Planes

Disney’s Planes doesn’t just look like a rehash of Pixars’ Cars—it actually tells you so on the poster. “From above the world of Cars,” it none too subtly exclaims. It’s a smaller-budget animated film (and perhaps it only exists as an experiment for Disney in a lower tax bracket) that for whatever reason has chosen the worst possible Pixar franchise as its model. Let’s be clear: Cars is very average and Cars 2 is downright bad. But Planes doesn’t even have the few functional elements of either of them. Plot: A crop duster wants to fly fast. There was a period in Disney’s history about 30 years ago when its future in animation was actually in doubt. While there’s no threat of that these days, the creativity coming out of Disney is really spotty now and if Planes is anything, it’s the new standard-bearer for laziness at the House of Mouse.