Why ‘Monsters, Inc.’ Fans Shouldn’t Write Off ‘Monsters at Work’
As Disney+ continues to grow its library of original content, audiences have been given many opportunities to revisit fan-favorite franchises in new and unexpected ways: MCU mini-series events highlighting secondary Marvel characters like Loki and WandaVision. A galaxy of new Star Wars stories surrounding an adorable Jedi youngling named Grogu. High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. Through its streaming platform, Disney has been able to explore and expand on beloved characters and stories in spin-off movies and shows that reliably generate internet buzz on a near-weekly basis. However, while franchise giants like The Mandalorian have become a huge phenomenon, a recent Disney+ original has somehow fallen under the radar, despite its ties to a Pixar classic.
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Monsters at Work serves as a direct follow-up to Pixar Animation’s 2001 hit Monsters, Inc. and follows recent scaring school graduate Tylor Tuskmon (Ben Feldman) as he tries to find his place in the now laugh-powered halls of Monstropolis’ former scream factory. The animated series plays around with familiar workplace sitcom tropes and storylines to essentially become a child-friendly take on The Office.
Although not produced by Pixar proper, Monsters at Work proves itself as essential viewing for fans of the original Monsters, Inc. and its 2013 prequel Monsters University. At first glance, the series may appear to be a self-contained comedy geared toward little kids, but across its 10-episode run, Monsters at Work operates as a full-fledged sequel built on an understanding and progression of the themes established in the original theatrical films.
Image via Disney+
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The overarching theme of both Monsters movies is adaptability to change. Told within the framework of a career in scaring, each film pits their job-focused main character through circumstances that challenge the value they put into their vocation, and shows how they are changed by and choose to adapt to it. Monsters, Inc. showed how a chance encounter made heavily-trained top scarer James P. Sullivan (John Goodman) decide not to scare kids anymore upon seeing firsthand the kind of fear his job provokes in them. Because of this, Sulley changes the shape of his industry and helps the factory switch over to laugh power. Monsters University followed a young Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal) as he learned the hard way that despite his dedication and hard work, his dream of being a top scarer would not come to pass because he simply isn’t scary enough to generate screams in the human world. Because of this, Mike learns his skills are best suited to be a scaring coach to Sulley as they work their way up from MI’s mailroom.
The life-altering challenges that Mike and Sulley both faced are emblematic of the environments that each film found them in. Monsters Inc. told a story about how a life that prioritizes one’s career in the workplace can be changed forever by a change in perspective founded in love. Monsters University taught that the idealized career path young people have going into college is just as fallible and uncertain as life itself. These stories illustrate that the way one achieves or maintains a dream job is not set in stone, and that one must be adaptable to a changing world around them (and allow themselves to change). These are lessons that Tylor Tuskmon had to learn from the moment he stepped into Monsters, Inc. on his first day.
Image via Disney+
Monsters at Work finds Mike and Sulley as the heads of a now fragile industry on the brink of collapse that is about to undergo a cultural shift. Set the day immediately after the events of the original film, Monstropolis has finally found the solution to their pressing energy crisis: laughter is ten times more powerful than screams. The factory is in a transitional period; its Scare Floors are now Laugh Floors and the entire workforce of scary monsters are to be retrained to be funny enough comedians to generate laugh energy. Enter Tylor Tuskmon, recent MU scaring graduate. Originally hired as a scarer, the unfunny Tuskmon is brought on to the entry-level position of “MIFT-er” (Monsters, Inc. Facilities Team) with the realization that this dream job is now obsolete, his degree practically worthless, and his skills as a “jokester” unhelpful.
Tylor’s struggle is a real one, and the driving force of each episode. He is a recent college graduate with a degree in a now-defunct profession entering the uncertain workforce of a rapidly evolving industry. After being denied the career he had spent his life dreaming of and studying for, Tylor’s new motivation is to work his way up from the underground MIFT offices to be a “jokester” on the Laugh Floor. Every episode follows Tylor either studying the new trade of monster comedy or trying to impress his superiors in the hopes of earning a promotion or reassignment away from MIFT. The challenge before him is to fit into the new demands of a shifting industry and find a new purpose in it.
Tylor’s story is a worthy, spiritual follow-up to Mike and Sulley’s because he, too, learns to change. Despite his initial fear and reluctance to the new ways of monster comedy, he personally adapts to the shifts of the world and what his career path now requires of him. The situation he walks into on his first day puts him and the rest of the MI staff right back to square one, which is how many new graduates feel upon entering the real world of their chosen industry. He wants to put in the work and struggles to find his footing in being a “jokester” and “MIFT-er,” but by the end of the season, he succeeds at being both because he learns to adapt. Like Sulley, his unexpected friendship with his fellow “MIFT-ers” grants him perspective on what he thought was a career setback, eventually allowing him to view his situation as an opportunity to still do meaningful work. Like Mike, he learns to reallocate the value of his skills and learn what is most needed of him and where he is needed most. By the end, he finds his ideal career, but not in the way he initially imagined.
Image via Disney+
The generation that grew up on Monsters Inc. and Monsters University are themselves about to enter the workforce of their chosen fields, if they haven’t already. On top of the nature of industry being as uncertain as it is, the current age of the COVID-19 pandemic has made working environments, their culture, and even entire industries susceptible to on-the-dime changes that must be met to survive. This is what makes Monsters at Work an essential and timely addition to the Monsters, Inc. franchise. Much like the world-shattering switch to laugh energy, the very identity of the workplace is continually transforming itself to meet the drastic changes of an uncertain world. Monsters at Work explores such adaptability as a daunting yet rewarding means of survival and growth in not just the workplace, but in life. Tylor and the rest of the monsters of Monsters at Work learned to adapt and flourish because they listened to “the winds of change.”
Monsters at Work is streaming now on Disney+.
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