Lilo and Stitch (2025) and Fant4stic: Family Means NOTHING
So with Thanksgiving just a few days away, I've been thinking about making a post in honor of the holiday.
And after a long and lengthy thought process, I decided to talk about Lilo & Stitch (2025) and my old "friend", Fant4stic.
You're all probably wondering why though, given how DRASTICALLY different they are from each other.
But after looking into them again, I realized that they share something major in common.
That being they both more or less disregard the core theme of their respective franchises.
And guess what that is......
So today, I wanna look through both films and discuss how they do so.
Spoiler Alert: One of these films does it worse than the other, and I'm sure you all know which one it is.
So with that said, let's start this off by looking at the one that at least kinda kept the core theme.
But before we talk about this film, let's about the original real quick.
Or more specifically, it's development history.
When Lilo & Stitch was in development, it was originally gonna be set in a rural town in Kansas.
But Chris Sanders (the film's co-director and the voice of Stitch himself) decided to change it to Hawaii instead, since it was a location that hadn't been done in an animated film at that point.
And so, he and the film's crew took a trip to the island of Kauaʻi to get immersed in the culture and references for the film's setting
While there, they had learned about the concept of 'ohana, the Hawaiian term for family, from their guide and how important it was to their culture.
And so, Chris and the crew decided to make it the core theme of not only the film, but the entire franchise as a whole, being present in just about every entry.
Well.....almost every entry but that's a topic for another day.
But in the remake, while that theme is still there, its notably downplayed.
The main conflict of Lilo possibly being taken away and put into foster care isn't taken nearly as seriously when compared to the original.
There, it was massive deal for two reasons....
1#) Lilo and Nani desperately wanted to stay together, given they were the only family they had left. Especially so given how recent the death of their parents were, which you know for sure hit them pretty hard.
2#) Foster care, while well-intentioned, is kinda bogus. Largely because it can ironically do more harm for children than good, for a variety of reasons. Home shortages, overworked caseworkers, high rates of placement changes, and just not knowing what kind of people you're gonna end up with. This cause tons instability and trauma for children. And for someone as already as troubled as Lilo, that's not a good thing. It's also not helping that children of color tend to have a harder time getting adopted.
There's also the fact that we don't get as many scenes of Lilo and Nani bonding in the remake when compared to the original.
So the moments that they do knowledge the threat of Lilo being taken away, they feel very much hollow.
And the moments that showcase the familial themes in the original are generally kinda butchered in the remake.
In fact, they're treated more like punchlines for jokes.
Like the "I like you better as a sister than a mom" line.
But the most famous is definitely the kitchen scene, where Nani gets fed-up with Stitch's bullshit and tries to take him back to the dog shelter.
But as Lilo tries to stop her, she says the very line that defined the movie.
"'Ohana means family. Family means nobody gets left behind........or forgotten."
But in the remake, this scenes has Nani finish the sentence in an annoyed fashion, right before getting hit in the face by a fridge door.
And if you thought that was bad, what she says next really takes the cake.
When Lilo asks Nani why she's trying to go against their family's motto, she answers with, as I quote.....
"Because they left us behind."
There's a lot of unpack here.
First off, like in the original film, Lilo and Nani's parents died in a car crash during a bad rain storm.
And the way Nani says this.....
She makes it seem like as if their parents abandoned them.
Plus, the way she says it kinda makes it seem like she resents them for dying and thinks its their fault for doing so.
Like, this is borderline sociopathic behavior.
Even Greg Heffley would be giving her a look like this, wondering what the fuck is wrong with Nani.
This is would like Aunt May telling Peter Parker that Uncle Ben abandoned them......after he was literally MURDERED!
Like, how do you say something like that and not expect people to think you're a sociopath?
What happened to their parents was clearly an accident.
Even Lilo, who is canonically 6, clearly understands what happens to their parents was an accident.
Contrast to Nani, who is canonically 18!
In fact, the remake really downplays how much the death of the parents really affected Nani and Lilo.
A lot of what Lilo was doing, besides just being part of her quirks, was also a result of her grieving for her dead parents, who had died not too long before the events of the movie.
She's a clearly a girl suffering from trauma.
Same goes for Nani, hence why she's so desperate to keep Lilo (the only family she has left).
But in the remake, that's not really there.
