Pixar SparkShorts Trailer: Pixar Previews 6 Experimental Short Films By Rising Directors

Over the years, Pixar shorts have gained as much prestige as the studio's features. In fact, many a beloved animated short have become inseparable from the theatrical movie they were paired with — whether it was the Oscar-winning heartwarming Bao with Incredibles 2, or the classic Geri's Game that got paired with A Bug's Life, or the very early first Pixar short that birthed the studio's logo, Luxo Jr. You could say that Pixar built its brand on those envelope-pushing, technologically cutting edge short films.

So it's no surprise that the studio wants to cultivate new talent with its short film program, SparkShorts. Pixar has been slowly rolling out the shorts in theaters and on YouTube, but all 6 animated shorts from rising directors will soon debut on Disney+ this November. Watch the Pixar SparkShorts trailer below.

There's nothing like the magic of watching a Pixar animated short, a medium the studio would frequently use to experiment with new technologies and give a creative playground for rising directors. Now there's a whole program for doing that with Pixar's SparkShorts, which will debut on Disney+ upon the streaming platform's November launch. Three of the SparkShorts shorts got a theatrical and YouTube debut earlier this year, but this new SparkShorts trailer previews all six the new shorts, which include Float, Purl, Smash and Grab, Kitbull, Wind, and Loop. 

"The SparkShorts program is designed to discover new storytellers, explore new storytelling techniques, and experiment with new production workflows," President of Pixar Animation Studios Jim Morris said in a statement back in January. "These films are unlike anything we've ever done at Pixar, providing an opportunity to unlock the potential of individual artists and their inventive filmmaking approaches on a smaller scale than our normal fare."

With a whole program dedicated to cultivating new talent through short films, it does make one wonder whether this is the end of the era for Pixar shorts getting paired with theatrical releases. This initiative does come in the aftermath of the poorly-paired Frozen "short" with Coco, in which impatient children were treated to 30 minutes of irritating Olaf antics before the movie. But Bao seemed to bring back the heartfelt reputation that Pixar shorts used to enjoy, winning an Oscar for its beautiful story of parental love. Perhaps we'll get both, and new artists can try their hand at directing a SparkShorts short before graduating to the big screen. Either way, that means more opportunities for diverse voices getting the Pixar spotlight.

Pixar's SparkShorts debuts on Disney+ on November 12, 2019.