The Wild Robot and the Joys of Mothering
How the most popular animated film of 2024 is a testament to motherhood
One of my favorite places on this planet is the movie theater, and it’s one of my goals as a dad to instill in my kids a love for it. Yet in an age of sequels that can rarely justify their own existence (for goodness’ sake, we got Despicable Me 4 and Kung Fu Panda 4 this year), it’s not too often that something comes along that I feel I must get my kids to the theater to see. But this year, after hearing Collin Gabarino’s review and seeing the Rotten Tomatoes score back up his claims, I knew The Wild Robot was a movie I wanted my family to experience on the big screen in 2024.
Last week, the kids’ Tuesday night soccer practices finally ended, and The Wild Robot was, due to its popularity, still in theaters two whole months after its opening weekend. Sensing the Lord’s favor upon us, I bought the $5 Tuesday tickets, loaded everyone up into the minivan, and we descended in glee upon the theater. I am happy to say, that this movie theater experience was, indeed, magical. And more than this, it was one of the most pro-mother films I’ve ever seen.
When No One Wants to Be a Mom
Before we get into the movie’s plot, let’s talk about the false message in our culture surrounding women - a message I very much do not want my 7 and 10 year old daughters to come to absorb. It goes something like this (and I ran these by my wife, who agrees with my assessment):
1. Be successful in your profession. Your value as a woman is dependent upon your ability to excel in your vocation (as long as your vocation is not a homemaker).
2. Do everything in your power not to have a baby until you have achieved your professional dreams (this is what abortion is for, after all).
3. If you do have a baby, it is your duty as a woman to not in any way let that child affect your career. To do so would be an insult to women everywhere.
The Western world’s aversion to children is pretty well documented at this point, so I won’t belabor the discussion. Suffice it to say that women are programmed by society to look at childrearing as a great inconvenience that is fundamentally beneath them. Shame on the woman, says our culture, who makes it her primary ambition to be a mother. This is the message my daughters will hear over and over again in the coming years, sometimes subtly, sometimes blatantly.
The Wild Robot is a beautiful, heart-warming, soul-stirring cry against those cultural lies - a film that wonderfully takes aim at those falsehoods in a way that seems almost impossible in 2024.
ROZZUM 7134 - the Modern Woman
ROZZUM 7134 (or “Roz,” as she comes to be called) is perfectly representative of the modern woman society wants my daughters to become. Roz is programmed by Universal Dynamics to be “task” oriented. The first 20 minutes of the movie follows Roz making her way around the island she’s crash landed on, seeking tirelessly to find a customer who will give her a task to complete. “A ROZZUM unit always completes the task!” is the repeated phrase she joyously tells the terrified forest animals she encounters. Roz sees her entire purpose, the literal core of who she is, to be her productivity. Her value is found in what she can accomplish.
Does this sound familiar?
Roz’s understanding of herself begins to change when she rescues an egg from a nest she accidentally destroyed. When the egg hatches, the gosling inside immediately imprints upon Roz. The adorable bird’s little heart is filled to the brim with love and affection for his “mother.” Roz, however, is decidedly uninterested in becoming a mom. Why?
“I do not have the programming to be a mother.”
She speaks these words to a possum mom with seven kids of her own, who laughs knowingly at her and replies, “No one does. We’re all making it up as we go.”
Begrudgingly, Roz accepts her new task - not only to provide food and shelter for this little gosling (who she names Brightbill), but to teach him what he needs to know in order to be ready to for the winter migration. And oh, what a consumingly wonderful task it is!
Mothering - a Joyful Sacrifice
As Roz sets herself to the task of raising Brightbill, I was moved to tears multiple times at the sacrificial beauty of parenting that is on display in this film. My oldest turns ten in just a few days, and I’m positively convinced that I would not have appreciated The Wild Robot nearly as much a decade ago. With my four kids huddled around me, holding the hand of my 7 year old daughter, I had the benefit of ten years of parenting behind me. That changes the way you see a movie like this. You feel it more deeply. But as much as I could relate to this movie as a father, I knew this film was far more a celebration of my wife’s role as a mother than my role as a father.
Through Roz’s relationship with Brightbill, we see her heart - initially so cold and distant towards this little creature under her care - begin to warm and expand. The sacrifices range from small to significant. At one point, Roz loses a part of her own body, giving it up in order to protect Brightbill - a moment that is so contrary to the “my body, my choice” rhetoric we so often hear. The film presents us with the hard realities of being a mom while also celebrating the incredible joys that come from giving of yourself so that your child can grow into their own person. Without spoiling anything, Brightbill’s ascendance from a runt who should have died in infancy to a courageous and heroic goose is beautiful to behold - and only possible because of Roz’s sacrifice.
My wife did not enter into the task of mothering quite so begrudgingly, but I know she’d admit to an expanding of her own heart over the years as she’s given of herself day in and day out to the task of raising our kids. I’m involved, too, of course. But there’s another level of care and attention that my wife gave my kids over the past decade that I could not. And by God’s good design, love grows through sacrifice.
The Wild Robot Woman
At the end of the film, a villain confronts Roz on her decision to overwrite her programming and step outside of the established bounds of her “design.” How dare she veer from the purpose she was programmed for? How could she do this? The answer is that Roz is a wild robot. She is the glorious exception to her kind.
Roz ends up being a beautiful metaphor for those women who make it their primary ambition in life to be a mom. She represents those who reject our culture’s programming to value a career above family; to prize the corporate ladder over the family tree. Rather than give in to the lie that her identity can only be found in professional productivity, Roz is an embodiment of mothers who are willing to sacrifice their career ambitions to truly mother. That’s something rarely celebrated in our day. What a joy for it to be found in the most popular animated movie of 2024.
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I haven’t yet watched this movie, but I keep hearing good things.