The Legend of Spyro

The Legend of Spyro (also titled simply Spyro in other territories outside of North America) is a 2018 computer-animated action-adventure fantasy film produced by Illumination Entertainment and Buddy Animation and distributed by Universal Pictures. It is directed by Chris Renaud, Jimmy Hayward, Steve Martino and Chris Meledandri (in his directorial debut), co-directed by Scott Mosier, produced by Meledandri and Janet Healy, co-produced by Bob Gordon based on a screenplay by Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio and based on the video game franchise by Toys for Bob.

The film stars the voices of Tom Kenny as the titular character, with André Sogliuzzo, Cassandra Lee Morris, Chantelle Barry, Melissa Hutchison, Cissy Jones, and more. The film follows a purple European dragon named Spyro, who, with new and old friends, is on a quest to recover the lost eggs, defeat the Rhynoc army, and stop the evil Sorceress.

The Legend of Spyro debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 18, 2017 and was theatrically released on January 17, 2018. The film received positive reviews and earned $720 million worldwide, becoming the ninth-highest-grossing film of 2018. It was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Golden Globe Awards. The Legend of Spyro is the only film in the Spyro film franchise.

Plot
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Cast
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Development
Spyro as a film was initially supposed to happen in 2002. Walt Disney Pictures had planned it as a 2D animated film, however, the rights were acquired by Sony Pictures in 2004. In May 2004, Sony Pictures had began production with Sony Pictures Animation on a 3-D animated film, though these plans were also scrapped. Then, it shifted to Blue Sky Studios. Chris Meledandri was CEO of Blue Sky at the time in August 2004, and he accepted a multi-year deal with the Spyro.

Production and Cancellation
During the production, a massive widespread hack was targeted at the Illumination Studio in Paris, France, causing its animation files to be deleted permanently without any trace of the original files. As a result, Universal cancelled the project in January 2016. Chris Meledandri, the CEO of Illumination, stated in an article published to The Los Angeles Times, saying he "was extremely disappointed at the hack that was targeted directly at us," and he further stated that he "never in my history of animation had ever experienced such tragedy".

Back In Production
In March 2016, two months after the project was cancelled, an employee at Illumination Studios Paris (formerly Illumination Mac Guff) had found the deleted files in a spare computer that the hack did not have access to, and recovered the files quickly. Coincidentally, a similar incident happened in 1998, when a Pixar employee accidentally typed a command, being "/bin/rm -r -f *", which caused 95% of Toy Story 2 's files to be permanently wiped from the database.

Animation
The concept design of Illumination's take on Spyro the Dragon was conceived in July 2015, after the release of Minions. Illumination Mac Guff Senior Executive, Jacques Bled, had provided examples of test animation to Spyro owner Toys for Bob, who approved of the character design. The overall landscape, the character designs, the modeling, rendering, shading, and texturing was animated at Illumination Mac Guff, the animation service provider for Illumination Entertainment in Paris, France.

Music
The film's music production first began in July 2017. American singer Pharrell Williams had finished composing music for Despicable Me 3 in June, and had began recording original songs for the Spyro film. The song recording wrapped in November 2017, and two of the songs featured in the soundtrack album, Dragon Warrior and We Made It, were part of his studio album Love, Hate & Everything In Between, released on December 25, 2017 through i am OTHER/Columbia Records.

Soundtrack
The film's score was composed by Brazilian composer Heitor Pereira, who composed the Despicable Me films, as well as the Minions film. The films' soundtrack album, with songs composed by American singer Pharrell Williams, as well as its score album, was released through i am OTHER/Columbia Records on January 1, 2018.

Release
The Legend of Spyro held its premiere at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival on September 18, 2017. It later had its theatrical release in the United States on January 17, 2018. It later had an international release on January 20, 2017. The film was rated PG by the Motion Picture Association of America for mild violence, brief language, rude humor and peril. It was also rated PG in most provinces in Canada, except for Quebec, for which it was rated G, by MPA Canada, as well as rated U in the UK by the British Board of Film Classification, rated 12 in Germany by Freiwillige Selbstkontrolle der Filmwirtschaft, and rated PG by the Australian Classification Board.

Marketing
The first trailer for the film was uploaded to Illumination and Universal Pictures' YouTube channel on August 28, 2017. It received generally positive reception, with the main praise for its animation and design, as well as praising Tom Kenny's voice performance as Spyro.

Home media
The Legend of Spyro was released on DVD, Blu-ray and 4K UHD Blu-ray on July 9, 2018 by Universal 1440 Home Entertainment and Buddy Home Entertainment. It features a behind-the-scenes feature, an interview featuring the cast from the games, a music recording session with Pharrell Williams and Heitor Pereira, and included extra features; Creating The Legend of Spyro, The Beats of Spyro, Picking the Best Spyro, and an exclusive demo of The Legend of Spyro: The Movie, a video game based on the film that was released on August 29, 2018.

Critical response
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports an approval rating of 88% based on 192 critics, with an average rating of 7.2/10. Its critical consensus reads: "Flying around and saving the world with ease and pleasure, The Legend of Spyro portrays Spyro's personality and character trait with the help of Illumination, who had a rough beginning." On Metacritic, the film has an average rating of 71 out of 100 based on 15 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore assigned the film an average grade of "A" on its A+ to F scale.

Box office
The Legend of Spyro grossed $251.6 million in the United States and Canada and $468.4 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $720 million, becoming the ninth-highest-grossing film of 2018, the 21st-highest-grossing animated film of all time, and is not listed in the top 50-highest-grossing films of all time.

Trivia
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