted to "play with both really high-end technology and really low technology"? His exact words were, "WALL-E, I always call a tractor, EVE, I always call sort of like a Porsche. She's the highest, most expensive, no expense spared kind of project that the Buy 'n' Large corporation could use to make a probe droid... WALL-E is much more 'nuts and bolts' and you can kind of get how he works from afar." The filmmakers of Robots wanted the characters to be less EVE and more WALL-E. Basically, everything in the movie looks like it was made from household appliances. Rodney resembles an Evinrude outboard motor, one building looks like Chris Wedge's waffle iron, and another is a coffee pot.

Concept art for Rodney.

As the film's art director, Steve Martino, put it, "In the typical cartoon, you'll have a jet-propelled robot, and all his mechanical apparatus is hidden. All you'll see is smoke as the robot takes off. We thought it would be more fun to strip away the coverings and show the real mechanics. So if somebody is going to fly, put him in a pod, spring-load it, and fling him across the city. That way the audience gets to see the setup, the anticipation, and the result."

The robot world was organized into three distinct sections based on three distinct periods of technology: the steam era, the combustion era, and the modern era. The steam era, based on the Industrial Revolution, is the Chop Shop. The combustion era, based on early automobiles and engine-driven objects of the twentieth century, is the neighborhood where Fender and the Rusties live. The modern era, with its streamlined materials and the mechanisms mostly hidden under composite metal, is Bigweld Industries and the robots who run it.

After that, the search began for the film's writer, someone who "worked from character first". They eventually read the play Fuddy Meers and thought that its writer, David Lindsay-Abaire, would be a good choice. Chris Meledandri, one of the higher-ups at Blue Sky, said, "David was the one that really got our Robots story started. He wrote a sweet, funny draft that nailed a lot of the tone I had in mind for the movie." Specifically, Chris wanted the film to be a musical with the tone of a 1930s screwball comedy. David Lindsay-Abaire watched those movies, came up with a lot of funny lines, and even wrote a song. Eventually, however, it was decided not to make the film a musical. Blue Sky wouldn't make their first musical until Rio. David was joined by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel. While they previously worked on City Slickers and A League of Their Own, this was the first animated film they wrote for.

Concept art for Rodney's arrival in the creatively named Robot City.

It's not easy creating an entire world from scratch. Chris Wedge said, "It was very intimidating at the beginning, because for a long time we had no idea what the limits of the world were and how fantastic we'd be able to make it. But as the work collects, the movie world starts to talk back to you. It's really a process of discovering things. You wade into the pool first, and then everyone jumps in."

So, who was the hardest character to design? Believe it or not, Rodney. According to William Joyce, it took two years for them to get his design down. As he put it, "He's an amiable ordinary fella, he's not Arnold Schwarzenegger and he's not Tom Cruise. We didn't want him to be too muscular or perfect. We wanted the audience to be able to put themselves in his shoes instantly and easily." Cappy and Ratchet were pretty hard, too.

Concept art for Piper.

Aside from that, designing the characters was pretty easy. ANIMATING them was another story. "This is the hardest thing I've ever animated," animation supervisor Mike Thurmeier lamented. "You don't get anything for free. The models look great as static images, but there's no flab jiggling around or tails and ears to follow through. You have to work incredibly hard to get a really good expression or mood." They wanted to make the robots really feel like they were made of metal but still have them be warm and expressive. Using that old technique of squash-and-stretch was difficult, for instance, because metal doesn't squash and stretch much at all. Early animation tests just looked too stiff and mechanical. "We knew we had to find a way to break the rules without breaking the character," co-director Carlos Saldanha explained. To help with that, the riggers built hidden extension rods into the characters' arms, legs and spines, allowing the characters to make goofier poses without making it look like metal was stretching.

Giving the robots detailed textures was hard, too. The traditional method of texture mapping, where 2D images are painted and then put on the 3D models, wasn't working, so they developed a new procedure to create a multi-level texture - for example, a core metal base topped by corrosion, primer, paint, and oxidation. To create the Chop Shop workers, the filmmakers created libraries of existing body parts that could be mixed and matched to create "Franken-bots".

Here is the original animation test for the movie (the director character here had his character design reused for Jack Hammer in the movie):

Robots was first announced to the public at the American Museum of Natural History's IMAX theater in June 2003. In addition to Ewan McGregor, Halle Berry, Mel Brooks, Drew Carey, Amanda Bynes, Stanley Tucci, Jim Broadbent, Dianne Wiest, Harland Williams, Jennifer Coolidge, Paul Giamatti, and Dan Hedaya, it was also mentioned that D.L. Hughley, Jamie Kennedy, and a pre-Modern Family Sofia Vergara were among the voice cast. I don't know which characters they were supposed to voice, or why they wound up leaving the film. There was also, strangely enough, no mention of Robin Williams or Greg Kinnear - maybe they joined the film after that?

"[Joyce's stories] have a golden era of Hollywood nostalgia to them," Chris Wedge said. "The robots aren't futuristic or spacey transformers. They ooze personality and personify objects that we know in our world, whether a car, an outboard motor or a washing machine."

I watched the DVD commentary of the film to see if it gave more information about the film's development that wasn't online, but there wasn't a lot. I did find out a couple things, though. For instance, at one point the film's plot was apparently going to be "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington meets The Three Musketeers meets Robin Hood", but with robots. Also, Rodney's name was "Dart" for a while.

Concept art for Fender, Crank, Diesel, and Lug.

John Powell was brought in to do the film's score (he would go on to do the scores for several other Blue Sky films). The filmmakers told him that they wanted to have the music sound like it was being done by the "Robot Philharmonic". "Part of the trick of putting a movie together with a theme like this... is to try and make everything feel connected," Chris Wedge explained on the DVD commentary. So instead of strings and violins, they used brass instruments. And who was brought in to help John with the score? Blue Man Group! Remember those guys? I think they're still a thing, but they were super-popular in the 2000s. Fitting that they were involved, seeing as they're something that freaked me out a lot when I was younger too (no offense to any members of Blue Man Group reading this).

Some of the music heard in the movie was replaced after scenes were done, though - apparently the higher-ups at FOX wanted more pop songs in the film.

I don't remember THIS scene being in the movie.

Since there are a lot of comedic actors in the movie, there was a lot of ad-libbing. ESPECIALLY with Robin Williams. Y'know the scene where Rodney and Fender try to sneak into the Bigweld Ball, and Fender is posing as the strangely-accented valet of  "Count Von Brokenzipper"? Robin did the scene about eight times, in eight different dialects. Fender's iconic "Singin' in the Oil" song was ad-libbed by Robin as well.

Perhaps the hardest part of making the film was the editing process. Apparently, there is a director's cut, but it's never been released. Among the stuff that got cut was some more development for Cappy and Lug, an extended version of the scene at the Bigweld Ball, there was an entire character cut out of the film, too - Dr. V. Needle, a mad scientist robot who was going to give Bigweld a lobotomy under orders from Madame Gasket.

A screencap of Dr. V. Needle.

To promote the movie, there were, of course, tie-ins. The first one to sign on was Sunbeam - if you bought a specially-marked Sunbeam toaster oven, toaster, mixer or iron, you could get a toaster oven that imprinted Piper's image onto your toast, or a cookie cutter in the shape of Rodney. There was also a contest where kids ages five to sixteen could write an essay about a hypothetical invention that could make things easier for their family, with the grand prize being a four-day trip to New York City, five hundred bucks, a tour of Blue Sky Studios, and the chance to meet the film's director. Robots also got its own cereal, and you could get toys of the characters in boxes of Kellogg's cereals and Burger King Kids' Meals. There were Robots Pop-Tarts, U.S. Postal Service put Rodney and Fender on its cancellation stamp, there was even a limited time flavor at Cold Stone Creamery called "Rodney Copperbottom's Crazy Crackling Cotton Candy Concoction".

I never ate these, so I have no idea how they tasted.

Unlike with Quest For Camelot, all that promotion paid off. The film made $262.5 million dollars on a $75-80 million dollar budget. Reviews were mostly positive. The main reason for Robots' obscurity is that, unlike Ice Age or Rio, it never got a sequel. An article from around the time that the film was released on DVD claimed that Chris Wedge was considering doing a sequel, but nothing came out of it. Probably for the best, honestly... Blue Sky's sequels were not their best work. I often find myself wishing that Ice Age had just been a standalone film.

If you can find Robots on a streaming service, give it a watch. You'll have a good time.

Sources:
- https://web.archive.org/web/20210418223204/https://www.ign.com/articles/2003/06/10/foxs-robots-revealed
- https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/movies/robots-pushes-animation-envelope-20050916-geirtp.html
- https://www.chiefmarketer.com/robots-the-movie-brings-150-million-in-promotional-tie-ins/
- The Art of Robots

* I know, it's tremendously ironic that I thought Robots had creepy character designs while I was in the lobby waiting to go see Shark Tale. Nothing in Robots is as creepy as Will Smith Fish.

Did You Know? - Thirty Fun Facts About the "Ice Age" Franchise

Welcome to another edition of a series that I like to call Did You Know?. Inspired a little by the Nostalgia Critic's "What You Never Knew" series, this series will allow me to share with you some interesting tidbits, behind-the-scenes information, and fun facts about an animated movie or TV series. Because I like sharing new information with people.

For this second edition of Did You Know, I'd like to talk about a movie called Ice Age.

