It turns out that Inside Out 2 nearly had two villains causing havoc in Riley’s brain.
One of the most significant structural changes in the critically praised sequel was the introduction of a more traditional villain. This person was Maya Hawke’s Anxiety, who arrived at HQ with the other newbies in Inside Out 2: Envy, Embarrassment, and Ennui.
Anxiety felt that she knew what was best for Riley and that the growing teenager needed more sophisticated emotions, not just the old guard (Joy, Sadness, Disgust, Anger, and Fear).
Anxiety Wasn’t Always the Only Villain for Inside Out 2
In an exclusive interview with The Direct's Russ Milheim at San Diego Comic-Con 2024, Inside Out and Inside Out 2 writer Meg LeFauve revealed that the sequel almost featured two villains.
The conversation started when the topic of cut emotions came up, where the writer first confirmed that "Schadenfreude" was almost in the spotlight for the movie but "came in and out pretty quick:"
"Schadenfreude came in and out pretty quick. He was really fun. It's a German word for an emotion where you laugh at people's pain. Which is very teenager-y because you don't have a frontal lobe, and it's why we all laugh at pratfalls. Because somebody falls, we laugh; it's funny, right? But why does our brain do that? That's Schadenfreude. But he didn't make it."
LeFauve then confirmed that the emotion of Shame would have been another villain alongside Anxiety:
"The one that stayed the longest and really was a big shift in the story was Shame. Our emotional consultant, Dacher Keltner, had a strong, and I agree with him, view that Shame is one of the emotions that really is a stand-in word for self-loathing, which can be a very big part of teenage years. And how Joy is the antidote to that in terms of self-compassion. So we tried many, many versions of Shame in the movie with Anxiety. It was kind of a twosome."
"Shame just kept really stealing the movie from Anxiety," she explained, which led to the emotion's boot from the film:
"But Shame just kept really stealing the movie from Anxiety, and the director was right. He had started with Anxiety and wanted to stay there and that pocket. So Shame got the boot. It's the only emotion that I can say is probably not a good emotion. Every other emotion you have is a very healthy emotion, and don't judge it. But Shame is not guilt, by the way. It's very different. Shame is really about making you feel small and hateful against yourself."
The writer added one small detail about Shame, describing how in one version of the script, they "didn't even get to Shame until the third act," where "she was down in the belief system hiding."
Read more about the cut emotions from Inside Out 2.
Another big cut idea from Inside Out 2 was "the emotions waiting room," which existed to help explain where all these additional emotions were the whole time:
"One of the places we went in the early version is we went to the emotions waiting room. Because you have to prove to the Pixar world or Pete, who's the originator, where have they been? So we went there, and you saw other emotions waiting, and they have like a kind of shitty screen and a tiny little button. And Anxiety's like, Look, we've been here forever, and she takes a magnifying glass, and in one of the old memories, you can see just a pinprick of anxiety. So, we explained it all."
She added that "procrastination land was amazing" in the scripts and that, at one point, the story event went "to the writer's room in Dream Productions."
The conversation then pivoted to Embarrassment, who didn't have much to do in the sequel. LeFauve said that the plan was always for him not to do any talking throughout the movie while also revealing that Embarrassment "used to have more to do because he and Sadness had a bigger subplot:"
"From the moment he arrived, he was not talking… He, for sure, used to have more to do because he and Sadness had a bigger subplot of helping her get to... She got to the console more, and they did more stuff. But again, it didn't really speak so much. Everything you do has to talk to Riley's story, Joy's story below, and headquarters. Any story idea has to be a three-tier experience, and of that just started not to be affecting Riley, it wasn't affecting Joy... Kelsey [Mann] is a great director; he had to make some choices."
The writer then spoke about how dealing with something like Anxiety shaped Riley's experience not only internally but in real life as well. She explained how "your entire sense of self starts to move outside of yourself" once you hit those teenage years:
"Well, because if you think about it, when you become a teenager, it is like we did in the beginning, Parent Island gets really small and Friend Island takes over. Your entire sense of self starts to move outside of yourself, right? Because you start to become aware, become conscious that other people are looking at you and have opinions about you. And that is a big mental shift."
"Even when I'm at Pixar," LeFauve admitted, "I catch myself feeling my center moving out into my value and who I am:"
"And so many girls lose their center outside of themselves at that age, and what if you had asked them before that transition? They would have said, like the boys, 'I run fast, I'm good at math, I can climb a tree,' and something happens. And when they get to that age, they start to say, 'I have a lot of friends, I have some nice clothes,' everything that identifies them as moving out. And a lot of females, even adults, struggle with that. Even when I'm at Pixar and a brain trust, I can catch myself feeling my center moving out into my value and who I am."
This sensation comes when she's sitting in a meeting and hearing people discuss her story ideas, where she has to remind herself often that it is the work being discussed, not her as a person:
"And my sense of self is moving out into these people around a table talking about a story that I wrote… And I'll literally be like, 'Okay, feel your feet. Where's your center right now? Put it back in yourself, right? They're talking about a story. They're not talking about you, right?' So I think there's a very big, profound idea in this movie that people are not talking about as much now because Anxiety is so big, and she takes up a lot of space. And she feels so real. It's a beautiful conversation that we need to have because of what's happening."
LeFauve praised how "incredibly profound" of an idea the belief system in Inside Out 2 is:
"But the belief system is an incredibly profound idea. I mean, think about it: Your sense of who you are and how the world works is based on the memories you choose to believe. Right? So you might have gotten an F in math in sixth grade, and you are still telling people you're bad at math. And you, every once in a while, you have to catch those and say, 'Wait, is that true… Where did you learn that? Who taught you that? Is that true…' It's all about self-knowledge. And that sense of self being built by those beliefs. It's an incredibly profound idea."
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According to the writer, the emotions also represent "standings for being a parent" to Riley:
"All of them in the mind, especially Joy, are stand-ins for being a parent, right? If you really think about it, they're parenting her. Sometimes, the hows are wrong, but the intention is always good. Riley is their child, they are so connected to her... And then it's kind of different moods of your parenting or different moods of yourself too..."
While initially exploring the characters of the core emotions in the first film, LeFauve explained how the team had trouble nailing them down due to them being "kind of one-note archetypes:"
"In the early, early versions of the first movie, that was becoming a problem. That they were just kind of one-note archetypes, especially Joy as the lead. That's really tricky, right? One thing that I figured out in the first movie is, 'Oh, Joy isn't just Joy, and joyful, too, because that's her archetype, or she gaining power that way...' No, it's her default, when she feels vulnerable. When Joy feels vulnerable, she'll get very happy and tell you, 'Please don't worry that I'm good. I know what to do.' And there's a beautiful naivete to that…"
The storyteller praised Amy Poehler's performance as Joy (learn why other original Inside Out voice actor Mindy Kaling didn't return for Inside Out 2)and what the actress brought to the narrative table:
"When you get Amy Poehler playing Joy, [she] is so giving, she wants you to be happy. It's not about I'm Joy. No, no, no, you could be happy, and you could be happy, we could all be happy. And there's a beautiful plus to that for all our positive friends out there. But there's also danger in it. Because sometimes you have to get real and let the vulnerability up and let the other sides of yourself have a chance to talk to you."
Inside Out 2 is streaming on Disney+.
Read more about Inside Out 2 on The Direct:
Inside Out 2 Includes 5 Deleted Scenes & 2 Bonus Features In Online Release
The Return of the Inside Out Universe on Disney+
How Inside Out 2's Disney+ Release Paid Off at the Box Office