Plus, Nani being dismissive about the concept of 'ohana is really yikes given how her actress, Sydney Agudong, is not even Native Hawaiian or even of that descent.
She's actually half-Filipino/half-Caucasian.
And lastly, there's the ending.
Everyone has already lambasted the ending of the remake.
In the original, Stitch had officially become part of the family and he, Lilo and Nani were under the protection of The Galactic Federation.
Jumba, Pleakley, David and Cobra Bubbles became part of the 'ohana as well.
Jumba, Pleakley and Cobra becoming uncle figures to Lilo, while David became an older brother figure to her.
In the end, Lilo and Nani may've lost their original family, but they were able to form a new, bigger family.
It's genuinely one of the best endings to any Disney movie.
The remake......doesn't really do that.
The movie ends with Lilo going to live with Tūtū, their neighbor and the grandmother of David, with both of them and Cobra looking after her and Stitch while Nani attends college in California to study marine biology.
Everyone has already criticized this ending.
First off, the decision for Nani was.....certainly a choice.
On paper, her wanting to go to college and a theme about prioritizing for yourself a little bit isn't really that bad.
The problem is how it's executed.
Nani in the film is primarily shown often complaining about something.
And topped that off with how incredibly dismissive she was about the concept of 'ohana, she tends to come off like a selfish bitch.
Plus her wanting to pursue marine biology in the film is only mentioned like once or twice.
If they had emphasized that aspect a little more, her decision to got to college would be a little more earned.
Also, as everyone else has asked, if Nani wanted to go college, why go to California for that?
There are plenty of colleges in Hawaii.
Granted, not nearly as much when compared to most other states, but still, about over two dozen.
Plus they do have marine biology programs.
Not only would Nani be able to still be with Lilo while pursuing her dream, but it would definitely do her a lot of favors down the line.
Since Native Hawaiians are granted free tuition and assistance within their home state.
Most people tend to go to college in their home states because of how RIDICULOUSLY high out-of-state tuition often is.
Dude, if you saw the out-of-state tuition for the average Californian college, you'd probably have a stroke.
Nani, you're most likely gonna be drowning in a student debt for the rest of your life.
Secondly, Lilo going to live Tūtū doesn't really feel earned.
While she is established as being a neighbor to the girls, that's about it.
Like, she knows the girls, but it doesn't feel like she really KNOWS them.
This would feel much more earned if Tūtū was written to be a long-time, close family friend.
To the point where she's basically an aunt to the girls!
But the way she's characterized in the movie.....
While it's definitely better than Lilo ending up in foster care, it still feels like really irresponsible on Nani's part to leave her in the custody of someone they don't really know that well.
Once again, making her seem like a selfish bitch.
And of course, we can't forget how in contrast to the original, Jumba and Pleakley don't become part of the 'ohana at all in this film.
Largely thanks to Jumba infamously being turned into the VILLAIN of the film due to the removal of Gantu.
Cobra also joining the 'ohana isn't nearly as earned as well since he's not even a social worker in this version and doesn't really care about Lilo until the climax.
Overall, this film REALLY fumbled the bag when it came to its main theme.
But at the very least, it still stayed true (barely) to that of the original and the film actually had a theme.
Can't say the same for the next film.....
I figured we'd come to back to it in honor of its 10th anniversary.
But anyway, to better understand why the film was the way it is, we gotta go back to its infamous production.
Fant4stic was first conceived back in 2009, when 20th Century Fox decided to hit the reboot switch for The Fantastic Four, following their latest film: Rise of the Silver Surfer.
While the film did do very well at the box office, it was notably lesser when compared to its predecessor.
Fearing that the third film would potentially be a financial flop, Fox decided to reboot the franchise.
However, no work was done on the film until 2012, when they had found a director in the form of Josh Trank, who was fresh off his directorial debut Chronicle, which funnily enough, was also produced by Fox.
As for why they hired Trank.
1#) With how successful Chronicle was, Fox believed he would be a solid choice to helm the film.
2#) He was also the most convenient since he had just finished making a film for them and Fox wanted to get this film rolling right away.
But little did they know that this would be their greatest mistake.
As I'm sure many of you know, Fant4stic is renowned for having one of the most turbulent productions of any film in last 25 years.
