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Disney to Make Toy Story 3 Without Pixar
rdurell writes "CNN is reporting that Disney has begun the process of setting up a new CGI studio with the goal of making Toy Story 3. Pixar has balked at the idea of another sequel thus far though Disney does own the rights to the franchise. Does this truly spell the end of the Disney-Pixar relationship? Can both Disney and Pixar live without the other?" We covered the Disney/Pixar breakup in January.
Disney has repeatedly fucked Pixar over. A toy story 3 without Pixar will suck, though it may not flop with Disneys brand recognition. Ive been waiting years for Pixar to sever ties with Disney.
Pixar's realized it doesn't need Disney (all they've done lately is act as distributers). Disney killed their golden goose in an effort to grab a little more profit for themselved.
and that it quickly becomes a direct to video failure. C'mon Disney, is mining existing properties all that you have left in you? What happened to creativity anyhow?
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*Sigh*. Disney will ruin it--I don't think anything decent has come out of Disney in the past five or ten years, aside from the Pixar stuff. Does anyone know if Disney owns the rights to The Incredibles sequel? That would be really unfortunate...
Perhaps Pixar can buy the rights back.
without having to keep their stuff as purely kid-friendly and cutesy as Disney requires. The Incredibles was a step in the more-adult direction, but without Disney, they could do whatever their creative minds come up with, even if it is far edgier than a Disney cartoon.
Of course, I speak as an adult fan of their work, not as a stockholder, nor as a 5 year old hoping for stuff my prudish parents will take me to.
I really don't care if Pixar or Disney get along.
But I beg of You, please, PLEASE!
Don't let the same people who brought us Cinderella II: Now it's just for 2 year olds, Little Mermaid II: The Sea Shells got Bigger and the Story got Dumber, Lion King 1 1/2: The Pointless Version, and Pocohontas II: We Just Can't Take Historical Innacuracy with a Native American Pamela Anderson Clone Far Enough make "Toy Story 3".
I don't think it if I had to suffer my children asking me for another movie where Andy loses his Woody again, and the kids take a trip to Neverland Ranch to find it.
Oh, and thanks for Metroid Prime II.
Amen.
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The interesting question for the next 5 years: Now that PIXR is free from the creative and financial shackles of DIS, will they be able to get their movies shown?
Or will DIS be able to use its distribution muscle to keep it out of theaters long enough to starve PIXR of revenue, and to serve as a warning to current "partners" that You Don't Fuck With The Mouse.
P.S. - Disney hasn't done anything original on their own in YEARS (nay, DECADES).
I must respectfully disagree. Lilo and Stitch was wonderful and not the stock issue Disney movie. (Admittedly, what they've done with the characters since then is truly sad.)
Then, after Toy Story 3, they will launch Toy Story: The Series, daily on the Disney Channel. Of course, it will be hastily put together and have completely flat graphics created as cheaply as possibly. They'll also be releasing direct-to-video sequals until people are so tired of it that the brand is useless. Then they'll wait 5 years and "rerelease" the original toy story to theaters, and come up with a "new" DVD set containing the original and all sequals. Of course, they'll do this just in time for the holidays and get all new Toy Story toys, books, ice cream, cereal, shoes, clothing, etc. Only then, after this dies down, will they consider the franchise "milked." If you don't like the way Disney operates, you're not alone
No, Disney has done NOTHING for any of the Pixar movies except distribute them. They have all been Pixar movies through and through.
Read up on them.
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I think you're vastly overestimating how much the general public cares about this.
Not to mention the power of Disney's marketing machine. It's not easy to sell an animated movie. Brad Bird previous movie "Iron Giant" was a masterpiece but it failed at the box office, because Warner had no clue how to market it. For an animated feature to be succesful it requires to be in McDonald's kid's menu, to be in Hasbro's, Mattel and Lego offers, to be in cheap and stupid kid's magazines etc. Disney mastered this machine just like Microsoft mastered using Windows monopoly to promote their applications. If Pixar can survive competing with Disney, it's still an open question. So far, only Dreamworks had real success on this field, but they were co-founded by Jef Katzenberg - it was as if Steve Ballmer would quit Microsoft to compete with Gates. In 2006 it might turn out that "Ratatouille" (the much-rumored first non-Disney Pixar feature) will be a masterpiece but a commercial failure and Disney's "Toy Story 3" will be an utter crap, but box office #1.
"What happened to creativity anyhow"
The name's Eisner, Michael Eisner.
I used to work for Disney. I called it creative purgatory. The company is so inbred that there is little hope for change without a radical shake up. I think realistically the only way of fixing the company is for a hostile take over that would allow for changing most of the executive staff and eventually most of the surpervisers. The inbreding goes all the way from top to bottom. We used to call them second and third generation as in the family had worked for Disney that many generations. Even worse now is it's all Eisner's cronies and their friends. Most have no creative ability. Creative people are often seen as a threat and tend not to do well. Personally I quit and you couldn't pay me enough to go back. The joke is if Walt were alive I'd have stayed with the company for life. They're ruined the best company in Hollywood and the box office reflects the disaster it's become.
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L&S was the last Disney project to be produced by the Florida skunkworks (out from under the thumb of Eisner). Despite efforts to push his in-house projects, "The Emperor's New Groove" and "Treasure Planet", L&S proved what the animators were capable of without Eisner's excessive micromanagement. The response: elimination of the Florida studio, under the guise of cutting costs.
That'll teach 'em to be original.
That story about Jeffrey Katzenberg isn't really true. The person who redesigned Woody was Bud Luckey, the animator who produced the "Boundin'" short that is showing with "The Incredibles". He's the oldest guy at Pixar and everyone jumps to work on his projects. I think the story is just Katzenberg blowing his own horn, which he seems to do quite often.
Pixar was in the middle of developing a shoddy direct-to-video Toy Story 2 when they realized such a thing would damage their reputation. John Lasseter specifically said, "We didn't want to be known as a studio that did great stuff and crap -- we want it all to be great."
They pushed to make Toy Story 2 a theatrical release, tossed out the stuff they had done so far, retooled the story from the beginning, worked themselves to deliver a quality product, and the rest is history.
Too bad any Disney-produced Toy Story 3 won't have half the love and care that Pixar gave to their movies.
--R.J.
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