Is ‘Big Hero 6’ a Pixar or a Disney Movie?

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The Walt Disney Company today is known as one of the biggest conglomerates in the western hemisphere. The company holds several production companies, including two animation studios; The Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios. These two companies are known for creating some of the most acclaimed animated movies ever. Disney Company today is also known for owning Marvel Studios, which produces Marvel live-action movies. Still, there is one movie based on Marvel Comics that was made by one of the animation studios — Big Hero 6! This article will tell you if Big Hero 6 is Disney or a Pixar movie.

Big Hero 6 was produced by The Walt Disney Animation Studios and distributed by The Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. Big Hero 6 is loosely based on the homonymous comic book Man of Action Entertainment, created and published by Marvel Comics. This movie is considered a Marvel movie by many not only because it was based on Marvel’s comic book but also because it features a cameo appearance of an animated Stan Lee, who was known for his cameo appearances in almost every Marvel movie before he died in 2018. While it may be called a Marvel movie based on that, Big Hero 6 is still an independent movie with no ties to Pixar or Disney’s Marvel Studios.

Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar Animation Studios today use almost the same animation style. However, Pixar doesn’t have a history of using traditional, hand-drawn animation that Disney Animation Studios used for decades before computer-generated animation took over. Today, both studios are using CGI animation because of which it might be visually hard to distinguish between Disney and Pixar movies. However, some significant differences still show how Big Hero 6, a Disney movie, has some Pixar-ish elements. Keep reading to find out what we mean by that.

Big Hero 6 is a Disney movie, but it has some Pixar-ish elements

When Big Hero 6 was released in 2014, The Walt Disney Animation Studios was largely known for many critically acclaimed movies, and this was the first movie produced by the studio after 2013’s Frozen, which is still one of Disney’s biggest hits. Although Big Hero 6 didn’t manage to repeat Frozen’s enormous success, it was still met with positive reviews, and it grossed $657.9 million worldwide. The audience particularly praised the loveable character Baymax, who was perfectly voiced by Scott Adsit.

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However, Big Hero 6 differs from typical Disney animated movies in several ways. The first, the most obvious, is that this movie isn’t a musical. The Walt Disney Animation Studios produced over 60 animated motion pictures; with some exceptions, most were remembered as critically-acclaimed musicals with amazing songs. Many songs are known for being a part of Disney movies. However, Big Hero 6 isn’t a musical.

The next difference is the idea of the story. The Walt Disney Animation Studios is generally known for making movies that usually tell some magical fairytale set in a kingdom or some fantasy land, unlike Pixar, which prefers creating unrealistic stories (talking toys and talking cars, for example) set in a realistic world.

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Big Hero 6 is an animated superhero movie and can be compared to The Incredibles, Pixar’s superhero animated movie, which is still considered one of the best Pixar projects. Both of those movies are set in realistic (as much as this genre allows) cities, and they’re following, as it usually goes, a group of superheroes on their task to stop the main villain.

Ultimately, we can’t say that Big Hero 6 is a typical Disney animated movie. However, it’s still proof of how, no matter what we say about Disney, they always deliver a great animated movie full of great entertainment, lots of laughs, and a heartfelt message at the end. Big Hero 6 won the Best Animated Feature Film of the Year Academy Award. While it seems no sequel will be made, there’s a spin-off series of short films, Baymax!, with the adorable title robot doing what he does best, being a personal healthcare companion.

Both Big Hero 6 and its spin-off series Baymax! are now streaming on Disney+.

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Lukas Abramovich is a freelance writer and photo and video editor based in Croatia. He's also a web designer and holds a Master’s degree in general Computer Science from the Faculty of Informatics based in Pula, Croatia. Since 2018, Lukas has worked on several portals writing about movies, TV shows, and video games. He's currently writing articles for two of them: Fiction Horizon and Comic Basics. He also has a YouTube channel in his native language, and the content there is mostly reviewing popular movies and TV shows. Lukas also has an Instagram page where he once used to post fan-made posters he made, which is something he would like to continue working on, as photo and video editing are also some of his passions. Lukas is a big movie lover who is okay with watching any kind of movie. His favorite movie is Michael Curtiz's Casablanca, but he's a loyal follower of Marvel and DC movies, as well as several other blockbuster franchises he's been following for years; Star Wars, Fast & Furious, Mission: Impossible, and James Cameron's Avatar are only some of them. His favorite director is Christopher Nolan, with Quentin Tarantino and Denis Villeneuve as honorable mentions. Lukas is also a big fan of four fantasy multimedia franchises; The Wizarding World, A Song of Ice and Fire, The Witcher, and The Lord of the Rings. He calls them "the four rulers of the fantasy genre." He loves to write about anything spawned from those franchises (books, games, movies...), as well as anything branded with the Marvel or DC logo. Video games and their adaptations are also something he follows faithfully since he's a big fan of story-driven single-player games like Assassin's Creed, The Last of Us, Uncharted, etc. His favorite video game ever is Red Dead Redemption 2.