FILM · 2000 · USA
Titan A.E.
59 archived facts 5 topics 1 source Last reviewed Oct 2026
All facts (59)
- #001
On June 6, 2000, for a preview screening in Atlanta, the film was transmitted digitally over the internet from the studio to a digital projector in the theater. The film was never touched, making it the first major Hollywood film to be shown publicly in this way.
- #002
A series of prequel novels and a prequel comic book mini-series were released to tie in with the film.
- #003
The film was originally pitched as a live-action movie.
- #004
Because the film's box office returns were not very good, 20th Century Fox shut down its animation studios in Arizona after only two feature films (the other being Anastasia (1997)). Fox later turned to Blue Sky Studios to produce animated films using 3D computer graphics, including Ice Age (2002) and Robots (2005).
- #005
As of 2023, this is Don Bluth's most recent animated feature film. Bluth has remained noncommittal about returning to animated films, but his longtime collaborator Gary Goldman is trying to finance a film based on Bluth's Dragon's Lair (1983) video game.
- #006
(At about 57 minutes) The book the girl reads in the drifter colony is "Robinson Crusoe," the story of a man stranded on an island for 28 years.
- #007
The Death Star is part of the New Bangkok drifter colony.
- #008
This is one of three non-musical Don Bluth films; the other two are The Secret of NIMH (1982) and The Land Before Time (1988) (oddly, all of the latter's MANY direct-to-video/DVD sequels are musicals).
- #009
Although many sentient/intelligent species appear throughout the film, only three besides humans are identified by name: the Drej (the enemies), the Akrennian (Preed's species) and the Gaoul. Production notes and tie-in materials also indicate that Stith is a Mantrin and Gune is a Grepoan.
- #010
A tie-in video game developed by Blitz Games and set to be released after the film's theatrical run was planned; there is even a short message from the creators telling viewers to look out for it when it hits stores. However, after the film's poor box office performance and mixed reviews, the game was later cancelled. The developers did, however, manage to put a demo online.
- #011
The film takes place from 3028 to 3044.
- #012
(At about 50 minutes) As Cale flies the ship through the nebula alongside the awakening angels, they clearly formed a DNA strand just before moving away from the ship.
- #013
According to the novelization, the Drej Mothership is powered by a captured white dwarf star.
- #014
The box office failure of this film led to Bill Mechanic being fired as president of 20th Century Fox. Rumors persist that Fox owner Rupert Murdoch fired Mechanic for greenlighting Fight Club (1999), which Murdoch despised, and that the box office failure of Titan A.E. (2000) was the last straw.
- #015
The fate of Korso and Tek at the end of the film was deliberately left ambiguous by the filmmakers, allowing the audience to decide whether they live or die.
- #016
Cale bears a striking resemblance to Dmitri in Anastasia (1997). Don Bluth directed and supervised the animation on both films.
- #017
This is Don Bluth's bloodiest film, with characters shot and impaled. One is blown up and turned into a pile of green goo. Another bleeds heavily in zero gravity and the blood splatters everywhere.
- #018
This marked John Leguizamo's first voice role in a film. He went on to voice Sid the Sloth in the Ice Age films, Alex the Alexornis in Walking with Dinosaurs 3D (2013), Bruno in Encanto (2021) and Anteater Antony in Zootopia 2 (2025).
- #019
The film was originally set for release in 1999, but after its release dates were lost to other animated films such as The Iron Giant (1999), the English dub of Pokémon: The First Movie - Mewtwo Strikes Back (1998), South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut (1999) and Toy Story 2 (1999), it was pushed to 2000.
- #020
Korso tells Cale to exhale when they are exposed to the vacuum of space. Most people now know that humans do not simply explode in that environment; far fewer are aware that if there is air in your lungs, the loss of external pressure in space will cause the lungs to expand and rupture from the inside.
- #021
(At about 5 minutes) The Arctic is Ground Zero for the Drej's Earth-destroying laser.
- #022
The film's working title was "Planet Ice".
- #023
The film's trailer features Creed's song "Higher".
- #024
This is the second film to feature both Nathan Lane and Jim Cummings; the other was The Lion King (1994), which was Lane's first animated film and also featured Cummings in the main voice cast.
- #025
This is one of two Bill Pullman films about an alien invasion, the other being Independence Day (1996).
- #026
Titan is the name of the spaceship at the center of the plot, while A. E. stands for After Earth.
- #027
This was the last Don Bluth film before Morris F. Sullivan's death in 2008.
- #028
This was Matt Damon's first voice role in a film. He went on to voice the title character of Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002) (though only in first-person narration), Krill Bill in Happy Feet Two (2011) and Flower in IF (2024).
- #029
Drew Barrymore and Roger L. Jackson both appeared in Scream (1996). Jackson voiced Ghostface, who terrorizes Barrymore's character over the phone.
- #030
The film appears to be a futuristic reimagining of the story of Noah's Ark. The Titan is the "ark" holding the DNA of all life forms on Earth, and Cale is the "Noah" whose purpose is to use the Titan to rebuild a new world.
