The pandemic has been a time to contemplate everything about life, and everything that happens after it. Thinking about unanswerable questions can be scary, so having depictions of these scary things through a more calming lens is more vital now than ever.

Enter “Soul.”

“Soul” is the latest Disney-Pixar collaboration, centered around a jazz musician and music teacher named Joe, voiced by legendary actor Jamie Foxx. I hate to break it to you now, but Joe doesn’t have the most pleasant of outcomes when he enters the scene. In fact, (and this isn’t a spoiler! It happens within the first ten minutes, I promise!) after what seems to be turning out as the best day of his life, he dies. But what is his loss is our gain: Joe finds himself on a path to the Great Beyond, and as he tries to find his way back to Earth, we find out what it really means to be alive.

Don’t worry, this is no “Up”-styled Pixar tear-jerker! If I need to prove it to you, know this: the other main character in the story, a soul that Joe must mentor in order to return to earth, is voiced by the ever-hilarious Tina Fey, writer of the movie “Mean Girls” and longtime “Saturday Night Live” contributor. At one point, Soul 22, Tina’s character, finds her way into Joe’s human body, and learns everything from what pizza tastes like to how the New York subway operates. 

This is the movie to watch with your roommates during the weekend after you’ve played every board game in your apartment. Instead of scrolling through TikTok for another two hours, might I suggest watching a movie that will remind you why life is beautiful, even if it doesn’t always seem that way?

Stream “Soul” now on Disney Plus.

Featured Image courtesy of PaulvilleMOCs via Flickr Creative Commons.