Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

a stork. a cloud. and a lot of dangerous babies. result - a touching film. first - for idea - the classic stork as messenger of special babies maker. second - for the impossible mission of eccentric team between good intentions of cloud and the unhappy but full of good intentions stork. not the least, the fireworks of imagination reflected by the chain of not ordinary animals. so, a soft, lovely film.

The clouds create cute babies and the storks deliver them. Gus is a gray cloud who keeps producing babies that aren't the easiest to deliver. Peck is the stork tasked to deliver them. First, it's a crocodile which almost bites his head off. Next, it's a ram which packs quite a punch. He gets pricked by the porcupine and the shark is simply too much. Peck flies away but he returns with helmet and pads to take on the dangerous babies. Although the protection may not save him from the electric eel. The premise may work for little kids but it's not quite as good for anybody older. It's not as charming as it wants to be although it is a cute idea.

As we all know, babies of all types are delivered by storks, which collect them from their point of creation (in the clouds) and carry them in bundles to the ground. Of course you have you r cute creatures like puppies and kittens, but one stork works with a slightly less fun cloud where the creatures tend to be of a more "jagged" nature. Over time the working conditions that the stork has to endure appears to put a strain of the working relationship.This short preceded Up in the cinemas and continues Pixar's tradition of having a supporting short film for their releases (a tradition that I'm all in favour of and still maintain that more "live action" releases should do it too). This slot has seen some very good animated short films and it must be said that Partly Cloudy is not really one of the better ones that they have done. Of course, as with nearly all things Pixar, one of their outputs being slightly below their normal standard still means that it is very good by normal standards, and so it is with Partly Cloudy.In terms of content it is a relatively straightforward short with physical comedy providing all of the four or five laughs it has. This is not a complaint though because it is only a short film and as such it does do the job of being amusing by delivering these solid laughs in a short time. Of greater note that the specific laughs is the concept itself. The stork aspect is an old one but the whole idea is well brought to life by the design and the animation and it was this spirit of invention and creativity behind the laughs that I enjoyed.Not Pixar's strongest moment in terms of their feature-supporting short films and a bit simple in terms of substance but the design and concept is imaginative and generally it is still funny and enjoyable with physical comedy sight gags.

As of late, the Pixar shorts haven't been up to scratch as they used to be.The first big indication of this was with 2003's flop Boundin', which even the narrator knew it was a bore. The story seemed to be Pixar's bare minimum and the visuals just seemed generic.Jack-Jack Attack was a huge improvement, and no doubt it was destined to be, having taken the whole scene out of the actual film. Therefore the dialogue was riveting, the visuals were superb and it was very enjoyable. Of course, being an extract from the movie, it lacked in an original short and to be honest compared to most of the previous shorts, it was pale in comparison.One Man Band was a nice idea, but it was executed messily and the music got a-bit irritating in the end, but I liked the story here and the characters, but it generally was a step down from Jack-Jack Attack.Mater and the Gaslight featured like Jack-Jack Attack - characters from a main Pixar movie, but it wasn't an extract it was actually an original short. Now I must admit that I enjoy Cars, but this short was just so...mediocre and to be honest - pointless. Of course not as bad as Boundin', it did contain an engaging humorous story after all..Lifted, was a new short not based on any Pixar movie, but it confirmed my fears that the Pixar shorts were slowly dying in quality.This was further confirmed by Your Friend The Rat and Presto - whilst the rat one was quite informative and taught me many things I didn't even know about rats - it was too long and as a result boring. Presto was just an overdose of slapstick and frankly almost as bad as Boundin' BURN-E was cute and much better than the previous two shorts, but again it was quite weak in story and humour. Although I did like how incorporated the character into the film itself.So on forth to Partly Cloudly - absolute visual joy to watch not only in the stunning animation, but the cuteness of it all. The story was very interesting and I really rooted for the characters and the short had some of the best music I'd heard from a Pixar short for a long time.Like the title says best Pixar short since Mike's New Car, and has drawn me back to wanting to go to the cinema to see them rather than dreading their appearance. In total great short and if you're a fan of the 80s, 90s and even early 00s Pixar shorts, I'm certain that this'll keep you back on track to adoring them again!