The other night, I settled in with my family to watch one of our collective favorite Pixar movies- Monsters, Inc. It doesn't take a genius to catch some of the more overt messages of most Disney and Pixar movies, which are usually applicable to children and adults- Be kind to others. Be patient. Treat your friends and family with respect.

But as I was watching Monsters, Inc., the goofy environmentalist in me made an observation- is there actually an environmental message to this movie? These are the texts I sent one of my friends while watching:

"dude when u think about it"
"monsters inc is a metaphor for sustainable energy"
"the screams are unsustainable because they hurt the kids and make them unhappy just like current nonrenewable energy makes our planet sad"
"but the laughs make the kids happy and sustainable energy makes our planet happy"

You get the picture. The more you think about it, it makes sense- during the movie, they talk about how there is an energy shortage because kids aren't as easy to scare anymore. Because of this, creepy Randall and Mr. Waternoose invent the genuinely terrifying "Scream Extractor" which is actually super dark for a kids movie. This is pretty much right in line with our current sources of energy- as traditional sources of energy, like coal and oil, are starting to run out, we begin to look for other natural resources to exploit rather than looking for sustainable, renewable energy that doesn't do damage.

In the end, using children's laughter not only becomes a far more viable source of energy for the city of Monstropolis, but it leaves kids with smiles on their faces and monsters with clear consciences! Laughter is their renewable resource! There are Pixar movies like Wall-E and Finding Dory with a more explicit environmental message, but Monsters, Inc. has a subtle call for us to find happy renewable energy rather than stretching outdated and unsustainable methods until we are forced to go beyond their limits to make them productive.

So rather than treating our environment like this:

And making it feel like this:

We could treat it like this:

And make everybody feel like this:

Now, let's go save the world.