Rise of the Guardians: The Untold Story of The Last Light

Rise of the Guardians: The Untold Story of The Last Light is a 2013 direct-to-disc traditional-animated action-adventure fantasy comedy-drama film produced by Amblimation and The Kennedy/Marshall Company. Distributed by Universal Pictures Home Entertainment and released July 16, 2013 on Blu-Ray and DVD, the film's main plot concerns two characters, Jack Frost and Jamie Bennett. Both characters have to deal with the reality of how cruel some adults can be to young children.

The movie was originally written to be a television movie/series pilot in four episode-length segments. The four segments (all of them are written by eight people) are titled "Portrait of a Child", "Breaking Apart is Easy to Do", "Leggo My Child-O", and "Jay and Jamie's Excellent Adventure".

While it did receive positive reviews for it's writing, animation, and voice acting, it also generated a significant amount of criticism and controversy from various media organizations and critics for it's portrayal of child abuse which, unusually for a studio like Amblimation, is portrayed in a very serious manner.

These four episodes aired as the four-part premiere of Rise of the Guardians: The Series. NBC aired the edited, shortened and separated versions of the four segments on September 19, 2013. It also had several scenes cut out, new scenes put in, and other scenes altered to make it more appropriate for broadcast on television.

Plot

Portrait of a Child

During the first day of spring break, Jack Frost visits Burgess to bring snow to town and to cure every child's boredom. While he is doing just that, Jamie and his friends decide to play a game of manhunt, but the former ends up going too far from his friends and meets two strangers who parked their van next to the park. The men try to persuade Jamie into going to the van by telling him that his mother is injured, but he refuses to. When Jamie's friends call out to him, the two men capture him and drive away, Jack Frost tries to stop them but ends up failing in the process, and Sophie ends up speaking briefly with the kidnappers before cutting her off.

The Bennett household calls the FBI to hopefully get Jamie back, but when they arrive, they say that the person must be missing for ninety-six hours before they could take action. (They also add that if Jamie isn't found before that time is up, he might vanish forever.) However, they are unable to act. Concerned by the government's actions, Pippa and Monty overhear this and collaborate with Cupcake and Sophie (who is trying to cope with her brother's disappearance) that they should act themselves.

Sneaking into a computer lab at school, the four decide to use Google Earth to trace Jamie and find a satellite image of him being grabbed by two strangers from earlier. Camouflaging themselves in the forest and confronting them with a picture of Jamie, Cupcake gets the men to reveal where they took him (complete with an address). The four children rush to an apartment where they think that he is being kept hostage, but when they find a person wearing Jamie's clothes, he reveals that he was taken away to a secret child slave auction in Miami.

On their way to the auction, Monty slips inside with Sophie, Pippa and Cupcake all dressed up as a trio of victims but as they try to hide, the three girls are caught and are entered in the auction. They end up putting on a show where they dance to Tchaikovsky's Waltz of the Flowers. This forces Monty to buy them, but all four are discovered to be frauds when confronted to pay. As the four children become chained in an underground basement, Cupcake breaks free and overpowers the captors with the pipes they are chained to while Sophie finishes them off.

As they exit, they spot Jamie being rushed away in a box and try to intercept but the people who bought him evade them and rush the box into town. Stealing both a motorcycle and car, the four decide to split up in two's and try to find him. When the box is opened, Jamie finds himself delivered to a young man who is setting up some stuff in his own house and refuses to be his slave. The young man reveals that he bought him not to be a slave but to be in the night of the town and introduces him to some of his friends who are attending this event. The man convinces Jamie that if he declines to stay any longer he will be driven home by him. The young boy agrees to stay and is able to re-dress himself but ends up becoming interrupted by his friends and sister who are overjoyed to see him.

Jack Frost also reunites with the little boy but is intercepted by Tooth, Bunny and Sandy who are angry at him for bolting away like that. All of them are cornered by the Miami police department. Jamie tells the officers that it's okay and that there is nothing to worry about. He also tells them about the events that led him here and lets the police use a neuralizer on not only him but everyone who was with him, blanking memories of his own involvement in the process, and taking him and his friends/sister to a hospital before taking the five back to their home safely. 

Back in Burgess, the families are happy to see their children again. However, in the Bennett household, Jamie tells his mom that he realized his own lonely existence in the world and wishes that there were some people (apart from his friends) that he could relate to. At the end, he says that it is good to be back home and that the events that happened to him would not have any long-term repercussions.

Breaking Apart is Easy to Do

Several hours after the police use a neuralizer on them, Jack Frost is the last to wake up and panics about where Jamie is. Toothiana and Bunnymund calm him down and tell him that he's safe at home with his mom and sister. They also told him that his friends were in grave danger but North told them the good news that they are fine. Jack slowly breaks down into tears and says that it was his fault. North, Tooth and Bunny protest that it's not his fault. Jack yells out that they don't know what he thought these people were going to do to Jamie and tells them about what happened when trying to save him and that they were trying to violate the rules that North recently told him never to do. He soon erupts into a mixture of anger and grief as he explains that, while it seems to him that the Guardians aren't aware that actions have consequences on others and that they don't seem to care about children, he cares about his first believer more than anything and when he loses him in the future, he will be left alone as a nobody. This bursts him into tears. After a few seconds, North tells him, "Do you want to talk about it?". Jack yells out a long and aggressive "NO!" in response.

