As posted in the Disney thread:
Just saw Inside Out last night. I don't normally go and see Disney/Pixar movies at the theater because (1) most of them are must-buy DVD/BR purchases anyway, and (2) seeing them in the theater doesn't add much to the experience, unlike a big screen action movie like the Marvel films. So I am usually content to save my money and just wait for the home release. But the reviews (combined with $5 movie night) got me out the door. Fantastic movie. I really enjoyed it, as did the wife and all the kids. Such a neat, creative idea, and [mostly] very well executed.
The only reason I say "mostly" is because I felt like they had a gaping lingering plot hole that they had no good idea how to resolve, and ended up resolving it in a really dumb way. Joy and Sadness are stuck outside of headquarters with no way back. "How do we get them back? Uh...remember the scene in one of the unmemorable Matrix sequels where Neo fights all the Agent Smith clones? That was cool. Let's do that with invisible boyfriend, combine it with the trampoline deux ex machina from The Emperor's New Groove, and have that translate into an against-all-odds perfect trajectory shot that you would only see in a Loony Toons cartoon. That should do it!" That could have been handled better. I'm not sure how. But they easily could have used some other device that seemed more plausible. In fact, what would have been both more plausible and more emotionally satisfying is if there was a situation where Sadness was in some sort of real danger (I mean, that's kinda what they were going for by having her float off on the cloud, but I didn't feel like it really came off the way they were intending it to), and Joy sacrifices herself to save Sadness and get her back to headquarters, except that Joy ends up making it too. Again, that's kind of what they were going for, but I felt like it just ultimately came out of nowhere, seemed rushed, and fell flat, and that they expected the audience to not really notice/mind because they rushed right into the emotional resolution of the film by having Sadness come into her own and "save" Riley. And they are partially correct. Ultimately, I didn't really overly mind that that part was dumb, because the payoff was still rewarding enough. But still, I've come to expect better from the Pixar writers. To me, this was the one flaw in an otherwise terrific movie.
Some other alternate possible solutions I thought up:
-Have the train tracks not completely destroyed, but maybe either incomplete, or with a gap smashed in the middle. Have Sadness about to destroy herself, but Joy comes in and convinces her that she is necessary and incredibly important to Riley's well-being, and they discover some link between Sadness and Bing Bong that allows Sadness to sing the song and give the rocket wagon more power when she does it, so that it is able to rocket them along the train tracks and fly over the gap to get them back.
-Have the unicorn be a Pegasus (or unipeg). They go back to Dream Productions (or whatever it was called), and convince her that Riley needs her help, so she flies them back to headquarters. If they really MUST use invisible boyfriend, maybe unicorn gets smitten when she sees him, and that is the tipping point that makes her decide to help.
I mean, these are half-baked ideas that are rough around the edges. But if I could come up with them the day after seeing the movie, Pixar could have come up with something better than what they gave us for that particular issue resolution.
EDIT: Unrelated to the movie itself, I also have to take just a moment to express my hate of movie theaters. Why? Well...the background is that over the last 2 1/2 months, I have for the most part been extremely disciplined with my diet and have lost just shy of 30 pounds. I have managed to do this even in the face of being on a week-long trip to DC, father's day dinner, a few parties and bbq's where there were massive amounts of food, and other everyday situations where it would be very easy to justify "cheating." Last night, I found my weakness. As the giant bucket of buttered movie theater popcorn kept passing back and forth between the 5 of us, I was unable to keep myself from going back again and again and again. Curse you, movie theater popcorn!