The very first feature-length film to be made by Blue Sky Studios, Ice Age focused on a woolly mammoth, a giant ground sloth, and a saber-toothed tiger teaming up to return a human baby to its tribe as the Ice Age approaches. I've loved Ice Age ever since I was younger... and by "Ice Age", I mean the first one. The second one sucks. The third one was okay. The fourth one was bad too. Haven't seen the fifth and I plan to keep it that way. I believe that the first film should've just been standalone, but the sequels haven't stopped me from loving it. I seem to be alone in that department, though.

As a tip of the hat of sorts to the first film and the talented folks at Blue Sky Studios, this edition of Do You Know? focuses on the Ice Age franchise. Be they behind-the-scenes facts, hidden details, bloopers, or just weird coincidences, we're going to talk about 'em. Let's get started!

1) The first movie was originally going to be traditionally animated and directed by none other than Don Bluth and Gary Goldman. After Titan A.E. (which coincidentally ALSO had John Leguizamo voicing one of the characters) bombed, the project was offered to Disney, but they turned it down. Then Blue Sky Studios was given the film. The rest is history.

2) Before Ray Romano was cast, Ving Rhames and James Earl Jones were considered for the role of Manny. Albert Brooks was also offered the part.

3) John Leguizamo tried about thirty different voices for Sid. After watching a documentary about sloths, John learned that they stored food in their mouths and was inspired to give Sid a lisp.

Concept art of Manny and Sid.

4) A female sloth named Sylvia (voiced by Kristen Johnston of 3rd Rock From the Sun fame) was to appear in the first film. She was essentially Sid's stalker. She was cut because, among other reasons, she made Sid come across as unlikeable. When I was younger, I borrowed the film's "Movie Storybook" from the library and I couldn't help but notice that Sylvia was in it.

Here is Sylvia. Repulsive, isn't she?

5) The second film also had a character cut from it - another saber-toothed tiger named Joe Junior (not sure whether or not a Joe Senior was also supposed to appear in the film at some point). Below is a Marquette of him.

You can see him about to attack one of the possums in that
piece of concept art in the background.

6) All of the actors, at least in the first film, were encouraged to improvise as much as possible to help keep the animation spontaneous.

7) Originally, Scrat was just going to appear in the first scene (his scene was included because without it, the first sequence with snow and ice wouldn't appear until about thirty-seven minutes into the film, which would be kind of weird in a movie called ICE Age). But he was so popular with test audiences that he was given more scenes. Now he's for all intents and purposes the franchise's - and Blue Sky Studios' - mascot. They also considered having him talk, but decided against it.

8) The responsibility for animating the scene where Sid snowboards was given to animators who actually had experience snowboarding in real life.

9) Originally, Diego was going to actually die at the end of the film. Sobbing test audiences convinced them to change this and let Diego live (thank goodness cats have nine lives).

10) Ya know those drawings of the film's characters that appear during the end credits? Those were drawn by the animators' children.

Concept art for Diego and Sid.

11) Nowadays, we know Alan Tudyk best as Disney's good luck charm, lending his voice to every movie in the Disney Animated Canon made since 2012. However, before that he made his voice acting debut in the first Ice Age, showing off his range by voicing THREE characters - he's Lenny (the fat member of Soto's pack), one of the long-necked tapir-esque dudes (you know, the "How do we know it's an Ice Age?" "Because... of all... the ICE!" guys) and at least one of the dodos. He also voices characters in the second (a big animal called "Cholly") and fourth (Milton the sloth and the hunky sloth siren that Granny is turned on by) films. Neat, huh?

12) To promote the second film, Sid hosted the Fox Network's lineup for at least one night. I remember seeing one bumper featuring him asking why it was called the "Fox" Network as opposed to the "Sloth" Network.

13) Scrat was going to officially join the group in the second film, but that didn't happen.

13) Speaking of endings, the second film was originally going to end with Manny and Ellie parting ways with Sid and Diego to join the mammoth migration. The filmmakers decided to instead keep the herd together. Which, in my opinion, was a wise move.

14) Buck was originally to be voiced by Harrison Ford, but he turned the role down due to scheduling conflicts with the fourth Indiana Jones movie.

15) Captain Gutt, the fourth film's main antagonist, was originally going to be a rabbit, then a bear. Somebody theorized that an ape would be right at home swinging through the rigging of a ship, so they made Gutt a Gigantopethicus.

Concept art for Zeke (the Jack Black-voiced saber-toothed
tiger in the first film).

16) The fifth film was released on John Leguizamo's fifty-second birthday.

17) The scene in the first film where we learn Manny's backstory (the biggest "make the audience cry" scene in the movie) was originally going to be at the beginning of the film.

18) Cretaceous and Maelstrom, the creepy reptile dudes that attack the main characters in the second film, were originally going to talk. They changed this to make them more threatening. They were also originally going to be joined by a third aquatic reptile guy.

