disney
A 79-Year-Old Doing Hip-Hop? ‘The Simpsons’ Is Where Free Speech Battles Age Bias Claims
As the old saying goes, no business is like show business. For one thing, show business is speech business. But what acts by an entertainment producer are legitimately free speech, and what acts are plain ol’ discrimination? That’s not always clear. Just look at the ongoing case of Alf Clausen, the 79-year-old who was fired as Simpsons composer after 27 years of celebrated work on the animated classic. As his lawsuit heads toward an important hearing next week, Clausen looks to undercut Fox’s positioning that this dispute relates to an important First Amendment issue. Clausen is suing Disney and its Fox divisions with the claim that his termination was due to age and disability discrimination. The musician says he has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and he o...
Why Summer Blockbusters Won’t Ever Go Straight to VOD
Blockbuster Month is celebrating the true titans of the genre. All month long, you’ll read through a variety of features digging deep into the greatest hits of Hollywood, from popcorn classics to underrated gems. Today, Josh Spiegel debates whether the blockbuster will ever eschew the theater experience and go straight to our living rooms. Back at the end of March — remember March? Like, even the concept of the month of March? — my wife informed me that our sister-in-law was being proactive. She was starting an online petition regarding an issue about which she felt passionate. Was it related to the dearth of Covid-19 testing throughout the country? Staggered school re-openings in her state or others in the Union? No, she had begun a petition to exhort the Walt Disney Company to release Mu...
Disney Postpones Next Star Wars Trilogy, Avatar Sequels
As theaters have again pushed their planned opening dates in light of the surging pandemic, Disney has announced a massive shakeup of its upcoming release schedule. The biggest news is that the next Star Wars trilogy and the long-awaited Avatar sequels have all been shoved back, as Variety reports. Disney still plans to stick with a Christmas-timed release pattern for Star Wars . The first in the unspecified trio of new movies set in a galaxy far, far away will now debut on December 22nd, 2023, instead of 2022 as originally planned. Each follow-up has also been pushed a year, with the second coming December 19th, 2025 and the third hitting December 17th 2027. It’s still unclear if these films are connected to the movies rumored to be in the works from Rian Joh...
Whatever Happened to the Movie Theme Park Ride?
Blockbuster Month is celebrating the true titans of the genre. All month long, you’ll read through a variety of features digging deep into the greatest hits of Hollywood, from popcorn classics to underrated gems. Today, Clint Worthington revisits a time when the theme park ride was often a part of the summer blockbuster experience. I was never a big theme park guy. Between my disdain for crowds and heat and the high-level anxiety I get around rollercoasters, suffice to say I never actively sought them out in my early years. Then my eighth-grade school band was invited (like many bands do) to play at Walt Disney World in high school, so off we went to Orlando for a week of chaperoned magic — both there and at Universal Studios Florida. Yes, the rides were fun, the merch was overpriced (albe...
Beyoncé Blessed Us With A New Official Trailer For ‘Black is King’
Source: Dave J Hogan / Getty Beyoncé has made more than a visual album, she made one of the Blackest films Disney+ has in their repertoire. In two weeks, fans will finally get to see what Queen Bey’s new trailer teases for her forthcoming visual album Black Is King. Of course, Jay-Z with friends Naomi Campbell, Kelly Roland, and Lupita Nyong’o make an appearance on the project. By the looks of the trailer, the big wigs at Disney spared no expense to ensure Bey’s project debuts like a blockbuster film. The story in Black Is King reimagines the lessons in the movie The Lion King, where she starred as Simba’s homie Nala in last year’s live-action remake. Via NYPost: “The voyages of Black families throughout time are honored in the tale about a young king’s transcendent journe...
The 100 Greatest Summer Blockbuster Movies of All Time
“Cool.” “Riveting.” “Gripping.” “High-Octane Thrill Ride!” All cliches of film criticism and yet all feelings we’ve experienced while watching a crackerjack summer blockbuster. Oops, there we go again. All things considered, any moviegoer can speak to the divine feeling of sitting in a cool, packed theater in the heat of the summer and being united by narrative. Not just united, but hypnotized, mentally convinced that the fate of the world is before your eyes, and there is nothing more important in that very moment. It’s escapism. It’s popcorn. It’s Chinatown. But also, it’s the power of spectacle. Over the years, Hollywood has certainly run that concept through the ringer, having turned what used to be a summer blockbuster season into, well, an entire calendar year. Now, all those aforeme...
