by Emily Maesar, Associate TV Editor

There are films that are historically under-watched—rare gems that you find when scouring every streaming service you swore would be cheaper than cable, and every rental store front that feels too expensive. Sometimes you even saw those films in theaters, but it feels like nobody else did. There are those films… and then there are the films that are under-watched to the degree that they nearly (or sometimes do) tank a whole studio.

And despite being a deeply charming and lovingly animated film, DreamWorks’s Rise of the Guardians falls squarely in the latter half of unseen films. We almost didn’t have a DreamWorks Animation after 2012, because the success of Rise of the Guardians was the seesaw of existing vs. not existing that DreamWorks was resting on. But what’s interesting about this film is that it actually made a fair amount over its original $145 million budget (making roughly $307 million worldwide). However, it still lost the studio $87 million. Ah, the great business of film. A nightmare of Pitch Black’s making, I’m sure.

Okay, so Rise of the Guardians is actually a pretty well seen film. It’s not Shrek or anything, but it made a similar amount as Monsters vs. Aliens, which came out three years prior and went on to have a television series continuation. Or even Home, which came out three years later and went on to have a television series continuation. It made more money than Mr. Peabody & Sherman, Turbo, and even Trolls, all of which (say it with me now) have a television series continuation. In fact, Rise of the Guardians is one of the few DreamWorks Animation films, post Shrek, to not get a sequel in the form of another film or a TV show. Which is kind of wild. I have many thoughts!

But first, let’s talk about Rise of the Guardians because this film turned ten this year and there isn’t a week that goes by in the winter season that I don’t think about it. Partially, it’s because I’ve loved Jack Frost ever since I first saw the Rankin/Bass stop-motion special aptly named: Jack Frost. I like a lot of those films, but Jack Frost was always my favorite—I still love it dearly. And the 1979 TV special really tapped into the “girl who is too obsessed with Peter Pan, but make it Christmas” vibes that were apparently living inside of me. The special has obvious flaws, but it endeared me to this little folklore winter imp and I love it for that.

So, when I saw one of the trailers for Rise of the Guardians and saw my little folklore winter imp and he was being voiced by Chris Pine? I was already very locked into whatever was going on. Not to mention I’m obsessed with stories like this, especially when they’re done well. I know a lot of people, at the time, compared it to The Avengers, which had come out earlier that year, but it always felt much more like The Nightmare Before Christmas, at least to me, in the ways that the story blended together western holiday figures. Honestly, in retrospect, I’d even call it a Dungeons & Dragons party with a hyper specific prompt—that’s the kind of vibe that the film gives off. So, of course I love this film!

So, what happened? Despite doing similarly well, or even better sometimes, than its other DreamWorks siblings, Rise of the Guardians’ success, or seemingly abject failure because of marketing and distribution costs, means that this film is (and probably will remain) the only entry in the franchise. In fact, it’s hard to even call it a franchise, all things considered. One of those things to consider is how, had the film done well, DreamWorks could have potentially spun the story into the DreamWorks story because of the Man in the Moon. (My friends and I have always maintained that the boy in the moon of the DreamWorks logo is the DreamWorks story to tell, and had Rise of the Guardians been even remotely a hit then they could have had a really great potential entry point into telling a larger-than-life, magical story about him. But alas.)

Marketing budgets are always a killer, but I do think it’s interesting that a lot of places reporting on how much Rise of the Guardians lost DreamWorks also mention the cost of distribution as a contributing factor. DreamWorks isn’t big enough on its own to actually distribute its films, unlike Disney. But it only recently, as of 2018, became a subsidiary of a larger company that can do its distribution, like how Disney distributes Pixar films. And, even then, the first DreamWorks film distributed by Universal (because it was NBCUniversal that bought them) was in 2019 with How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World. They didn’t release a film during the year the buyout was taking place.

However, despite the film doing well critically, and eventually hitting it off pretty well on the home video market, Rise of the Guardians was the first time that DreamWorks had lost money on a film since 2003’s Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas. Four months after its release, the company announced it was laying off 350 people as part of them having to do a company-wide restructuring. Which feels… bad. It sucks very, very bad. The loss of profits from the film also effectively killed a few of the upcoming projects, as DreamWorks was a company that used profits to fund the next thing.

But okay, let’s talk about the creative force behind this film because even though it has a bunch of sad stuff associated with its release, this film is good and I love it. Based on the William Joyce children’s books (which are really interesting and I recommend them if you’re interested in a retelling of these kinds of western folk figures), the screenplay was written by David Lindsay-Abaire. Who is, most notably, a playwright. He famously wrote the play Rabbit Hole, as well as the screen adaptation of it. But, more likely, you’d know his musical work. He worked on the musicals High Fidelity, Shrek the Musical (okay DreamWorks daddy), and Kimberly Akimbo (which he wrote the original play for in 2001. The man works and has a deeply weird, but interesting history).

However, the most interesting creative force in the film is the director, Peter Ramsey. Rise of the Guardians made Ramsey the first Black director to helm a major animated film with a budget of the film’s size. He would go on to co-direct what is possibly one of the greatest animated films of all time: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. A film he won an Oscar for, rightly so!

It’s been ten years since Rise of the Guardians was released, and it still rules. It’s a deeply winter film, despite taking place on Easter weekend (a thing I find absolutely hilarious). It’s got a wildly fun cast, including Hugh Jackman voicing a jacked up Easter Bunny with a fucking boomerang. Also, it’s delightful that instead of doing a “Save Christmas” present run, like in the aforementioned The Nightmare Before Christmas, this mad dash is about the tooth fairy and swapping out baby teeth. It’s weird and so dang charming.

Rise of the Guardians is a film that deserves to live on the animated holiday classics list for more people than just me. It’s a rich world, filled with really lovingly crafted characters, and I hope the next decade finds this film well. It’s a great highlight in DreamWorks’ 2010s filmography, and I think time will allow the story to live on, well past the ugly, financial side of the industry.