19) Ray Romano's kids voice minor characters in almost every sequel (for example, his daughter Ally voices one of the teen mammoths in the fourth movie).

20) During that scene in the first movie where Manny, Diego, and Sid walk by a UFO frozen in ice, Roshan (that's the name of the baby) does the iconic Vulcan salute from Star Trek.

How does a baby in prehistoric times know about Star Trek? I dunno, it's best we just
don't think about it too much.

21) Josh Peck and Queen Latifah were fans of the first film before getting cast as Eddie and Ellie in the sequel.

22) There was a live show based on the films called Ice Age Live! A Mammoth Adventure. I have not seen it.

23) The third film was the first Blue Sky Studios film not to be released in March.

24) It's kind of funny that the fourth film has Wanda Sykes playing a character voiced by John Leguizamo's grandmother, as they were born the exact same year.

25) There were rumors that the fourth movie would've been called Ice Age: TH4W and been about the characters getting thawed out in a modern day museum. I'm honestly really glad they didn't do that. It sounds like it would've been incredibly stupid.

26) At one point in the first Diary of a Wimpy Kid movie, the first film can be seen playing on TV at one point. A highlight of an otherwise pretty drab movie.

I remember seeing that film in theaters. It was mediocre.

27) Scrat made an appearance in a 2006 episode of Family Guy.

28) At one point, there was actually an Ice Age RIDE. In March of 2005, an attraction called Ice Age Adventure opened at Movie Park Germany in... well, Germany. The attraction featured audio-animatronics of Manny, Sid, Diego, and Scrat, as well as special effects. Alas, it closed in 2016...

29) However, an Ice Age ride still exists, but if you want to ride it you'll have to go all the way to Indonesia. At a theme park there named Ancol, there's an indoor flume attraction called Ice Age Arctic Adventures. It too features audio-animatronics and special effects.

30) Finally, it's pretty common knowledge that there was never an actual saber-toothed squirrel in prehistoric times. However, in 2011 a prehistoric animal was discovered and dubbed the "Cronopio". It wasn't a squirrel, but paleontologist Guillermo W. Rougier pointed out that it looked very similar to Scrat, saying "It just goes to show how diverse ancient mammals are, that we can just imagine some bizarre critter and later find something just like it." I've included a restoration of the Cronopio below so you can see the resemblance for yourself.

The Cronopio.

Well, there you have it. Thirty fun facts about the Ice Age franchise.

Let's Watch This: "Rio" (2011)

I think the reason why most reviewers review things that they don't like is because it's easier to get joke material out of something that's not good. Is it possible to make a funny review of a movie that you like? I don't know, but I'm gonna give it a shot.

First off, let's talk a little about Blue Sky Studios. For a while, they more or less became the animation studio that everyone hates (a title that used to be held by DreamWorks, then was held by Illumination Entertainment, and is now held by Sony Pictures Animation), which I don't think they deserve. Sure, they were way too reliant on Ice Age for a while (we didn't need FOUR SEQUELS TO IT), but it's not like they're incapable of making good films. I personally love the first Ice Age (and kinda like the third - the second and fourth ones are lousy and I haven't seen the fifth and make no plans to [and I'm going to be cautiously optomistic about the television series that'll be featured on the DisneyPlay streaming thing), Horton Hears a Who, and The Peanuts Movie.

Today, we'll be looking at another film of theirs that I personally am a fan of. That film is their 2011 release, Rio.

The movie begins with the sun rising over the city of Rio de Janerio... and a rainforest near the city. A bird flies around, waking up other birds, leading into our first musical number: "Real in Rio". I like the animation during the animation during this scene: the scarlet macaws doing their thing, the toucans dancing... Although (and this is admittedly a nitpick) it's pretty obvious that for the yellow macaws, they simply took the model for Blu, recolored him, and called it a day. I mean, I understand that CGI animation is expensive and all, but come on, couldn't you make it a little less obvious?

"Dude, have you noticed that we look EXACTLY THE SAME?"

The music wakes up an adorable blue macaw chick in a tree, who starts to dance to the music. But then, the musical number is interrupted by poachers... I'm sorry, smugglers, who capture all the birds. In the confusion, the chick falls out of the tree and gets captured as well. Soon he's in a truck in Minnesota, and the crate that he's in falls out of it and gets found by a little girl named Linda, who gently tells the little chick that she'll take care of him.

Years since that faithful day, Linda (voiced by Leslie Mann) now runs a bookstore, with the bird, who she's given the name Blu (voiced by Jesse Eisenberg), as her faithful assistant.

Uh... macaws don't have teeth, do they? What the heck is Blu brushing?

