Even if you couldn't stand Disney Pixar's Inside Out, you could at the very least say you liked Bing Bong. But would you have loved him if he were a gruffer, more snarky figment of revolution over imagination? Check out this deleted scene, and find out.
Collider nabbed one of the cut scenes that will be on the Inside Out Blu Ray, which will be released on November 3rd. Introduced by the film's director, Pete Docter, the scene is named "Construction" and it involves Joy paling around with a Bing Bong that would have been more at home in a 1960's activist group than he would in a little girl's imagination. Sharing Joy's mindset that the more things change, the more they suck, Bing Bong tried – and fails – to teach his fellow emotion the art of the protest.
Warning: Slight spoilers for Inside Out are now in play.
Obviously, this scene comes from an earlier draft of Inside Out's story, which is something Pixar loves to give the audience a look into when they release their trademark "Super Genius" home video releases. What's particularly interesting about this incarnation of Bing Bong is the fact that if you plot this same character on the emotional trajectory that the final incarnation was sent through, it doesn't work as well. While Richard Kind can play angry to a tee, he can just as effectively be goofy and lovable – which is exactly what Bing Bong needs. By the time his arc is complete, and he tells Joy to take Riley to the Moon for him, you're absolutely devastated – all because you've gotten to know his character and love his eccentricities. That just wouldn't have happened if Bing Bong was trying to take down the man.
Storytelling is all about give and take, and if the counter-culture version of Bing Bong were still in the alternate cut of Inside Out, it's a good bet the story would have taken a different turn. But considering where our universe's version of the film finds itself in the end, it really was for the best to scrap and re-draft Bing Bong's core characteristics. To a greater extent, Disney Pixar has employed similar tactics when it comes to whole films – the most recent being The Good Dinosaur - as they've scrapped a couple of their past projects in order to create something new or massively retool what was there in the first place. Here's hoping that the latest endeavor from the studio maintains their tradition of emotional magic.
You can re-live the joyful, as well as the sad, moments of Inside Out, when it's released on DVD, Blu Ray, and Digital HD on November 13th.
