Pixar’s chief creative officer, Pete Docter, is defending the decision to remove queer storylines from the studio’s 2025 film Elio. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Docter said the studio wanted to avoid putting parents in situations where they might have conversations with young children that they are not ready to have. He said, “We’re making a movie, not hundreds of millions of dollars of therapy.”
The animated film originally featured scenes suggesting the main character’s budding queer identity. But those moments were removed during production after early audience testing and leadership concerns. Director Adrian Molina left the project in 2023. Scenes reportedly cut included one where the young protagonist turns collected trash into a fashionable pink tank top and another involving a possible male crush.
According to reporting from The Hollywood Reporter, a Pixar editor in the company’s LGBTQ affinity group said she was saddened and aggrieved by the changes, while another source claimed the studio was sanding down queer moments. Pixar also canceled a planned film titled Be Fri and reportedly instructed teams working on Inside Out 2 to make the movie less gay and avoid queer themes. Later, parent company The Walt Disney Company cut a transgender storyline from its animated series Win or Lose.