As he enjoys his hot chocolate, Blu is taunted by two geese outside voiced by Wanda Sykes and Jane Lynch. Question: what exactly was the purpose of getting celebrities to voice these characters who only show up in one scene and have very few lines? Not that Wanda and Jane do a bad job, but it's kind of weird, isn't it? You couldn't have just gotten, I dunno, Tress MacNeille to do them?
Granted, this sort of thing isn't new for Blue Sky - Robots had Paula Abdul, Jay Leno, and Randy Jackson as background characters with jack-squat in the way of lines (Jay Leno voices a fire hydrant at the beginning who congratulates Rodney's dad on his new baby, then notices a dog standing nearby and says "Don't even think about it.").

A guy named Tulio (voiced by Rodrigo Santoro) shows up, scaring the geese away. He explains that he's there because he heard that Linda has a rare "blue macaw" (it's actually called a Spix's Macaw) and then starts acting like a crazy person. Blu asks, "Linda, a little help here?" I don't blame you for being freaked out, Blu.

Anyhow, it turns out that they found a female blue macaw, and they want Blu to go to Rio de Janerio so that they can get it on. Linda isn't exactly a huge fan of the idea, she's kind of overprotective of Blu (he doesn't even fly) and let's be honest here, Tulio seems kind of crazy. So she turns him down, but that night Blu tries his hand at flying (and fails miserably), so she decides maybe he wants to go to Rio after all.

So it's off to Rio, where Tulio informs Linda about Carnival, and Blu meets a canary and a cardinal named Nico and Pedro (voiced by Jamie Foxx and will.i.am). They offer to get him out of his cage (Pedro says he'll "pop that cage open like a soda can), and give him some romantic advice when he reveals that he's there to meet a girl.

"Dude, somebody's doing a review of our movie. And it's full of unfunny jokes!"

They arrive at the bird sanctuary place, where Tulio allows birds to eat out of his mouth (which is in my opinion gross) and Blu discovers that the macaw he's there to meet, Jewel, is kind of a free spirit. Tulio makes Blu look "irresistible" - and by "irresistible" I mean stupid. Seriously, look at him.

He really thinks Jewel is going to find that attractive? She'll probably take one look at him and burst out laughing.

Jewel (voiced by Anne Hathaway) tackles Blu, then after Blu introduces himself, she leads him over to a tree (which he climbs up), and Blu assumes that it's time for some "repopulating". But when Blu tries to kiss her, Jewel gets angry - she was enlisting his help to escape the place. "Did you actually think that we were gonna kiss?!" she demands. "We just met!" Blu insists that it's all just a big misunderstanding, but then Tulio decides to set the mood with, uh, a disco ball and Lionel Ritchie music, and Jewel assumes that Blu is responsible for those things (for some reason... I mean, how could he have possibly summoned it?) and starts beating the heck out of him.

Linda is hesitant to leave Blu alone as she and Tulio go out to eat, but Tulio insists that the security guard, Sylvio (voiced by Bernardo De Paula), is super-competent. But then a fierce cockatoo named Nigel attacks him, getting him out of the way so that somebody can sneak in and steal the birds. Also, I did not need to see the guard in that outfit. You couldn't just have him dancing to the music with his normal clothes on?

(I was gonna put a screencap of the guard in the outfit here, but I decided to spare you all)

Meanwhile, Blu is trying to sleep, and Jewel is still trying to escape. "I wouldn't expect a pet to understand," Jewel says. "I am not a pet. I am a companion," Blu insists. Jewel asks why she would want to be with a human over his own kind and claims that you can't trust humans. We don't any explanation as to why Jewel doesn't trust humans, but I guess they thought the implication that she was captured by humans and brought to this place for reasons that she probably doesn't understand was enough. Blu insists that humans are awesome and then Nigel's partner-in-crime sneaks in and nabs them.

Linda obviously isn't thrilled to discover that Blu's been stolen and initially blames herself, then blames Tulio for dragging her into this mess in the first place. Tulio says, "I don't understand! Sylvio is the best guard in the business!" I dunno, I think anyone who dresses like that wouldn't make for a very competent guard.

Meanwhile, the birdnapper is bringing the birds to his employer's lair. Blu is repeating to himself, "There's no place like home, there's no place like home, there's no place like home..." Sorry, Blu, but that only worked for Dorothy because she was dreaming.

It turns out that the birdnapper is a boy named Fernando (voiced by Jake T. Austin), who was sent to nab the blue macaws by an evil guy named Marcel (voiced by Carlos Ponce). Marcel has two idiot henchmen named Tipa (voiced by Jeffery Garcia) and Armando (voiced by Davi Vieira). Remember that gag in the Nostalgia Critic's review of Pound Puppies and the Legend of Big Paw where the villain's two idiot henchmen point out that they're in every single movie ever? The fat guy and the skinny guy who are both thugs? That same joke applies here. Because Marcel's henchmen are that stereotype. Fernando isn't evil, of course - he's only working with the smugglers because... I don't know why he's helping them (apparently he's just really desperate for money?).

