A buddy comedy whose premise inverts a child's natural fear of the unknown
Two factory workers whose job is scaring children. Five things every parent should know:
1. George's forced public nudity scene. When George the monster is contaminated by a child's sock, CDA agents erect a curtain, shave his entire body, and spray him down. When the curtain drops, he stands covering his crotch. An agent then rips a bandage off his back; George screams and exposes himself on camera. The entire scene is built around forced stripping and genital exposure played for laughs.
2. "BE MY dAL" cupcakes. When Randall ices cupcakes intended to read "BE MY PAL," one briefly reads "BE MY dAL" before he corrects it. "Dal" is slang for flirtation and sexual overtures. A buried sexual come-on inside a scene featuring the film's villain.
3. Mike and Sulley mistaken for a gay couple. At dinner with his girlfriend Celia, Mike begins, "the most beautiful monster in Monstropolis…," spots Sulley at the window, and finishes with "Sulley." He and Sulley then hide together behind the restaurant menu, whispering. Celia concludes the two are romantically involved. The joke structure treats same-sex romance as humor inside a film marketed to preschoolers.
4. The premise undermines a child's spiritual instincts. The whole film is built on monsters entering children's bedrooms at night through the closet to terrify them. The film's moral is that these intruders are misunderstood working-class figures who should be befriended. Scripture is serious about spiritual realities in the unseen — "we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers" (Ephesians 6:12). This film trains children to laugh at and reject the instinct to fear nighttime spiritual intrusion.
5. Boo's abduction normalized. A toddler is pulled through a closet portal into another dimension, handled by strangers, and eventually returned. Her parents never appear and show no concern. Children absorb the message that disappearing with friendly-seeming strangers leads to fun adventures and safe returns home.