Lightyear's Zurg Twist Repeats Disney's Worst Movie Villain Cliché
Warning: Contains spoilers for Lightyear.
Lightyear has a twist involving its depiction of Zurg that ends up repeating Disney’s worst movie villain cliché: the twist villain. While there are more examples of Disney having a straightforward villain than not, Disney has still done the twist villain enough times for it to be seen as a specific cliché of the studio. Lightyear is the latest to do it, and its execution might be one of the worst yet.
One criticism that’s been levied at many Disney movies is how many of them will feature a twist villain in that a seemingly innocent character will be revealed as the true villain of the story instead of whoever was made out to be the villain before. In addition to being criticized for how often Disney’s done it, especially with its more recent movies like Frozen, Big Hero 6, Coco, and Incredibles 2, there’s also how the twist usually causes the villain, or the conflict surrounding them, to be underdeveloped because the movie needs to keep them a secret for most of the runtime. While the trend has died down in recent years, with some Disney movies not even having proper antagonists, it’s still associated enough with Disney to be considered a cliché of the studio's movies.
Related: Lightyear Ending Explained (In Detail)
Unfortunately, Lightyear’s Zurg ends up being the latest Disney villain to follow the twist villain cliché. Near the end of the movie, it’s revealed that Zurg isn’t a robot or an alien being, but an older version of Buzz Lightyear from an alternate timeline who went back in time to try and stop his crew from getting stranded on Tikana Prime. Just like other Disney twist villains, barely any time is spent setting up the reveal, so Zurg has very few moments where he
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