Jewel tries to escape (she's not trying to abandon Blu, she just doesn't know he can't fly yet and was expecting him to follow her) but Nigel (voiced by Jermaine Clement) stops her and puts her back in the cage. Then Fernando brings the cage into the room where Mr. Sunglasses and Stupid Haircut keeps all of his OTHER smuggled birds. I like the gag about the bat being among the caged birds.

"You gotta get me outta here! This cage is driving me BATTY!"

(I know, I know, it's an obvious joke...)

So Marcel's all, "We're going to be rich!" and Fernando is bummed because instead of being a normal kid he's stuck working for these three idiots.

Then we cut to Sleazy McSmuggler Guy and his two idiot henchmen. Sleazy is making a deal with some guys to deliver the blue macaws to them, and then it's time for Nigel's feeding. Here we learn that Nigel is a cannibal. Just like Woodstock:

I have this movie to thank for making me a fan of Jermaine Clement. He does a wonderful job as Nigel.

Then Nigel enters the room where the smuggled birds are kept and tells Blu and Jewel (and the audience) his backstory. He used to be the star of a television show, but then they decided to ditch him for a parakeet. He didn't take it well, and decided to get revenge on all pretty birds.

I actually like Nigel's song, though I will admit the rap portion in the middle is kind of cringe-worthy (though the gag about him blaming seagulls for his pooping on people is pretty funny).

Jewel then tries to bust out of the cage, which gets the attention of the smugglers and Nigel. Blu then shows her that they can just pick the lock on the cage, and Jewel decides to fly for it. And it's NOW that Blu reveals that he can't fly, causing them to fly to the ground, slide across a clothesline, and land in a pile of boxes. "Is there anything else I need to know?!" Jewel demands. "Yes!" Blu replies. "I can't fly, I pick my beak, and once in a while I pee in the birdbath!" That's funny, but I have to ask... how is it physically possible for Blu to pick his beak?

And apparently Blu is really heavy, too, because Jewel can't fly when he's
chained to her.

Then it's time for a chase sequence between Blu, Jewel, Nigel, and Sleazy Smuggler Guy's idiot henchmen. There's a cute gag here where Blu barks like a dog to scare off a cat that's in their path, then says that he's bilingual. Long story short, Blu and Jewel get away and escape into the jungle, where Blu is freaking out - for a bird that can't fly, the jungle is a pretty dangerous place. Fortunately, they find some sort of structure where they can sleep.

Meanwhile, Linda and Tulio are searching for Blu, and the next morning Fernando finds one of the posters they put up and informs Linda that he knows where Blu is. And Tulio continues to be incredibly weird.

Everybody has their little quirks.

Then we see Blu and Jewel trying to break the chain, but it backfires on them spectacularly. Then baby toucans show up and attack them, but the father toucan, Rafael (voiced by George Lopez) saves them. This is actually the only voiceover role that George Lopez has had so far that doesn't make me question why he hasn't fired his agent. He also voiced Grouchy Smurf in those live action Smurfs movies (despite the fact that George Lopez's voice does not fit a teeny-tiny Smurf at all), the orange slug alien guy in that Escape From Planet Earth thing (which I haven't seen and I plan to keep it that way) and one of the Chihuahuas in Beverly Hills Chihuahua... ah yes, and he was also going to voice Speedy Gonzales in that live-action/CGI hybrid movie about him that fortunately didn't get off the ground. Yeah...

Anyhow, Rafael says that he knows this guy named Luiz who can get the chain off, but first he must ask permission from his wife (voiced by Bebel Gilberto). His wife's initially suspicious that he just wants to sneak off to Carnaval, but Rafael somehow convinces her that this isn't the case by reminding her of when THEY met at Carnaval. And we find out that Rafael's wife can't sing.

"WHAPAH!"

So anyhow, Smuggling Mr. Sleazy  decides that since his idiot henchmen are morons who are able to get outsmarted by parrots, he is putting Nigel in charge of finding the macaws. Then we cut back to Blu, Jewel, and Rafael. Rafael decides to teach Blu how to fly. His idea is to have Blu and Jewel jump off a mountain, but wouldn't you know it, Blu chickens out as they're running (and as he points out, I'm pretty sure Rafael's whole "one of you flaps their left wing, the other flaps their right wing, together you fly" plan wouldn't have worked anyway) and he and Jewel fall off the cliff and onto a hang-glider. They ride the hang-glider for a minute or so, but then they fall off and WHACKY SHENANIGANS ENSUE.

