Dug's Special Mission

Being a Pixar fan, I was looking forward to this short film ever since it was announced. Heck, I was eager for it even BEFORE it was announced, because Pixar always includes a second short film on their DVDs. While I can see by the ratings here on IMDb that some people didn't enjoy it as much as I did (I can see why, if they're comparing it to "Up"), I still think that this short film had a number of elements that made it very enjoyable to watch.

All the humor that comes with Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Dug is here, as well as Alpha's "broken collar" joke. However, this film did have a few discrepancies with the feature film it was based on that bothered me slightly. They're mostly anachronisms or continuity errors, but I can forgive them considering that this film is supposedly a representation of how Dug remembers these events, just like the "Married Life" sequence in "Up" was supposed to be how Carl Fredricksen remembered his marriage with Ellie.

This film isn't all physical humor, though. Before I go on, please note that you shouldn't watch this until you've seen the feature film it's based on. Anyway, after Alpha gets fed up with Dug, Dug is (to be brief) very sad and alienated. Pixar does their thing with the emotions, and Dug runs away into some fog-filled rocks. The first time I saw that, I felt sorry for Dug. However, as per his birthday wish (it is his birthday, after all), he finds "a new master": Carl and Russell. What a nice alternate location story!