Nevertheless, Transformers and Alvin and the Chipmunks, which were released in 2007, were the true box office juggernauts of this cycle. Something these two movies also notably feature, respectively, are egregious product placements and hyperrealistic character designs that were still appealing and expressive while hipping them out to fit into modern culture.
The Smurfs (2011) is a Frankenstein of those two films, embodying the most cynical, consumerist aspects of the live-action adaptations that people despised, but now in a short blue package that was baked to marketing perfection. This starts with the voice cast that is so of its moment, you can still hear the 2010 timestamp being punched from the meeting where an exec said, “Katy Perry is at the pinnacle of her career, so let’s cast her as Smurfette! We also need some network stars for the parents. Let’s bring in Neil Patrick Harris, Jayma Mays, Sofia Vergara, and Hank Azaria.”
The movie incorporates so many corporate-pleasing trends in the final product that it’s hard to even call it a movie. Moreover Smurfs‘ color-coded, universal brand appeal made it the ideal conduit for spewing product placement. There was literally a Harper’s Bazaar issue with Smurfette modeling Marc Jacobs. Whereas the sequel is more plot-oriented, but otherwise still bad, the first Smurfs is a soulless paean to consumerism.
To paraphrase Rick from Rick & Morty, the globe “didn’t ask questions or raise ethical complaints, we just looked straight into the bleeding jaws of capitalism and said ‘yes daddy, please.” It grossed over nearly half a billion dollars. It was the perfect exploitative IP adaptation, arriving at the right moment at the right time.
Smurfs: The Lost Village (2017) – Frozen and the Rise of Animated Fourth-Wave Feminism
Within the same year, The Smurfs 2 dropped, a little Disney movie called Frozen was released, and it went on to gross the full billion dollars. Cool. In addition to its box office success, the film was a pioneer in the representation of female-centric narratives by self-determined, independent women in mainstream American animation. Disney, along with Pixar’s Brave from the year before and Moana in 2016, managed to create female-led films without the plot or the protagonist’s motivation being centered around a man. In addition to the fact that those films made bank, Sony was quick to hit that reboot button, finally going all in on a fully computer-generated Smurfs feature, adopting Peyo’s art style, and creating a whole film about Smurfette discovering another village of Smurf girls.
That’s it. That’s the movie. It’s not a good one either. Also, to signal the changing of the seasons, another exec exclaimed, “Let’s make Demi Lovato the new Smurfette since she’s well-liked by the children!” For the record, this is the same studio that cast Selena Gomez in Sony Animation’s Hotel Transylvania series. Hey if it ain’t broke?