"Blue Sky Studios' next movie after this is a FOURTH ICE AGE MOVIE?!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

Nigel, meanwhile, enlists the help of some marmosets to find the macaws. Why marmosets? Well, because as the Nostalgia Critic said, Hollywood thinks that monkeys automatically equals funny. Why did I mention the Nostalgia Critic TWICE? Now I'm afraid that I'm just going to come across as a Nostalgia Critic wannabe (though I think that ship has sailed already).

"Make one Flight of the Conchords joke and I'll eat you alive!"

Blu, Jewel, and Rafael run into Nico and Pedro, who as it turns out are buddies of Rafael (Nico's "Baby got beak" joke is pretty awkward). They say that they just missed Luiz, but there's plenty of time before the next cable car shows up to do a little PARTYING and take them to the Tiki Room Rave Party. Actually, now that Disney owns FOX, I wouldn't be surprised if they decide to stick characters from the film in the Enchanted Tiki Room*. I don't think it's necessary for that to happen, but eh, it can't be any worse than when Iago and Zazu ran the place.

Tweety Bird can suck it. NICO is the best cartoon canary.

This leads to the movie's next song, "Hot Wings". Which is awesome. DANG can Jamie Foxx sing. If this song is included, I would be totally fine with a retheme of the Tiki Room based on this movie. Anyhow, this is also the scene where it becomes obvious (as if it wasn't already) that Blu and Jewel have feelings for each other. But before they can get repopulating the species, the marmosets arrive and tell them that they are coming with them. Rafael tries to be the peacemaker, but the lead marmoset insults him, and the other birds say that if they mess with their friends, they mess with THEM. And then it's (as Pedro puts it) BIRDS VS. MONKEYS!

What WOULD happen if a flock of birds went at it with a bunch of marmosets?
Now I'm curious...

Then the cable car arrives, but a spoonbill named Kipo (also voiced by Bernardo De Paula) gives Blu and Jewel a lift. Nico channels Indiana Jones and takes out the marmosets. And Blu says that he and Jewel are like "cheese and sprinkles". Do people actually say that in Minnesota?

So then we cut back to Linda, Tulio and the kid. Fernando admits that he's the one who took them and Tulio makes this face.

He does not approve of this film's use of the "Liar Revealed" cliché. Actually, DOES this qualify as the "Liar Revealed" cliché? Fernando didn't actually lie about being involved with the bird-napping, he just... didn't bring it up.

Then Fat Idiot Henchman and Idiot Thin Henchmen show up dressed in stupid chicken outfits while Linda and Tulio hide. Apparently, they're going to be in Carnival. When they leave, Linda and Tulio decide that they must stop the two idiot henchmen and decide to use a motorcycle to do it. Tulio can't drive it to save his life, but of course Linda can do it with ease (because it's just like riding a snowmobile).

Nigel interrogates a rejected Angry Birds character** on the whereabouts of the "cerulean birds", and then we cut back to our heroes. Blu tries to make the moves on Jewel, but he's not very good at it. And then the others decide to set the mood, which leads to another song - and this is performed by Jamie Foxx, too. Seriously, if Jamie Foxx does any more voiceover work, the projects he lends his voice to better have him sing. Otherwise, that's just a waste. But alas, the romantic mood is ruined by Blu swallowing a petal.

Then they finally arrive at Luiz's garage. Luiz, as it turns out, is a bulldog (voiced by Tracy Morgan). It isn't specified if he actually owns the garage or if he just has an owner that we never see. While I like Luiz, I'm not a fan of the fact that he CONSTANTLY DROOLS (I'm sorry Luiz, I know you can't help it and that it's a medical condition).

Somehow, Luiz has access to dangerous machinery which he plans on using to cut the chain, but Jewel decides to fly for it, resulting in Blu barely missing the whirling blades. Thankfully, the day is saved by Luiz's drool, which allows Blu and Jewel's talons to slip out of the chain.

Did you know that bulldogs got their name from their use in an English sport
called "bullbaiting", which involves tethering a bull to a stake in the ground and encouraging
the dogs to try and bite the bull's nose? Yes, that DOES sound like a really cruel (and stupid) sport.

Then we get the typical "couple has an argument", during which Blu admits that he hates samba, much to everyone's shock. He claims that every song sounds exactly the same (which is my opinion on most modern music today, just FYI). Blu storms off in one direction, Jewel flies off in another, and Rafael, Nico and Pedro know that it's up to them to get them back together.

Ah yes, and Luiz puts on an outfit just like the one the guard wore earlier. What is this movie's fascination with male characters in that outfit? It's not as disturbing as when the guard wore it, but still...

Nico and Pedro decide to catch up with Jewel as she flies off in order to convince her not to give up on Blu, but Nigel shows up. Jewel tries to claw his eyes out, but Nigel grabs her by the legs and announces that she's taking her to a parade. And everyone loves a parade.

