‘Twenty Something’ Touches on the Universal and Tricky Nature of Growing Up

As each birthday comes and goes, we grow up a little bit more. We’re always experiencing new and unexpected things and figuring life out in real-time as each day passes. This is was makes our lives exciting – but can also intimidate us at times, too.

Aphton Corbin’s latest project, a Pixar Sparkshort titled, Twenty Something (airing September 10 on Disney+), touches on the sometimes awkward (and exciting) nature of growing up. 

The title character Gia, finds herself celebrating her twenty-first birthday at a dance club and is a little out of place with all the drink options, the ever-changing environment, and even the attention from others at the bar.

Without giving anything away, let’s just say that Gia experiences something that is (in our minds) a universal truth and experiences imposter syndrome with various versions of herself.

In our recent conversation with Aphton, she noted that she wanted Gia to feel like a fish out of water in many ways. In addition to physically showing her awkwardness in the new environment, she also designed Gia to always appear in primary colors while the rest of the characters and environment are bathed in rich purples, oranges, and more. 

Aphton noted that the short was produced between February and September 2020 and is a blend of 2D characters placed in a 3D modeled world. This was due to the fact that SparkShorts have a limited timeline and budget. Since the club was going to be populated with so many characters, and have quite a bit of dialogue, she knew there wouldn’t be the resources to generate enough 3D characters. 

This is one of our favorite things about the SparkShorts program – it challenges artists to balance their creative vision against the real-world constraints of time and budgets. This creates decisions where artists have to challenge themselves, lean on their team, and grow their skillsets.

We’re going to be releasing our 1-on-1 interview with Aphton Corbin on September 10 in a separate post, so we don’t give away any spoilers. In the meantime, get ready for Twenty Something to hit Disney+ on September 10 and get ready to chuckle and commiserate with Gia along the way.