- #031
Matt Damon voices Cale Tucker, the stranded-in-space protagonist whose destiny is to find a new planet for humanity. Fifteen years later, Damon would star in The Martian (2015), playing an astronaut stranded on Mars fighting to survive.
- #032
Hank Azaria, Richard Kind, Austin Pendleton, John Stamos and Tom Arnold were considered for the role of the Sun.
- #033
Drew Barrymore named this film, along with Batman Forever (1995), among the films she should never have done.
- #034
A shower scene and brief nude shots of Cale and Akima were added to raise the film's rating to PG.
- #035
This was Drew Barrymore's first voice role in a film. She later voiced Maggie in Curious George (2006) and Chloe the Chihuahua in Beverly Hills Chihuahua (2008).
- #036
This was the first film Matt Damon appeared in, or in this case did voice work for, that dealt with space and the future. The fourth came after Elysium (2013) and Interstellar (2014), with The Martian (2015).
- #037
Michael J. Fox was offered the lead voice role in both this film and Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001). He left the decision to his son Sam Fox, who chose the latter.
- #038
The film's failure not only led Fox to shut down its brand-new animation studio months before release, but it was also the last straw for Don Bluth, who, after years of frustration in Hollywood, quit filmmaking to focus on stage productions at his home in Scottsdale, Arizona.
- #039
Hank Azaria was originally set to appear in the film as an unknown character.
- #040
This was the first collaboration with Jim Cummings and David L. Lander since Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988).
- #041
Janeane Garofalo takes on a fully voice-acting role in an animated film for the first time. She had previously voiced Ursula in Kiki's Delivery Service (1989), and would go on to voice Bridget the Giraffe in The Wild (2006) and Colette in Ratatouille (2007).
- #042
This was Jim Breuer's first voice role in a film. He later went on to voice the crow in Zookeeper (2011) and Mr. Glump in Bling (2016).
- #043
This is the second theatrically released 20th Century Fox animated film, outside of the credits, to feature veteran voice actors as part of the main cast; in this case, that applies to Jim Cummings in the role of Chowquin (though he is mentioned in the group listing section without character images). The first was The Pagemaster (1994), in which he appeared alongside Frank Welker.
- #044
After the film performed terribly in its opening weekend, Fox pulled all of the film's advertising, sealing its fate as a box-office failure.
- #045
The film, in which Earth is destroyed by an alien race, is set in the 31st century; this is also the period in which Fox's animated sitcom Futurama (1999) is set.
- #046
Sarah Michelle Gellar was considered to voice Akima.
- #047
Reese Witherspoon was considered to voice Akima.
- #048
Jean Smart was considered to voice Akima.
- #049
Christiane Hörbiger was considered to voice Akima.
- #050
This is the only Don Bluth film featuring David L. Lander, John Cygan and Rodger Bumpass while Cygan was alive.
- #051
According to the DVD's behind-the-scenes featurette, Drew Barrymore played Akima as a more feminine and inexperienced/naive character. The directors ultimately decided they were not happy with this, and the lines were re-recorded (or in some cases cut and rewritten). In an interview, Barrymore implied she preferred the original characterization.
- #052
Production cost an estimated $75–90 million and grossed only $36.8 million at the box office. According to the film's supervising producer Christopher Meledandri, the film lost Fox $100 million.
- #053
Christopher Scarabosio, an assistant sound designer at Skywalker Sound, provides the voices of the Drej and the Drej Queen. As of 2023, this is Scarabosio's only major voice role.
- #054
Although the film itself, its later DVD releases and its vanilla digital releases upend this, you will have difficulty finding digital or physical releases of the soundtrack or the numerous tie-in novels published to promote the film. Titan A.E. also holds the distinction of being the last animated film released on LaserDisc.
- #055
Don Bluth tended to be responsible for low-key fantasy animated films, usually involving animal characters, rather than a space opera. In fact, he and Gary Goldman were not the original directors.
- #056
The film is accused of putting the final nail in the coffin of the period from the late 1980s through the 1990s when more mature, artistic animation dominated much of the media. Its inability to be defined either as a film for children or as a film for mature audiences, along with executives' excessive interference over budget and time constraints, led the studio to lose $100 million.
- #057
This was Nathan Lane's first animated film in which he played the villain rather than a comic relief character.
- #058
Gary Goldman said the team was proud of Titan A.E. but that making the film was not a fun experience. The film put its producers and directors into production 18 months later, by which point they had already spent 30 million dollars and had only pre-production drawings to show. Don and Gary decided to start the film from scratch, and it was given a budget of 55 million dollars and 19 months to be completed, while creative executives caused the team many problems through to the end of the film. And halfway through the film, Fox abandoned hand-drawn animation and decided to focus on CG films such as Ice Age (2002), which would lead to Bluth's animation unit closing before the film was even released.
- #059
Akima is a woman of Asian origin voiced by Drew Barrymore, who is entirely white.
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