Pixar Addresses Future Disney+ Movie Projects

Pixar’s president discussed his gut feelings about Disney+. Yesterday, Bloomberg reported that Pixar was mulling the idea of a reboot for popular franchises like The Incredibes and Finding Nemo. Now, there are some quotes from Jim Morris about staying away from releasing big movies on the streaming platform. Disney+ enjoyed the launches of Soul, Luca and Turning Red during the last few years. While all of these titles reviewed well, and audiences largely inside remember them well, they didn’t get to enjoy much box office success. Now, Morris is hoping that their new crop of films, starting with Inside Out 2 will not have to pass that hurdle.

“I hope that we will not release another feature film on Disney+,” Pixar President Jim Morris told the outlet. “If we do more stuff for Disney+, it should be a series, and then that makes a clean demarcation between what we do for theaters and what we do for streaming.”

A lot of this comes from the box office perception around some of Pixar’s recent releases. Clearly, the studio is considering taking a trip down memory lane if Inside Out 2 doesn’t perform better than titles like Elemental and Lightyear. (You could probably toss Soul and Turning Red in there as well. Although, they got shuffled off to Disney+ because of executive mandates rather than box office performance.) Disney and its studios are doing everything possible to orient people back towards theaters and massive IP reboots would be the sort of thing nostalgia-driven viewers would turn up for. Keep in mind that it’s been a long while since The Incredibles or Finding Nemo graced multiplexes. 

Disney Leaning Even Further Into Franchises

Disney has not been shy about the idea of leaning into the franchises that made it such a juggernaut in the present. This goes beyond Pixar, but those massive animated features have been talked about a lot with the CEO and other decision makers. Earlier this year, during an investor call, Bob Iger told shareholders that they could expect Toy Story 5, Frozen 3, and a new Zootopia movie all on deck for the next few years. If this Finding Nemo comes to pass, you should also expect that in the near future too.

Iger told the collected press and shareholders, “And today, I’m so pleased to announce that we have sequels in the works from our animation studios to some of our most popular franchises: Toy Story, Frozen, and Zootopia. We’ll have more to share about this production soon, but this is a great example of how we’re leaning into our unrivaled brands and franchises.”

“And so, with that goal in mind, we will focus even more on our core brands and franchises, which have consistently delivered higher returns. We will aggressively curate our general entertainment content,” the executive continued. “We will reassess all markets we have launched in and also determine the right balance between global and local content. We’ll adjust our pricing strategy, including a full examination of our promotional strategies.”

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