Monster’s University

Mike and Sulley are back on the big screen with this adorable prequel to “Monster’s Inc.”, entitled “Monster’s University”. I finally got the chance to see the film the other day and I’m happy to report this is another excellent film by Pixar.

Usually prequels and sequels for that matter are not as good as the first one, however, Pixar has been known to hit the mark with the many “Toy Story” films, but failed when it came to the “Cars II” movie. Therefore it was a 50/50 chance that this movie was going to be a bomb. Luckily though that was not the case.

In the movie, we learn how Mike and Sulley became friends, and how the two are really only successful with each other. The film starts with Mike and we learn about his childhood and why being the best scarer at MU is so important to him.

Mike's first day at MU
Mike’s first day at MU

James P. Sullivan, on the other hand, comes from a family of scarers and is your typical jock type slacker college student who’s there to party!

Sulley haven stolen the Scare Tech mascot
Sulley haven stolen the Scare Tech mascot

Now like any good comedy certain events take place where the two find themselves having to work together. If that wasn’t enough the overachiever (Mike) and party dude (Sulley) also have to work with the total rejects from Oozma Kappa fraternity.

Ozzma Kappa
Ozzma Kappa

You’ll have to watch to find out about the rest of the story. Though I must admit that the film like a lot of good 3D animation films out there lately feels like a comedy from the 80’s. In other words, if we were in the 80’s this would have been a film, not a 3D animation. Think of it as a cross between “Real Genius” and “Animal House” or even “Revenge of the Nerds”.

Interestingly enough I find myself feeling this way about a lot of animated films lately. “Para Norman ” that was released last year had an 80’s feel to it much like “Monster House” from 2006. In that film, even the clothes the kids wore; were so 80’s. “Wreck it Ralph” was all about video games mainly from the 80’s, and most of the films tend to have 80’s music. I think the reason for this is the type of comedy that many of these films have. While most traditional film comedies today focus on the raunchy gross factor, the types of comedies we would have seen in the 80’s are now better suited for a younger more “G” rated group. Though in most cases some of the jokes are a bit over the kid’s heads, the adults love it. I also find it interesting that more and more young couples like me and my husband are going to see these types of films, because there the a fun good clean comedy and we won’t lose brain cells watching them like if we were to watch one of those live action comedies or if you can call it that.

Anyways, these are just some thoughts I had on the subject. Back to Monster’s though I really think you should check it out. One side note though, as a college professor I don’t care for the ending since it kind of indicates that your don’t need college, I disagree you do!

Akram Taghavi-Burris

Akram Taghavi-Burris is an award winning designer, an educator with over 15 years of experience in graphic arts and web design. Akram has an M.Ed. with an emphasis on Design Education and has been awarded several prestigious awards for her work such as the American Advertising Federation (AAF) Award and, the Davinci Fellows Award for innovation in teaching. Currently, Akram teaches Computer Simulation and Gaming (Video Game Design) at the University of Tulsa. to life.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *