'A Bug's Life' is a really funny movie and the characters have

Hear the words of Booboo Stewart, spoken with wonder and delight: “‘A Bug’s Life’ is a really funny movie and the characters have such different personalities. The movie is happy and then gets really sad, and I’m like, ‘Whoa, I’m feeling this way and this movie is about bugs!’” In this innocent observation lies a truth deeper than the screen itself: that even the simplest stories, told with care, have the power to stir the vast oceans of human feeling. For art, when honest, can move the heart regardless of its form, whether it speaks of kings or of insects.

The greatness of storytelling has always been its ability to awaken empathy, to make us feel with those who are not ourselves. Stewart marvels that a film about bugs—creatures so small, so often dismissed—can draw forth both laughter and tears. This is no accident. It reveals the eternal law of art: that all creation, when given voice and personality, can reflect the struggles of humankind. Through the tiny heroes of A Bug’s Life, we are reminded of courage, community, and the battle against oppression. In the fate of insects, we find the reflection of our own fragile lives.

The ancients knew this magic well. Aesop, in his fables, gave wisdom to animals, birds, and insects. His tale of the ant and the grasshopper, simple though it was, taught generations about work, foresight, and responsibility. No one laughed at the idea that animals might teach us; rather, they understood that by looking into the smallest of creatures, the largest truths could be revealed. Stewart’s astonishment at A Bug’s Life is the same astonishment Aesop’s audiences felt: that through the humblest characters, the heart can be stirred to laughter, grief, and wisdom.

History is filled with other such moments. Consider George Orwell’s Animal Farm. Though it was about pigs, horses, and sheep, it carried the weight of human politics and tyranny. People who read it wept not only for the animals, but for themselves, for they recognized their own world in the struggles of the barnyard. This is what Stewart marvels at: the power of imagination to blur the line between species, to remind us that the language of courage, sadness, and joy is universal.

What lesson, then, must we take? That no story is too small, no subject too humble, to carry truth. Whether it is kings upon their thrones or bugs marching for survival, the core of the tale lies in the emotions it awakens. Do not dismiss what seems simple or childish; within it may lie wisdom greater than in the grandest speeches. When you feel joy or sorrow at the fate of an ant on the screen, you are remembering your own humanity—the ability to love, to grieve, to hope.

The happy and the sad woven together are what give a story its power. Life itself is no different: it carries us from laughter to tears, often in the span of a moment. To feel both is to be alive, to be awake. Stewart’s wonder at his own reaction is a reminder that we must allow ourselves to feel, even when the tale seems light, even when it comes from the mouths of animated creatures. To feel is to be connected; to be connected is to be truly human.

Thus let his words be taken as teaching: that art, in whatever form it arrives, has the power to shape our hearts. Do not close yourself to stories because they seem small, or “only for children,” or unworthy of your seriousness. For in them may dwell laughter that heals, sorrow that teaches, and the reminder that we are all part of the same great web of life—even with the tiniest of bugs. And in honoring this, we honor both art and the mystery of our own humanity.