Meanwhile, after being persuaded into buying a Smart TV, Jamie attempts to forget everything about the kidnappers, but Jack Frost goads him into seeing a counselor. After a lengthy talk with said counselor, he tries to look for a bodyguard for protection, but no one ends up taking the job knowing that they would have to face the three kidnappers. Unable to cope with the fact that the world is getting more and more unfair, Jamie decides to go into hiding and tries to accept saying to Jack that the world is big and he is little. However, three men, who are obviously the kidnappers using different clothes as disguises, offer to take the job, intending to lead him to a place where they can violate him with no other witnesses. Jamie, who is oblivious to their identity, hires them.

However, Jamie needs to run his mom's errands first. They are faced by every possible delay, and when they get to his house, he realizes that his mom has the keys. Keith, one of the kidnappers, suggests entering through the window, but it is too high for them to reach, so they ask Jamie to form a human tower with him on top. He does so but when he gets across, he mentions that the windows are jammed. Keith, Tim, and Eric, who are now moving a trampoline, tell him to jump but when he does this, the canvas separates from the frame and wraps around him. Tim tells Keith that using a paperclip could get them into his house, which infuriates him. The three bodyguards unwrap Jamie, lock the doors and try to choke him. The lights then turn on, revealing a bodyguard surprise party.

Jamie asks them how they knew, with Starling, the police officer and his mom's friend saying that they did what the invitations told them to do. The party goes on for a considerable length of time. After the party ends and the four are alone, the strangers try to violate him, but Monty shows up for an odd reason. Keith tries to get rid of him, saying that he could be one of the kidnappers in disguise. Monty then thinks that he is a kidnapper, which makes him break through a window and run away to turn himself in. Jamie is confused upon realizing Monty was one of the kidnappers. Keith, enraged, reveals their true identities and intentions by removing their disguises. However, he fails to understand, and is amazed by how well they were able to put clothes under their disguises. Eric yells at him by telling that the clothes were fakes that they bought at a party store. Jack Frost returns overhearing the word "party".

Annoyed and frustrated, the three kidnappers run away and Jamie tries to go after them, saying that he still needs protection from a bunch of "bodyguards". The three manage to escape but end up getting a call from their boss who gives them an earful. Meanwhile, A bunch of convicts escape from the state penitentiary and decide to hold up the Burgess pharmacy to get the money they need. Laura and Sophie accidentally intervene, knocking them out in the process. At the same time, Kevin (one of the police officers) is there and gives her a chance at becoming the next police officer. Laura instantly becomes popular, causing Kevin to become jealous of her fame. The next day, Kevin attempts to sabotage Laura's job, which leads up to the head of the police department dismissing him.

Deciding to follow Jack Frost's way of coping, (after losing the so-called "bodyguards") Jamie takes up drinking to calm himself. It starts with the usual madness like soda and nothing more, but as time flies, things spiral out of control for him. Jack Frost, seeking a way to cure his first believer, takes him to a night of drinking and chaos at the Burgess bar. Afterwards, Jamie attempts to go sledding back home and ends up crashing into the wall of the bar. Knowing that Jamie is Laura's son, Kevin takes advantage of the situation and presents footage of the accident at the police station. Laura is fired and Kevin is rehired as the top police officer. The next morning when Jamie recovers from last night's antics, his mom tells him that he is going to school tomorrow.

Televised version and changes

NBC aired the movie on September 19, 2013. As foretold in the audio commentary, many scenes were heavily edited and/or altered:

Scenes cut from TV:

• Jamie being dragged away by kidnappers after Eric says that he's not going anywhere.
• A few scenes from "Portrait of a Child" were edited out via commercial breaks:
  • Jamie trying and failing to escape the kidnappers who use tranquilizer gas to "shut him up".
  • Jack Frost recovering and frantically telling the Guardians what happened to him.
  • North telling Sandy, Tooth, and Bunny to look for Jack Frost after he bolts away from them to rescue his first believer.
  • Jamie being electrocuted by Keith with a taser and passing out before Keith tells Tim and Eric about their plan.
• A scene from "Breaking Apart is Easy to Do" is edited out via commercial break.
  • Jamie and his "bodyguards" doing his mom's errands.

Main changes from the Blu-Ray and DVD:

• The intermission between "Leggo My Child-O" and "Jay and Jamie's Excellent Adventure" was created especially for this movie.
• The opening credits are replaced by the intro to Rise of the Guardians: The Series and are shown at the beginning of each part. Each part is closed by the end credits.
• Some transition effects and music were altered to fit as regular episodes.

Small changes from the Blu-Ray and DVD:

• The first few gags of Jack Frost bringing snow to Burgess and Jamie talking to Caleb and Claude about what they are doing during spring break were cut, going straight to Pippa telling everyone if they want to play manhunt.
• Several shots of the FBI rushing through Burgess were cut.
• Jamie wondering if there's someone exactly like him, and then the cutaway to Jay over in Ohio.
• The "long-term repercussions" bit was cut from TV. However, the boss's scene was not cut, and a minor animation was added to mention him. Right before he shows up, Jamie takes a paper he found out of his pocket with phone numbers written on it, and Jamie's additional line is "I wish that I could remember where I ended up last night, and who added these odd phone numbers in."
• Jack wondering where Sandy is and Toothiana telling him that he is with Jamie.

Miscellaneous scenes cut from TV:

• Jack Frost finding the van the kidnappers drove with Jamie deserted, breaking him down to tears until he finds a paper saying that there is a child slave auction in Miami. Jack becomes angry and flies off into the horizon.
• Jack Frost and Jamie playing around with arcade games at the Burgess bar.

Scenes not on Blu-Ray and DVD:

The televised episodes also contained scenes not featured on the Blu-Ray and DVD:

• "Leggo My Child-O" begins with a "Previously on..." segment that showcases action-packed events which never actually occurred.