Meanwhile, Rafael catches up with Blu and informs him that he's not going to Carnival, he's going home to be with his family - he loves Carnival, but he loves his family more, and that's a decision that he made with his heart, not his head. Then Nico and Pedro show up and inform them that Nigel has Jewel, and Blu is all "NOT ON MY WATCH! WE'RE GONNA GO SAVE HER!". So it's off to Carnival!

Marcel the Sleazy Smuggler Sleaze Guy discovers that the idiot henchmen have made a float that looks like, um, this.

I think even the Great Gonzo would find this float hideous.

Linda and Tulio sneak into the parade dressed as Blu and Jewel, but Linda is mistaken for a dancer and shoved into a float. And then Carnival begins. And nobody likes Marcel and his idiot henchmen's float, where Jewel is in a cage.

When I first saw the movie, I wondered why Jewel didn't just bust out of the cage. I guess maybe she remembered that it didn't work for her when she tried it in the cage she was in back at the smuggers' hideout, but in that case, why doesn't she just pick the lock as soon as Nigel has his back turned? Maybe she knows deep down that Blu will be there to rescue her?

EDIT: My mistake, Blu didn't pick the lock before. He just knew how to open the cage from inside. So Jewel probably just doesn't know how to pick the lock. Or open the cage from inside, for that matter.

Blu and the others show up, and Linda spots Blu among the dancers. Blu has to decide - go back to Linda, or save his love interest? Of course, he chooses to go rescue Jewel.

Imagine having to render and then animate all those individual people. I hope
the animators were paid well...

Blu uses a skateboard to make it to the float and lets Jewel know that he's there. But that's just what Nigel wanted him to do! I like the gag where Blu says that he's got backup, and then we see Rafael, Nico and Pedro in another cage, and Pedro doesn't realize that Blu is referring to them and starts cheering that they're going to be rescued.

So the smugglers are getting away with the birds, but Linda is all "OH, HECK NO!" and steals a Carnival float. It's Sleazy Smugger and Idiot Henchmen Fighting Time!

Well, okay, no it isn't. Instead, the smugglers fly off in their plane. Dang, it would've been awesome seeing Smuggler the Smuggling Sleazebag and his idiot henchmen get their rear ends handed to them by Linda and Tulio.

So, how will our heroes get out of this mess? Easy - Blu pops his cage open like a soda can using a fire hydrant, and then he lets Jewel out, and then they let Rafael, Pedro and Nico out, and they all start freeing the other birds. Then they get the door on the back of the plane open and all the birds except Blu and Jewel fly for it. Jewel says they'll figure out how they can get Blu out of there together.

But then Nigel arrives and tackles Blu. Jewel tries to fight him, but Nigel launches her into a wall, injuring her wing in the process. Nigel is all "Now we have TWO birds who can't fly, BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" But then Blu is all "I don't think so, pal!" and uses the fire hydrant to send Nigel flying. Then Nigel says hello to Mr. Jet Turbine (though we find out during the credits that he survived).

Sleazy and the idiots jump out of the plane (in case you're wondering what happens to them, during the credits we see a photo of them in jail). Jewel falls out of the plane, and Blu jumps out after her. He has no plan here, other than "NOT LETTING GO OF MY LOVE", but then Jewel makes out with Blu, and then the power of love allows Blu to fly. "I'M NOT AN OSTRICH!" he shouts.

Then they make it back to Linda and Tulio. Ah yes, and Fernando, who apparently caught up to them offscreen. Tulio is all "I'll fix Blu's girlfriend's broken wing". Thus Jewel learns to trust humans, and soon she's ready to fly again. And Linda now works at the bird sanctuary (so who's running the bookstore back in Minnesota?), as does Fernando. And we end with a reprise of "Real in Rio", which thankfully means I get to hear Jamie Foxx sing again. During the song, we see that the two macaws have had chicks (who look nothing like they do in the sequel, but to be fair they probably didn't know that they were gonna have a sequel yet).

Oh, and Nigel survived, but he now looks like this.

Suck it up, Nigel. You got sucked into a JET TURBINE, you should consider yourself
lucky to even be alive.

So how does Rio hold up? Well, I personally like it. It's no Ice Age, but that's to be expected. It's got likeable characters, good songs, decent animation, and the voice actors all do a good job. I admittedly don't care all that much about the human characters (the idiot henchmen in particular I can do without), but I can stomach them fine. I'll admit that most of my comments in this review are nitpicks, but they don't take away from my enjoyment of the film, they're just little questions I have.

I would recommend giving it a watch. I haven't seen Rio 2, but I've heard that it's not very good, but who knows? If you liked the first one, maybe you'll like the second one as well. I don't know if they're gonna make a third one.

* Then again, I have heard rumors that they might be adding a Brazil pavilion to EPCOT. Maybe if they do, they can just stick a ride based on the film in there.

** He even throws the bird into a pile of crates (she hits a marmoset, but still).