The goal is not just to be hyper-realistic. “I think CG has been proving recently with Planet of the Apes and The Lion King and Marvel movies that we can do hyper-realism really, really, really well,” explains Perifel. The film’s backgrounds are more painterly, the character movements more exaggerated, and the specific effects and action sequences lean more on the look of a classic hand-drawn film than a computer-rendered one. The Bad Guys continues the swing, as one of DreamWorks’ most aesthetically different films since the 2D sequences in Kung-Fu Panda. the Machines and Spider-Man: Into the SpiderVerse, or Pixar’s Turning Red and Luca, are highlighting a new trend toward more stylized animation, rather than the detailed CG textures and settings that have defined the industry for the past two decades. Wolf convinces his gang to undergo rehabilitation - or at least pretend to, so they can actually plot their biggest heist yet.Īnimated movies like Sony’s The Mitchells vs. After an ambitious heist, they’re finally apprehended. The movie follows a group of animal criminals, all stereotypically dangerous animals, led by the charming Mr. You can see the trend is shifting a little bit.”Īfter working as an animator on a number of DreamWorks projects, like Kung-Fu Panda 2 and Rise of the Guardians, Perifel makes his feature directorial debut with The Bad Guys, based on a series of graphic novels by Aaron Babley. But I think there’s been very few right now, at least in the Hollywood industry, like Hollywood-feature big-studio types of films. I’m not the first one also to do a movie that’s slightly different.

“Because I find … ‘boring’ is probably excessive, but I want to see something different,” Perifel tells Polygon. When asked why The Bad Guys departs from the usual CG hallmarks, director Pierre Perifel struggles to put it diplomatically. The bar for a good animated film used to be how “real” it looked.īut DreamWorks’ new film The Bad Guys embraces a more stylized look, especially when it comes to the spaces the characters exist in and the way they move. While their character designs aren’t necessarily hyper-realistic, everything else usually is, from the characters’ expressions and movements to the textures and effects, and especially the backgrounds and scenery. For two decades now, American computer-generated animated films have more or less followed a similar visual template.

Pencil animation fight