Jude Law in Talks to Play Captain Hook in Disney’s Live-Action Peter Pan & Wendy
17 years after famously losing out on the role of Pirates of the Caribbean’s Will Turner to Orlando Bloom, Jude Law is finally getting a chance to sail the seven seas. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the actor is in talks to play the infamous Captain Hook in Disney’s live-action Peter Pan & Wendy. The latest in Disney’s maddeningly successful series of remakes of classic cartoons, Peter Pan & Wendy updates the 1953 animated feature. David Lowery, who also helmed the studio’s supremely under-appreciated Pete’s Dragon in 2016, is directing from a script he co-wrote with his frequent partner Toby Halbrooks. The pair also shared writing credits on Pete’s Dragon, while Halbrooks produced Lowery’s The Old Man & the Gun and the coronavirus-delayed The Green Kn...
Colin Kaepernick Partners With The Disney Channel For Documentary Series
Source: NEW YORK, NY – DECEMBER 05: Colin Kaepernick receives the SI Muhammad Ali Legacy Award with Beyonce and Trevor Noah during SPORTS ILLUSTRATED 2017 Sportsperson of the Year Show on December 5, 2017 at Barclays Center in New York City. (Photo by Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images for Sports Illustrated) Colin Kaepernick will continue to be a voice for the voiceless but now on a bigger platform. The activist is now partnering with one of the prominent media brands in the world to do so. As spotted on ESPN the former quarterback will be telling a much needed story regarding racial inequality in the United States via a new deal with The Disney Channel. According to the report the conglomerate will also deliver a documentary series on Kaep’s life including his career as a NFL star quarterba...
Ranking: Every Clerks Animated Episode from Worst to Best
Nothing about Kevin Smith’s 1994 cult-classic film Clerks lent itself to making an animated version for ABC. Not the maxed-out credit-card budget, not the grainy, black-and-white cinematography, and surely not the foulmouthed, esoteric nerding out about innocent plumbers dying on the Death Star or how much the average jizz mopper makes working a nudie booth. And yet, thanks to studio politics, the Disney-owned network is exactly where the animated adaptation landed. It was no surprise then when the premiere got bumped back to the pilot graveyard that is summer, only two of the original six episodes aired on the network, and Dante and Randal curtly got told that they weren’t supposed to be there today … or any day for that matter. Editors’ Picks No, Clerks the cartoon dropped dead qui...
What’s Coming to Disney Plus in June 2020
Each month, Consequence of Sound rounds up a full list of new TV and film titles coming to Disney Plus. June 2020 is no exception and should add some much-needed Mouse House whimsy to your living room. The big addition is the worldwide premiere of Artemis Fowl. Directed by Kenneth Branagh and based on the 2001 novel-of-the-same-name, the film was originally intended for theaters before the world turned upside down. Viewers may also be intrigued to see the season finales for both Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian and Be Our Chef. Meanwhile, nostalgics should find solace in revisiting both Schoolhouse Rock and Muppet Babies. Check out the entire list below. However, if you’re looking for more adult selections, you can check out what’s going down at Netflix and keep a look out for our guides on...
Disney’s Kevin Mayer to Become TikTok CEO
Disney veteran Rebecca Campbell will succeed him as chairman of director-to-consumer and international. Kevin Mayer, the Disney executive who oversaw the launch of the streaming service Disney+, is leaving his post at the entertainment giant to become CEO of the fast-growing social media app TikTok. Disney veteran Rebecca Campbell will succeed him as chairman of director-to-consumer and international. “I am very proud of what our extraordinarily talented direct-to-consumer and international team has accomplished in creating and delivering a world-class portfolio of streaming services, particularly Disney+,” Mayer said Monday in a statement. Mayer joins TikTok at a pivotal moment for the app, which is owned by Chinese conglomerate ByteDance. Less than three years old, it has bee...
Disney Working on a National Treasure TV Series
Disney already announced they’re working on a third National Treasure film, but it turns out that’s not all the Mouse House has in store for the goofy historical fiction title. In a new interview with Collider, producer Jerry Bruckheimer revealed plans for a National Treasure TV series that would live on Disney Plus. According to Bruckheimer, the TV show spin-off won’t follow Benjamin Franklin Gates, a.k.a. Nicolas Cage, but rather a “much younger” crew equally committed to undergoing made-up, elaborate, risk-riddled plots to save a watered-down version of American history. “We’re certainly working on one [National Treasure] for streaming and we’re working on one for the big screen. Hopefully, they’ll both come together and we’ll bring you another National Treasure, but...
