Wish Writer and Producer Jennifer Lee Talks Disney Easter Eggs

Wish is Walt Disney Animation Studios’ latest film, and it was released to honor the company’s 100th anniversary. While the movie has gotten mixed reactions, earning a 50% critics score and 82% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, there’s plenty for hardcore Disney fans to enjoy. In fact, Wish features a lot of nods to Disney’s last 100 years. There are plenty of easter eggs throughout the film in addition to a tribute to every animated Disney movie that came before during the end credits. ComicBook.com recently had the chance to chat with Jennifer Lee, the Chief Creative Officer at the company and the co-writer of Wish. During the chat, we asked how the easter eggs were chosen.

“No,” Lee replied when asked if there were ever any debates about which classic Disney characters would be represented in Wish. “Interestingly, at the beginning, it was just the story as it is, original fairytales, stay true to that. And there were things that would start to come in organically where you’re like, ‘Wow, it’s like it’s a part of this legacy and it didn’t know it.’ They were, just even all the way, which you’ve seen it, now in the very end with Asha, the rise to that was going, ‘Oh my God, she’s a helper. What is the ultimate helper?’ They were just things that kept lending themselves in a big way, I mean, in a way that was more evocative for the whole.” 

Lee continued, “And then once we were getting into story, and that people were drawing the film and they were getting into animation, we just said, ‘Let’s have fun.’ I mean, this is what this is about, really, and let’s not take yourself too seriously. If it’s too distracting at the wrong time, we won’t do it. But you’ll see that at the silliest moments we have, we push it the furthest, because we’re just having permission to relax. At the moments that are more intense, we’re keeping it more true to exactly these moments, and any of the nods in that happened to be something that’s just more organic.”

You can watch our interview with Lee at the top of the page.

Why Isn’t Once Upon a Studio Before Wish?

Last month, Walt Disney Animation Studios celebrated its 100th anniversary by releasing a new animated short in honor of the milestone. ABC aired Once Upon a Studio, which featured 543 characters from more than 85 Disney feature-length and short films. Now, the short is available to stream on Disney+. During our interview with Lee, we asked Lee why Once Upon a Studio wasn’t paired with Wish. 

“Well, I think there were [talks of pairing them], but I think because what was more important to a lot of us was that Once Upon a Studio was given to the world on the actual anniversary as a thank you. The thank you to all the artists, the thank you to all the fans, the thank you to anyone who has taken Disney into their lives, and that was a whole five weeks before this film came out,” Lee explained.

“Really, what it felt like is, we don’t want to hold it and didn’t want to feel like people had to pay for the theater to see it, if that’s what it truly is. And then there’s some parts of the world where it will go on the front, but just based on whether they didn’t have Disney+ or it wasn’t as easily available. Because we do want to make sure everyone gets to see it. But I think that’s really why, and it felt like, ‘don’t wait.’”

Wish is now playing in theaters.