Book Review: “The Art of Ralph Breaks the Internet”

We received the book The Art of Ralph Breaks the Internet to review. This is a movie I am really looking forward to, it opens officially November 21st and I will write a review on it then. We also sent a reporter to the press conference, and that article should be up soon. But first, I’ve never been disappointed by an “Art of” Disney book and The Art of Ralph Breaks the Internet one is no exception. There is less text in current “Art of” books than there used to be, and I do miss that – but there is quite a nice selection of concept art as always and the way the text is done in this book is unique and does offer a lot of insight. Keep reading for my review.

First, the foreward by Rich Moore and Phil Johnston is fun. It reads in the format of a text message, and the rest of the text in the book is similar to Twitter and Facebook boxes and threads. It is a really interesting way to keep with the theme. The foreward is quick and includes a little on how the concept for Ralph Breaks the Internet came about.

The Introduction includes questions from Author Jessica Julius (she is director, creative affairs, at Walt Disney Animation Studios). For example, what the biggest challengers were to making the film. The answers are in cascading Facebook style format, if that is the right way to put it. Anytime a question is asked, that is how the answer is posted. Visual Effects Supervisor Scott Kersavage said that trying to define the internet was the first challenge, and he does expound on that.

When there is just one thought from a filmmaker/artist, that is designed more like a Twitter box. The first real section is called Old Friends and there is discussion on what was changed in this film to look more real, including the clothes on the characters like Ralph, Vanellope and Felix. These original characters actually figure into the book moderately as far as concept art goes.

Companies including YouTube and Instagram are depicted in stylish ways in the movie. For example, Instagram was designed to look like a museum with millions of photos and pieces of artwork. It will be interesting to see how the movie ages due to focusing so much on current companies and trends. There is quite a bit as far as the internet in concept art.

There is a very small section on art of the Disney princesses in the film, and a lot on new characters and then the Slaughter Race racing game.

There are mild spoilers in the book. I personally would say to wait to read it until after you see the film, which is less than 2 weeks away from opening as of this review. For myself, I don’t care about spoilers, although I usually will usually not read anything that fully gives away an ending until after I see a movie.

There are 166 pages and hundreds of concepts shown in The Art of Ralph Breaks the Internet.

The book itself is textured – I think embossed – so with the book I received, the really nice artwork on the front dust cover is wavy. I don’t care as much for that, but the content is terrific. I enjoy concept art for Disney films and Chronicle keeps releasing books that are enjoyable to peruse and read.

This review does contain affiliate links.