A new animated series from Disney’s Pixar features a character offering up a Christian prayer.
The show, “Win or Lose,” was originally slated to include a transgender character, but that plot line was ultimately scrapped, according to CBN’s Faithwire. A spokesperson for Disney said the surprising about-face was an appeal to parental rights.
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At the time, the representative said, “When it comes to animated content for a younger audience, we recognize that many parents would prefer to discuss certain subjects with their children on their own terms and timeline.”
So the new foray into faith is certainly an unexpected twist.
As The Christian Post reported, the first episode of the series, “Coach’s Kid,” portrays a character named “Laurie” bowing her head in prayer ahead of the game. She prays, “Dear Heavenly Father, please give me strength. … I just want to catch a ball or get a hit. I promise I’ll be good, and I, uh, won’t do that thing again.”
She also prays at another point in the episode, “Please help me be good. I’m gonna train so hard.”
It is worth noting this “Win or Lose” episode marks the first time since 1996 that Disney has portrayed a character engaging in explicitly Christian prayer. The last time it appeared in a Disney project was in “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” during the film’s song, “God Help the Outcasts.”
The children’s show, which premiered in February, follows a co-ed middle school softball team, the Pickles, in the week leading up to the players’ championship game.
News of the character change comes as Disney has faced backlash for its live-action remake of “Snow White,” which is based on the 1812 story penned by the Brothers Grimm.
Disney made several consequential changes to the plot of the story, chiefly the elimination of the legendary song, “Some Day My Prince Will Come,” which was pivotal to the original 1937 film’s score.
Megachurch Pastor Greg Laurie was among those critical of the new “Snow White,” condemning Disney for distancing itself from the original “moral fable” that inspired the movie. According to CBN’s Faithwire, Laurie said the original story included a series of biblical parallels “about good versus evil.”
Dallas Jenkins, the creator and director of “The Chosen,” also took a mild swipe at the live-action movie starring Rachel Zegler.
In a Facebook post, Jenkins wrote, “I acknowledge we won’t finish above Snow White at the box office this weekend. But I will say this…unlike them, we actually love our original source material.”
His comments came amid the theatrical release of “The Chosen: Last Supper,” the first part of three nationwide premieres for the fifth season of “The Chosen.” Jenkins’ project pulled off an impressive box-office debut over the weekend, coming in third behind new-release competitor, “A Working Man,” an action flick starring Jason Statham, and “Snow White,” a holdover from the week before.
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