Actually, this is a good place to bring up Lightyear, which is an unusual case, in that it does contain an important "furry" character, but not the main character, and also they're a robot on top of being a cat. Basically, I'm not reviewing it (partially, to be fair, because I just don't have too much interesting to say beyond, "eh, it was okay"), but my justification there is that Sox isn't the main character (if he was, I would) and unlike, say, Rocket or King Shark or Peter Porker the Amazing Spider-Ham, he's not just an anthropomorphic animal. The robot part puts him at a bit of a remove. Also, I didn't review Toy Story 4, which has a similar, but also distinct reason; the main characters are human, and the supporting animal characters are anthropomorphic toys first, anthropomorphic animals second (also, I don't remember having anything interesting to say about that movie either).
There are a few interesting things to say about Lightyear that don't actually have anything to do with the movie itself, so I'm just going to use that to say them here. It's apparently kind of flopping at the box office, which is surprising, and their are a number of theories going around. First off, there was a conservative backlash due to Chris Evans replacing the openly politically conservative replacing Tim Allen as the actor voicing the title role, as well as the inclusion of a gay family (and not like "if you're paying attention, you'll notice those antelopes in the background are gay", but like "important character is explicitly in a same sex marriage"), and just Disney versus DeSantis was a thing recently, so there were the usual expressions of boycotting or whatever, and actually, maybe, it probably didn't help, but I doubt it really hurt anything and anyway there would have theoretically been an equal liberal backlash to the backlash to offset the losses, so ... that was a long sentence. The point is, I don't think that was a make or break issue.
Second theory is that nobody cares about the character of Buzz Lightyear, and like, what? I mean, really? Obviously, you (whoever you is in this case) may not actually care about the character that much, but for your theory about the movie about nostalgia for a movie from the 90s to hold up, you kind of need it not to get whooped in the box office by a different movie about nostalgia for a movie from the 90s. And Jurassic World Dominion literally features five heavily advertised characters being brought back from the original movie (six, if you count the T. rex, plus the return of the Dilophasaur species which hasn't been seen since that original), including one that literally inspired the line "See, nobody cares [who you are]." in the original movie. So I don't think it's because nobody cares about Buzz Lightyear.
Third theory is that, after the last three Pixar movies were straight to streaming, Pixar's maybe gotten the reputation of being, well, the straight to streaming Disney movies. Like, people are used to these things on Disney+ now, they can wait. This one is popular with a lot of the box office pundit types and animation fans and whatnot. You reap what you sow, I guess. And I love the irony of three well-respected Pixar movies getting the streamer label being sandwiched between the "meh, I guess" combo of Onward and Lightyear (haven't actually seen Luca yet, but I heard good things!). It's like a sandwich with the bread on the outside!
I also think it's 80% on Rotten Tomatoes isn't helping; Pixar's reputation is at least partially based on being the one thing both the "critics" and the "public" agree on as great. A lot of animation studios would kill for a "Certified Fresh" 80%, but for Pixar, that's worse than a 50% "Rotten" for a Minions movie. [Edit: Oh, wow, it's actually down to 76% since I last checked.] Whatever happened, I mean, this could honestly straight up kill Pixar. I spent the last decade and change grousing about them, and now it's maybe actually happening, and I'm like, uh, oh, I didn't really mean it.
On a lighter note, the conceit that this is actually a 1995 movie that Andy watched and wanted an action figure from is actually a bit weird, because ... this is just not a 90s movie. They're not even trying for a 90s aesthetic, even setting aside the cultural stuff like the gay subplot. I don't even think they would have allowed for Taika Waititi's accent back then. A lot of the space stuff is very clearly coming from a post-Gravity world, as well. Not to mention touchscreen stuff that really wasn't a thing back then. And it's obviously questionable if any of this was possible in 90s special effects. It's very much a 2020s movie.
Actually, this is a good place to bring up Lightyear, which is an unusual case, in that it does contain an important "furry" character, but not the main character, and also they're a robot on top of being a cat. Basically, I'm not reviewing it (partially, to be fair, because I just don't have too much interesting to say beyond, "eh, it was okay"), but my justification there is that Sox isn't the main character (if he was, I would) and unlike, say, Rocket or King Shark or Peter Porker the Amazing Spider-Ham, he's not just an anthropomorphic animal. The robot part puts him at a bit of a remove. Also, I didn't review Toy Story 4, which has a similar, but also distinct reason; the main characters are human, and the supporting animal characters are anthropomorphic toys first, anthropomorphic animals second (also, I don't remember having anything interesting to say about that movie either).
There are a few interesting things to say about Lightyear that don't actually have anything to do with the movie itself, so I'm just going to use that to say them here. It's apparently kind of flopping at the box office, which is surprising, and their are a number of theories going around. First off, there was a conservative backlash due to Chris Evans replacing the openly politically conservative replacing Tim Allen as the actor voicing the title role, as well as the inclusion of a gay family (and not like "if you're paying attention, you'll notice those antelopes in the background are gay", but like "important character is explicitly in a same sex marriage"), and just Disney versus DeSantis was a thing recently, so there were the usual expressions of boycotting or whatever, and actually, maybe, it probably didn't help, but I doubt it really hurt anything and anyway there would have theoretically been an equal liberal backlash to the backlash to offset the losses, so ... that was a long sentence. The point is, I don't think that was a make or break issue.
Second theory is that nobody cares about the character of Buzz Lightyear, and like, what? I mean, really? Obviously, you (whoever you is in this case) may not actually care about the character that much, but for your theory about the movie about nostalgia for a movie from the 90s to hold up, you kind of need it not to get whooped in the box office by a different movie about nostalgia for a movie from the 90s. And Jurassic World Dominion literally features five heavily advertised characters being brought back from the original movie (six, if you count the T. rex, plus the return of the Dilophasaur species which hasn't been seen since that original), including one that literally inspired the line "See, nobody cares [who you are]." in the original movie. So I don't think it's because nobody cares about Buzz Lightyear.
Third theory is that, after the last three Pixar movies were straight to streaming, Pixar's maybe gotten the reputation of being, well, the straight to streaming Disney movies. Like, people are used to these things on Disney+ now, they can wait. This one is popular with a lot of the box office pundit types and animation fans and whatnot. You reap what you sow, I guess. And I love the irony of three well-respected Pixar movies getting the streamer label being sandwiched between the "meh, I guess" combo of Onward and Lightyear (haven't actually seen Luca yet, but I heard good things!). It's like a sandwich with the bread on the outside!
I also think it's 80% on Rotten Tomatoes isn't helping; Pixar's reputation is at least partially based on being the one thing both the "critics" and the "public" agree on as great. A lot of animation studios would kill for a "Certified Fresh" 80%, but for Pixar, that's worse than a 50% "Rotten" for a Minions movie. [Edit: Oh, wow, it's actually down to 76% since I last checked.] Whatever happened, I mean, this could honestly straight up kill Pixar. I spent the last decade and change grousing about them, and now it's maybe actually happening, and I'm like, uh, oh, I didn't really mean it.
On a lighter note, the conceit that this is actually a 1995 movie that Andy watched and wanted an action figure from is actually a bit weird, because ... this is just not a 90s movie. They're not even trying for a 90s aesthetic, even setting aside the cultural stuff like the gay subplot. I don't even think they would have allowed for Taika Waititi's accent back then. A lot of the space stuff is very clearly coming from a post-Gravity world, as well. Not to mention touchscreen stuff that really wasn't a thing back then. And it's obviously questionable if any of this was possible in 90s special effects. It's very much a 2020s movie.