HUB Movie Review: Big Hero 6

Story posted January 23, 2015 in CommRadio by Sofia Westin

HUB Movie Review: Big Hero 6

Get ready for the Disney animated movie that is quite horrifying but manages to distract you from the trauma with a fluffy and huggable medical robot.

“Diagnosis: puberty.”

Big Hero 6 follows teenage tech wiz, Hiro, who, after finally committing to college with an application of an invention, sees his ever-supporting brother die, along with his invention. To comfort Hiro is his brother’s invention, a robot nurse named Baymax. But Baymax soon becomes his ally, along with four of his fellow college techies, when they discover an evil masked-man wielding Hiro’s creation. Together, they traverse San Fransokyo (yes, seriously, it’s like Honshu on up and left Japan and joined the union) looking for the masked-man; all the while Baymax continues to be “adorkable”. 

Big Hero 6 received high remarks all around. Metacritic, as usual, gave it the lowest score of the three main critic sites with a 74. RottenTomatoes certified it fresh with 88 percent of top critics liking it, along with 93 percent of its audience. IMDb audiences rated it at an average of 8.1.

It was nominated for a Golden Globe and is nominated for a British Academy of Film, Television Arts Award, and an Academy Award, which will be decided on February 8 and 22, respectively. All nominations are for the Best Animated Feature category. 

On the Penn State Scale...
1—when Penn State loses a game (Ohio State...),
2—an 8 a.m class (which are awful),
3—a canceled 8 a.m class,
4—free books for a year,
and 5—free Creamery for a year

Big Hero 6 garners a 4.3, due to the villain, cool animations, and Baymax. The latter is really what carried the movie. Baymax has so much heart and humor, with his overly honest attitude and remarks, and the progression of his behavior from when he’s fully charged (and he’s best nurse in the world) to when he’s on low battery (and acts like a drunk teenanger).

Besides, he reminds you of the Pillsbury Doughboy, so you can’t help but love him (and poke him), even though he offers more emotion even without facial expressions.

Now, to the villain. Though it was easy to figure out who the baddie was from early on, I greatly enjoyed that he had different motivations for doing what he does than the typical reason of “I just want to rule the world and be evil.” The villain is dynamic, which makes him more interesting. In addition, his story is revealed further through subsequent storylines that comes together with Hiro’s. This, in turn, opens up the world that they live in, allowing possible expansion for future projects featuring these characters. Also, I found his character, even after the big reveal, quite terrifying. The power he has through the tech, along with his expressionless mask, make a good combo to leave a trail of fear in you.

And the animation: I was more impressed simply with the tech animation than I was Tangled’s lantern scene (which, by the way, is absolutely stunning). But Big has it beat, all the way throughout innovative architecture of San Fransokyo, to the robots, the characters, colors, and then of course, Hiro’s tech.

This movie has quite the theme about robots and technology. We all know by now that technology is what makes the world go round, something we start to rely on more every day, but we also know that technology is something that is starting to be feared. It goes from objects such as drones to cyber terrorism. So this film looks at it too, that something used for good can also be used for evil*.

Robots have always been a controversial topic within films, whether they should have feelings, minds of their own, superpowers and the like, all of which have been explored in older films such as I, Robot, the recent TV show Almost Human, and will again be explored in the upcoming film Chappie. So far, the robots seem to win us humans over (for now), like Baymax would if he (it? see it’s already started!) were real.

Sorry for such a gloomy outlook, considering this is a kid’s movie after all. But I digress.

This movie is funny and good-hearted, and you shall love it. You will enjoy some of the added adult humor for good faith; so no, it’s not just for kids.

Final note: stay after the credits. You won’t be disappointed.

*I will actually call out Hiro on this. Baymax is a nurse robot. His job is to help and heal people, though as you see in the trailer, Hiro equips him with armor, fighting abilities, and strength. Sure, he makes something good be able to do more good, but everything can be reprogrammed… right?

Sofia Westin is a sophomore majoring in broadcast journalism and economics. To contact her, email sgw5090@psu.edu.