Chris Tarsitano, sophomore mechanical engineering major, discusses the Pixar Theory at the Student Union on Wednesday night.
Phillip Mora Howard
Music filled the air as students prepared for a movie-filled Pixar Night hosted by the Happiest Club on Earth at UCF Student Union on Wednesday.
As students entered the room around 6:30 p.m., speakers played songs from many Pixar movies such as “Turning Red,” “Ratatouille” and “Coco.”
Once attendance was taken, the games began. The first game had students place all the Pixar movies in chronological order to follow a fan-made theory called the Pixar Theory, in which all Pixar movies are connected.
Students kept going back and forth with each other on which movie takes place in which year and how it aligns with the Pixar theory, serving as a challenging yet fun activity for people to get together and use their heads to try to get everything in order to the best of their abilities.
Chris Tarsitano, sophomore mechanical engineering major and vice president of the club, joined the club during his first semester to make friends with whom he could go to Disney theme parks.
“For this semester, I want to try to theme every people to a different aspect of Disney so that everyone’s interests can be included,” Tarsitano said. “Upcoming, we have meetings themed to Marvel, Star Wars and even Disney Channel.”
For the next game, everyone was divided into teams of two, where both minds were put to the test to guess which movies the Pizza Planet Truck appears.
Trevor Ellis, junior mechanical engineering major, and Stefano Ciavaglia, freshman film major, joined together to test the limits of their Pixar knowledge. They named their team “Team Chris,” after the club’s vice president.
“I think these films resonate because so many of them were released when we were kids and they’re still entertaining to us,” Ellis said. “I think nostalgia plays a role as well since a lot of our first memories of the parks and Pixar movies are from years ago.”
Ellis’s and Ciavaglia’s combined knowledge tied them for the lead after the first round of two-person games.
The teams of two stayed united as the next game, a voice-match mania, kicked off. In this game, a pair of voice actors was presented on the screen, and students wrote on a piece of paper who the voice actors were and which Pixar duo they voiced.
“While doing good in classes and getting good grades is important to me, it’s also important to enjoy college and have fun and be with people,” Ciavaglia said. “Everyone’s in a happy upbeat mood, which I think is appropriate for a Disney-themed club.”
The final game was called “Just Keep Singing,” in which event runners played 15 seconds of music from a certain Pixar movie soundtrack, testing teams to figure out which movie the melody originated.
Students discuss how each Pixar movie relates to the Pixar theory at the Student Union on Wednesday night.
Phillip Mora Howard
Victoria Rubio Lebron, freshman marketing major, joined the organization in the fall 2025 semester and now serves as the club’s historian.
“I think Pixar resonates with college students because it’s a childhood most of us shared,” Lebron said. “And it helps connect people who love the same things.”
As the games concluded, points were tallied and the team “Go with the Flow” walked away with the victory, scoring up to 57 points in the Pixar duo game and winning Pixar-themed prizes.
Club leaders held a survey at the end to gather responses from the 20 attendees.
“If you’re considering joining HCOE, it’s a great way to meet people who love Disney movies and parks,” Tarsitano said. “Our meetings are free for everyone to come and go as they please and I highly encourage you to join us for one.”