Just going to make a goofy kids' movie

"Do you think God hides in heaven because he, too, is afraid of his creations?"

Still can't fucking believe that line was from a Spy Kids movie...

Also just the fact that Machete - sorry, Uncle Machete - is a character in these kids movies.

IIRC some even worked for free/way below their regular pay. It was just a fun project to be part of

The scenes of Clooney as the President in Spy Kids 3 were allegedly shot by Clooney in a day in his own living room with a camcorder he just had lying around.
There's no free in Hollywood because of the screen actors guild, but they can opt to work for the minimum.

See also: the postmodern piece of kino known as Hoodwinked!, which somehow managed to grab Anne Hathaway, Glenn Close, Jim Belushi, Patrick Warburton, Xzibit on a microbudget without the help of any major studio.

Patrick Warburton is the only one on that list who was actually on board with the film in its small budget phase. The rest came aboard after the Weinstein Company stepped in to be the distributor.
Picking up movies that were already finished for cheap and then using industry connections and capital to forcefully inject more star power into the voice cast is apparently something the Weinsteins did several times. They did the same thing to The Magic Roundabout (marketed in America as Doogal).
Funnily enough, getting the Weinsteins involved with Hoodwinked! in the first place was a chance encounter made possible by Robert Rodriguez's wife.
Weinstein company jumpscare
- Not available in Canada 😮‍💨

They all worked with him before. So they knew it was Rodriguez’ passion project and did him a favor. Probably also a great director to work with.

Danny Trejo describes being on his films as a kind of family reunion for a lot of Latino actors and actresses

I'm almost certain everyone in the whole series, including Rodriguez are all high on acid. The thing is a giant fever dream

Including the kids? 😳
- No, being a kid is trippy enough already.

Music by Danny Elfman. Huh

With a name like that, he better be famous for Christmas soundtracks.
- Well, he did The Nightmare Before Christmas as well as most of Tim Burton's other films. Along with tons of other things.

I can't imagine many more projects tondonjust for fun.
Thats a lot of Elijah woods horror roles, things that looked fun.
So I'm sure that's why they did it

Yeah and even when actors get paid "low sums" it's usually like six figures still, at least regarding projects like Spy Kids.
And even if it was "just" five figures, if its above 50k and last less than a year to film, it's more than most people make and the actors who do these aren't exactly broke to begin with.
Orlando Bloom "only" got 175k for the lotr trilogy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0nHeZgepNw
If someone paid me 175k to fuck about as an elf in New Zealand for 438 days, I'd be willing to suck their dick on the spot. And I don't generally like sucking dick too much.
- Orlando Bloom “only” got 175k for the lotr trilogy.
  I'd say I feel bad for him considering how much money the LOTR trilogy pulled and how great he was in it (like everyone tbh), but at least he got a lot of recognition for it, being pretty much unknown to the world before LOTR and getting a lead role in Pirates right after.