minimar‘ELEMENTAL’ earns $11.8M in the film’s domestic opening day, the lowest in Pixar’s history
I remember when every Pixar film was a huge deal, whenever there was a new one we had to see it in theaters. And then brave came out, and we saw it, and it was incredibly underwhelming. Since then I just haven't really cared for any Pixar release.
Fortunately it feels like other studios are making up for it, especially since into the spiderverse. The new one was absolutely incredible, and I can't imagine elemental coming anywhere close to that.
I wish I could find the specific article about it, but it's like a decade+ old and google isn't cooperating. If I recall right though, Brave was the first film idea that Pixar put out which had entirely been conceived without the original core team at Pixar's input. All the other stuff, even if it hadn't come out yet, and had been brainstormed by that group and their lack of involvement is why from that point on it all feels so much lesser than Pixar's golden age.
From my PoV a lot of more recent Pixar work feels very safe. I recognize they are now Disney-owned (rather than Disney being the distributor), but even then Pixar films don't really feel any different from films produced and created by Disney Animation.
Moana, for example, is a Disney Animation work you could easily convince me as something recent Pixar did.
If you tried to convince me current/recent Pixar is just another Disney Animation studio by another name, I would 100% believe you, because it really does feel that way.
I think that was close to inevitable when they got bought out, though it is a huge shame. Even with an incredibly strong internal cutlure, they are under Disney's corporate leadership and the fact they aren't completely independent in terms of leadership, picking projects, and internal promotions means they'd tend to converge and be absorbed for all intents and purposes.