Lightyear Director Angus MacLane Attacks Critics After Film Gets Embarrassed By Minions: The Rise Of Gru

MAKING SPACE – In Disney and Pixar’s “Lightyear,” Buzz Lightyear (voice of Chris Evans) and Alisha Hawthorne (voice of Uzo Aduba)—his long-time commander, fellow Space Ranger and trusted friend—are marooned on a hostile planet. Directed by Angus MacLane (co-director “Finding Dory”) and produced by Galyn Susman (“Toy Story That Time Forgot”), the sci-fi action-adventure opens in U.S. theaters on June 17, 2022. © 2022 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.

Lightyear director Angus MacLane decided to go after critics of his film after it got embarrassed at the box office by Minions: The Rise of Gru.

TRIAL AND ERROR – After being marooned on a hostile planet, Buzz Lightyear (voice of Chris Evans) attempts multiple test flights in an effort to recreate the complicated fuel required to reach hyperspeed so he and the whole crew can return to Earth. Directed by Angus MacLane (co-director “Finding Dory”) and produced by Galyn Susman (“Toy Story That Time Forgot”), Disney and Pixar’s “Lightyear” opens in U.S. theaters on June 17, 2022. © 2021 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.

Lightyear opened at the box office to a dismal $50.5 million according to The-Numbers and never found it legs as it saw a 64% drop in its second weekend only bringing in $18.1 million. By its third weekend it dropped another 64% to only bring in $6.4 million.

The film has currently only grossed $107.7 million at the domestic box office and $81.9 million at the international box office for a combined worldwide box office of $189.6 million.

HERO’S BEST FRIEND — Disney and Pixar’s “Lightyear” is an all-new, original feature film that presents the definitive origin story of Buzz Lightyear (voice of Chris Evans)—the hero who inspired the toy—following the legendary Space Ranger on an intergalactic adventure. But Buzz can’t do it alone—he shares space with a dutiful robot companion cat called Sox (voice of Peter Sohn). A hidden grab bag of gizmos in a cute kitty package, Sox is Buzz’s go-to friend and sidekick. Directed by Angus MacLane (co-director “Finding Dory”) and produced by Galyn Susman (“Toy Story That Time Forgot”), the sci-fi action-adventure releases on June 17, 2022. © 2022 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.

RELATED: Disney’s Lightyear Flops At The Box Office Following Chris Evans Comments On Same Sex Kiss Scene

In contrast, Minions: The Rise of Gru matched Lightyear’s entire domestic run in its opening weekend bringing in $107 million.

The film’s total domestic gross currently sits at $140.6 million and its international gross is at $93.7 million. Combined the film has a worldwide gross of $234.3 million.

(from left) Minion Otto and Gru (Steve Carell) in Illumination’s Minions: The Rise of Gru, directed by Kyle Balda. © 2022 Universal Studios. All Rights Reserved.

MacLane would lash out at critics of Lightyear and especially those comparing Lightyear to Minions: Rise of Gru retweeting Lon Harris who claimed people who are comparing the two films are “poisoned.”

Harris wrote, “Gonna get 100% serious for a moment. If you are reading this, and you think LIGHTYEAR vs. MINIONS represents a real political or social debate, such that you can read deeper meaning into their box office totals, log off the internet immediately. You have been poisoned.”

Source: Lon Harris Twitter

Not only did MacLane use Harris as a proxy to attack critics, but he described people who were giving Lightyear low reviews on IMDb as trolls.

MacLane responded to a user inquiring why reviews were so low on IMDb tweeting, “Short answer: much like the second chapter of THE HOBBIT, it mainly has to do with trolls.”

Source: Angus MacLane Twitter

RELATED: Lightyear Director Confirms That LGBTQ Character Was Not A Part Of The Early Development Of The Film

The film has a weighted average of 5.3 out of 10 on IMDb from 42,041 users albeit over 40% of the reviews are 1 star reviews. The arithmetic mean for the film is 4.6 and the median is 5.

Source: Lightyear IMDb

Interestingly, the poor reviews are across demographics as the the film only received average scores over 6 from females between the ages of 18 and 44.

Source: Lightyear IMDb

The review score on IMDb is not that much lower than aggregate scores found on other review websites. on Rotten Tomatoes, the film’s verified audience score sits at 85% with an average rating of 4.2 out of 5.

However, the All Audience score sits at 67% with an average rating of 3.5 out of 5. A score that is marginally higher than the Top Critics Tomatometer score which sits at 62%.

Source: Lightyear Rotten Tomatoes

RELATED: Chris Evans Calls Critics Of Lightyear’s Gay Kiss “Idiots” As His Film Is Banned In the Middle East

The IMDb user score is actually higher than the Metacritic User Score.

The User Score sits at 4.2 on Metacritic with 68 positive reviews, 23 mixed reviews, and 92 negative reviews.

Source: Lightyear Metacritic

On Letterboxd, the film has a paltry 3.2 rating out of 5 stars from 49 fans.

Source: Lightyear Letterboxd

Aside from attacking critics, MacLane would also try to rebuff criticism regarding Disney’s stated policy of grooming young children through their content that they most assuredly attempted to do in Lightyear.

He tweeted, “Why do you have to insert politics into science fiction.”

Source: Angus MacLane Twitter

What do you make of Angus MacLane’s attack on critics of Lightyear?

NEXT: Tim Allen Criticizes Disney’s Lightyear For Not Connecting With It’s Audience

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