Cool Stuff: Bad Ass Pixar Characters

Mature themes are one of the main components that separate Pixar films from most of the other animation that comes out today. In Toy Story 3, it was leaving your past behind, in Up it was loss of a loved one and in WALL-E, it was eternal loneliness. Each of those movies made adults explore their own emotions while simultaneously providing a fun, simple story for the kids to enjoy. Yet even at their darkest, Pixar films are still PG. They have to be. They're Disney films and that means family friendly.

When you actually think about it, though, Pixar characters lend themselves to much more explicit ratings than the PG's they've been labeled with. WALL-E is a robot that survives all alone on a planet of junk, Buzz Lightyear is a space ranger fighting aliens all across the galaxy and Kevin is one of the last of its species, protecting its family. Those are all high-concept, R-rated action ideas if I've ever heard them. Still, it's slightly off-putting – and cool – to see these characters reimagined as bad ass action heroes. You see a glimpse of Buzz above, but check out more after the jump.

The story behind these images is simple. Three artist friends came up with a contest to do some speed painting based on Pixar characters. The one stipulation was they had to turn the characters in to warriors. These are the results.

First up is WALL-E as reimagined by Jorge Lacera.

Next up is Buzz Lightyear by Carlos Villagra.

Finally, Russell and Kevin by Chad King.

Who wouldn't pay to see any of those movies? If you click on each artist's name, it'll take you to their site, where you'll see some process shots and read about how each artist got to their final product.

I hope these pieces both encourage Lacera, Villagra and King to do more art like this, but also inspire other artists to give us Pixar characters in ways they were never meant to be seen.

What do you all think?

Thanks to io9 for the heads up.