Pixar can make flying houses and talking toys feel effortless. But according to one of its veterans, the thing that nearly broke him was... a landline phone cord. Yes, the curly kind.
The Incredibles phone cord that would not behave
Dave Mullins, who spent roughly two decades at Pixar, resurfaced an old work-in-progress clip from 2004's The Incredibles and posted it on Twitter on November 25, 2025. The moment in question is a simple domestic beat with Holly Hunter's Elastigirl juggling a corded phone. No super-stretching, no big camera moves, nothing flashy. And yet animating that coil was the real supervillain.
"Man that phone cord almost killed me back in the day."
Mullins explained in replies that, yes, the team could have leaned on computer-driven solutions back then, but it was cheaper and frankly more fun to animate the cord by hand. The tradeoff: it took more days than he cares to admit. If you have ever tried to follow one of those coils frame by frame, you can probably feel his pain.
Another Elastigirl headache: motion blur on the rooftop
Mullins also pointed to a rooftop scene where Elastigirl stretches around Mr. Incredible, trying to get him to be more 'flexible'. The first full render came back, got the thumbs-up, and then he noticed the motion blur was wrong. He pushed for a rerender during crunch, even though it was pricey. The second pass looked a lot better, but if you step through it frame by frame, he says you can still spot a few blur hiccups. His words, not mine: he is probably the only person who would ever notice them.
Who Mullins is and where he went
Mullins worked across a bunch of Pixar staples, including Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, and Up. He left the studio in 2020 after co-founding the ElectroLeague studio.
Meanwhile, The Incredibles keeps going
A third Incredibles movie is in development. Brad Bird is back to write the script. Peter Sohn, who directed Elemental, will be behind the camera this time because Bird is tied up with Skydance's Ray Gunn.