I am going to say this one more time, this post contains spoilers for the ending of Big Hero 6. Please DO NOT continue if you do not want to have the ending ruined for you.
.
.
.
.
.
Last Chance to click away!
.
.
.
.
.
Alright, so I went last weekend to see Big Hero 6 with my kids, completely psyched up about this film. Disney kind of dropped the ball on the market for boys too old to care about Toy Story or Planes, and this seemed to be filling in the gap nicely. Plus, it’s based on a concept by Man of Action, a group of people I adore for their work on Ben 10 and Generator Rex.
Well, the movie ends, and I was told to stay for the bonus scenes in the credits, so, as names start scrolling up the screen and I look over to tell me daughter to stay seated, I notice that she is blood red with tears streaking down her face. I asked what was wrong, but I didn’t really need to. I already knew that the ending of this movie had put a lifelong scar across my daughter’s heart, and I knew that because I was in tears myself towards the end.
Baymax and Hiro enter into a teleportation portal to save a girl who had been trapped in there for a long time, I believe it was decades. And, just as our protagonists are about to leave the portal before it closes down forever, with the girl in hand, BAM, debris hits Baymax and renders his flight capabilities impossible. In, perhaps, the saddest moment in Disney history, Baymax tells Hiro that he can use his rocket fist armor piece to get Hiro and the girl to safety, but Baymax cannot fly any longer, so he will stay behind. Then, the killer moment, Baymax asked Hiro to tell him that he is satisfied with his service so that he can power down.
Cue waterfalls under the eye of every movie patron.
Now, Hiro rebuilds a NEW Baymax, but the old one is lost forever. In a particularly odd move, Baymax sneaks his personality chip into the rocket fist, essentially giving Hiro permission to create a new Baymax. It was a rough ending, to say the least.
But, as I’ve sat and thought about that ending, with a heavy heart each time, I’m kind of annoyed. Sure, you could say that there was a time crunch, so split second judgement calls came into play, but Disney made this film intentional depressing when it did not need to be. Everyone loves Baymax, and there was no real merit to having him hit by the debris in the first place.
In fact, even if Disney wanted a punchier ending, where the heroes didn’t go in and out of the portal unscathed, Baymax still didn’t need to be left behind. Baymax could have used one hand to grip onto the ship (that the girl was inside of, trapped in hyper sleep mode), or even Hiro’s hand, while the other of Baymax’s hands deployed the rocket fist. Presto! Instant salvation for everyone!
This beg the question, for me, why would Disney kill off Baymax so recklessly? I haven’t read the comics to see if that’s an authentic event, but Disney often makes changes to story lines while creating a film, and I don’t feel like resurrecting Baymax, via building a new Baymax, takes any of the sting out of that heart wrenching loss of a character. This is, quite arguably, the saddest moment in a Disney animated feature, and I would like to know why it needed to happen at all.
Certainly, other Disney films have had rough, emotional moments (Pixar films in particular). We have the heartbreaker Toy Story 3, which has made everyone cry. However, when Andy gives up Woody, there is pain to it. We see him pause and have that moment of realization/regret, followed by Andy and Bonnie playing together. While it’s a tear jerking moment, for sure, we get a sense that Andy is doing the right thing – it’s what Woody wanted, after all, and Bonnie is a fantastic little lady. We also see Ellie’s death in Up, but that was at the beginning of the film (so we had some time to get over it!) and a crucial plot point as to why Carl was so grumpy and all alone – why he refused to give up his house and thereby ran away with it. But, the ending of Big Hero 6 only serves to hurt people. It shows that Baymax is heroic, it shows loss for Hiro, and they make it clear that Baymax will power down and not be suffering, but there’s not a lot of morning after that. It’s a “death” that is frivolous to the story arch, and Hiro rebuilds Baymax moments later. So, again, I have to wonder WHY did this need to happen?
Exploring Disney 