And a lot of that is thanks to Trank himself.
This man was a FUCKING control freak!
He wanted everything to be his way and could barely cooperate with anyone.
And remember, this was his SECOND directorial role!
And that was all it took for the power of Hollywood to go to his head.
But what really solidified the film's doom (heh) was the fact that Trank had been pretty open about not really being a comic book guy and not having all that much knowledge on The Fantastic Four.
And unfortunately, he also make it clear he wasn't interested in learning about them either.
Rule of thumb when making an adaptation: it's usually best to have actual knowledge and respect for the source material (or at the very least a willingness to learn about).
Because if you don't, you'll get shit like this.........
Trank wanted to make the film dark, grounded and realistic.
You know, everything The Fantastic Four aren't.
And he wanted to put a particular focus on body horror and trauma.
Which could work for The FF, especially Ben, but as we all know, his depiction was rather shallow and kinda tryhard.
What makes this worse is the fact that Trank actually worked closely with people who knew a lot about The Fantastic Four.
Most notably was Jeremy Slater, the initial screenwriter for the film during its early production, who was a huge comic book guy.
I went over this in my review for this film, but Slater's draft was FAR more faithful to The Fantastic Four and overall sounded like it would be a genuinely good movie.
Unfortunately, his vision for the film wasn't what Trank wanted.
So as you would expect, they constantly fought and clashed over what the film should be like.
And just to show how much of a prick Trank truly was.....
When he went to show Slater's script to the producers, and when Slater asked about the feedback, he didn't tell him ANYTHING!
And so, with all that said, it makes so much sense why the film ended up the way it did.
Among Fant4stic's many, many, MANY flaws, the biggest is definitely how much it completely misses the point of The Fantastic Four.
They're supposed to be a family.
Even though half the team isn't even related to each other.
It's what made them stand out from most other superhero teams.
Fant4stic completely throws that theme out of the window.
Fuck it, this film doesn't even have a main theme!
And that's best showcase with The Four themselves.
The Four in this film have no goddamn chemistry.
Like, they just actively refuse to bounce off each other.
Not helping is their performances.
I know damn well the actors for these characters are very much talented (Michael B. Jordan especially).
But their performances here leave much to be desired.
Though that's largely because of how much their characters are portrayed as being kinda blank slates.
Johnny is like, the only one who has something resembling a personality, though even that's pretty subdued.
It's also not helping that they were constantly suffering on-set thanks to Tranks constantly treating them like shit, Kate Mara especially.
The Four famously don't even share the screen together until the very climax of the film.
For most of the film, the team are often split up into duos.
Reed & Ben and Sue & Johnny.
And unfortunately, they're not much better either.
In the comics, Reed and Ben are the best of friends.
Haven known each other for most of their lives.
Hell. They literally view each other like BROTHERS.
So much so that Reed and Sue's kids refer to Ben as their uncle!
But in Fant4stic, you'd probably wouldn't be able to tell.
Like I said in my original review, they really don't feel like best friends.
At most, acquaintances who just work closely together.
While I do prefer them being biological siblings like always, the concept of them being adoptive siblings is admittedly interesting.
Would've worked if the film was focused on the theme of FAMILY!
But here, it feels like they did this just because they could.
They do not feel like siblings at all!
And as the youngest of four, I know damn well how siblings interact.
And like I said in my original review, even if Johnny was still kept as Sue's biological brother, it still wouldn't make much of a difference.
And the other dynamics are practically none existent.
This film doesn't even attempt any sort of romance between Reed and Sue, despite both of them being famously known for being married to each other.
Johnny absolutely lacks the same brotherly bond he has with Reed and Ben, especially the latter.
One of all the dynamics, between the four, I think they got it the worse.
It's bad enough that they don't even share the screen with each other until the climax.
But when they are on screen together, I don't recall them interacting ONCE.
Hell, I don't think they've even referred to each other by name!
And this is pretty ironic and hilarious in hindsight given that their respective actors (Kate Mara and Jamie Bell) would go on to get MARRIED!
I know this post wasn't as lengthy as you would probably expect from one of its kind, but I think I got all I wanted to get across.
Let me know what you guys think about it.
I might make a series out of this in the future.
And lastly, be grateful for your families.
Not a lot of people in this world can even say they're grateful for having that.
