Big Hero 6: Thoughts From the Cast & Creators

By Mindy Marzec

Last month I had the great privilege to see a screening of “Big Hero 6” and attend a press junket with some of the film’s creators and voice actors. It was a fun afternoon at the Disney studios in Burbank, CA, and I want to thank Erin at Horsing Around in L.A. for the experience! My review of the film is coming up, but first I wanted to introduce you to some of the creative geniuses behind “Big Hero 6,” then be on the look out for the scoop on the short film that runs before it, called “Feast,” tomorrow!

First we got a little background about how the film was made from Don Hall (Director), Chris Williams (Director), and Roy Conli (Producer). They were asked about how the project came to be and how similar it is to the original Marvel comic of “Big Hero 6.”

Don: “The project came from my love of comic books. It was a dream project to take these things (Disney and comics) and combine them. We inquired about the project because I liked the title, found out it was a Japanese super hero team and then became more intrigued, then actually read the comics and got really intrigued. And so when we met with Marvel and said, ‘We want to do Big Hero 6,’ they loved it, they loved the idea we were going to do, and they said ‘don’t worry about setting it in the Marvel universe. Do your own thing. Use your own creative and create your own world.” So then we created San Fransokyo, because that’s what we do first, right off the bat, what’s the world we’re dealing with here? We love fantasy and we do fantasy very well, and so we wanted to create a fantasy world. That’s what led to this mash up of San Fransokyo. We wanted this world to not be super powered beings walking around, there’s a reality to this world. And then super technology became everybody’s super power. So a lot of these little decisions took us farther away from the comic book.”

What about criticism from Marvel fans?

Don: “One thing about our process is, no matter what story you think you’re going to tell when you start out, it is going to be something else by the end. That’s just the way it is. (Changing the story) was always going to be that way. I will say that Duncan Rouleau, who is one of the co-creators of the original comic, just saw (the film) and loved it.” 

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