D23 Announces A Plethora Of New Movies And Shows

Gabriel Anton, Staff Writer

Disney’s D23 Expo, a special fan convention akin to their own version of Comic-Con gives supporters an inside look into the future of the multi-billion dollar film & show industry. 

There the past, present and future of Disney entertainment are celebrated and presented to their millions of fans. It is a three-day event, named after the year when Walt Disney founded the company (1923). There, executives from every major film production studio under the Disney umbrella will have the opportunity to share updates on upcoming film and television projects.

They will also share special looks at their most anticipated ventures. Their most prolific productions are often attached to studios like Marvel, Lucasfilm, Pixar and now 21st Century Fox. D23 is quickly becoming one of the year’s most popular film industry-related events. This is the result of news about the latest Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and “Star Wars” films popping up in social media every two years. This has led Disney to foster more billion-dollar films each year.  

This billion-dollar standard started with Disney’s most recent batch of MCU films, each consistently grossing over $1 billion. As the year comes to an end, they are expecting their final chapter to the “Skywalker Saga in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” to follow the trend. But this year from August 23 to 25, Disney announced much more, leaving their fans overabundant in entertainment satisfaction.

After the massive success of “Game of Thrones” (last season included), Disney has decided to adopt a less theatric approach to their biggest properties going into the next few years. This year they announced the launch of their brand new streaming platform called Disney+. On this Netflix-rivaling $10 a month film and television service, Disney is looking to expand the universes of “Star Wars” and Marvel into several mini-series’.

The MCU, whose 23 film longitude has grossed the mega-studio $22.5 billion over 11 years, is going to continue its next phase of storytelling in the form of many hero-centric mini-series’. The new slate of MCU series’ will look to further the stories of the Avengers from Endgame in various genre-bending shows. These include: “Hawkeye,” “Loki,” “WandaVision,” “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” and “What If…?” These are all set to release on Disney+, but they won’t coincide with the streaming service’s launch on November 12 of this year. Instead, they are set to begin releasing them late next year and into 2021. Some other surprising announcements included the production of shows for “Moon Knight,” “Ms. Marvel” and “She-Hulk.”

On top of these shows, the MCU will appropriately continue their film releases with “Black Widow,”  “The Eternals,”  “Shang-Chi: The Legend of the Ten Rings,” “Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness” and “Thor: Love and Thunder” between May 2020 and November 2021.

Further down the line “Blade” starring two-time Oscar winner Mahershala Ali, “Black Panther 2” and an untitled “Fantastic Four” project was announced.  

With these new shows and films, Disney is looking to diversify the Marvel Universe by using genres that have not commonly been associated with comic-book films. “Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness” is said to be the first-ever horror MCU film, “WandaVision” is set to be a superhero sitcom, “The Eternals” will delve into a purely fantastical element and “What If…?” will explore how the universe would have unfolded if certain details in the films were tweaked through the style of animation.

Additionally, “Shang-Chi…” will feature their first Asian superhero while “Black Widow” will be the first superhero without special powers to be explored in a solo film. Although there have been comic-book films in the past that have touched upon these concepts, the MCU under Disney has solidified itself as the gold standard of this genre and has given new a definition to the art of genre-bending.

In similar context with the MCU, “Star Wars” has also embarked on the Disney+ series journey with three new shows announced. They will be centered around three defining eras in the “Star Wars” timeline. “The Mandalorian,” set between the events of “Return of the Jedi” and “The Force Awakens,” will debut alongside the launch of Disney+ while a new series revolving around Obi-Wan Kenobi starring the celebrated original actor Ewan McGregor is set to start production early next year. Another series centered around the popular character of Cassian Andor from “Rogue One” is set to be released next year, as well as the final season of the “Clone Wars.”  

But beside these eye-popping, ever popular blockbuster films, Disney still has a significant amount of entertainment to offer from their home Disney Studios and Pixar. The next few films developed from Pixar were announced this year, including “Frozen 2,” “Onward” starring the voice talents of Chris Pratt, Tom Holland, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and Octavia Spencer and “Soul” by Pete Docter of “Monsters Inc.,” “Up” and “Inside Out.” To add to their live-action Disney classic slate, “Maleficent: Mistress of Evil” starring Angelina Jolie, “Lady and the Tramp,” “Mulan,” “Cruella” starring Emma Stone and “The Little Mermaid” were announced to be released in the next few years. Among these were a few Disney produced live-action films of various genres and plot lines. 

Coupled with these new films comes a plethora of new Disney+ series from Disney Studios and Pixar. Hillary Duff will reprise her role as Lizzie McGuire in the sequel series, taking place in modern-day. “High School Musical” is coming back as a series, exploring East High with completely new characters. A show following a new character from “Toy Story 4,” “Forky asks a Question” will debut with the service along with “Monsters at Work,” a show set in the Monsters Inc. universe described as a workplace comedy following the events of the 2001 film. 

To say that the three days of D23 this year were full of excitement and surprise is an understatement. Disney+ is looking to be a titan in the upcoming streaming wars with Amazon, Netflix and even Apple TV+. We are now seeing the world of film transition into the digital world of television as more and more film properties are being broken up into series.

With many of the most popular film franchises under the umbrella of Disney, it looks like Disney+ won’t have any trouble being on top, not to mention that the Hulu slate is also included in their services. Whether or not this does happen, Disney fans will be excited to witness this very expansive future.