Purl: Pixar’s take on “Toxic Masculinity”

Pixar recently premiered a short animation: Purl, which has been the newest addition to their SparkShorts collections of short movies. It didn’t take long for the movie to capture the audience’s attention as the movie takes on the matter of toxic masculinity in today’s society.

The movie’s protagonist is Purl, a living pink yarn ball, who is the new hire at the B.R.O. Capital firm. The short follows Purl on her first day at B.R.O. Capital; she soon starts to be ignored and shut down by all the men as they do not accept her as part of the group in addition to finding her to be extremely annoying. Halfway through the movie, Purl changes her appearance by dressing in a suit like the other men with the goal of gaining the respect of her colleagues. She as well changes her attitude by being harsh, aggressive and telling dirty jokes. Soon enough her efforts to be respected at B.R.O. Capital result in success, the men start to interact and admire the new Purl and include her in all the company’s activities. At the very end of the movie a new ball of yarn is hired, Purl initially regards the new hire as useless and neglects her. However, at the very end, Purl finally decides to change back to her old self and be friends with the new hire. Fast forward we see that the company now has several balls of yarn working along with the men and they all seem to get along nicely.

I first heard about Purl while scrolling through my Twitter feed, the words that stood out were: “toxic masculinity” and “oppressive businessmen”. I was intrigued and looked it up immediately. Having finished watching the movie, I thought it was very daring and highlighted the toxic masculinity and suppression of women in today’s society. There is the lingering question of why Pixar decided to depict women as balls of yarn, maybe they really liked yarn or decided it was innovative and creative. Overall, Purl perfectly outlines the constant struggle many women face nowadays; the movie itself is quite entertaining and encourages change in and equality for women.