Highlights of D23 2013

Being the avid Disney fan I am, and lover of entertainment, of course I headed down to Anaheim for the 2013 D23 Expo.  For those that don't know about D23, it is a purely-Disney convention that takes place across the street from Disneyland in the Anaheim Convention Center.  D23 happens once every two years, and since it started in 2009, this was only the 3rd one.  I often describe it as "Disney's version of Comic Con," although clearly not a non-profit event and much more egocentric.  Nonetheless it was a great event, and a breath of fresh air to not have to shove through hundreds of thousands of people to get anywhere, like you have to do at Comic Con.

Read about announcements and highlights after the break.







The highlights of the first day was presented by the Walt Disney Animation Studios and Pixar.  WDAS screened the upcoming animated short film, "Get a Horse," which is based on early animations of Mickey Mouse, and is actually using archived recordings of Walt Disney's voice for Mickey.  Get a Horse will premiere at the beginning of WDAS' next feature film, Frozen, which is coming to theaters November 27, 2013.  I'm definitely looking forward to seeing both of them in theaters.  Concept images were also released for the animated adaptation of Marvel's comic Big Hero 6, as well as Planes: Fire & Rescue, The Pirate Fairy and Zootopia.  Pixar also took the stage to show images and footage from upcoming projects Toy Story of Terror, The Good Dinosaur, Finding Dory and Inside Out.




The second day was kicked off with announcements from the Walt Disney Studio's live-action projects.  This was the big moment, thousands had made the necessary travel arrangements to come and see some new announcements about Star Wars: Episode VII, but much to everyone's dismay, not one spec of news was mentioned.  After Bob Iger's announcement of this, a barrage of booing flooded the arena, so to lift up people's spirits, Marvel took the stage to show some kick-butt footage from their upcoming lineup.  Two scenes were shown for Marvel's Captain America: The Winter Soldier, in which Cap teams up with Black Widow.  One scene shows him on an elevator which keeps stopping on each floor and filling with more people.  They all attack him, and of course, he kicks the crap out of them.  The other scene showed Cap and his team stealthily hijacking a shipping barge in the middle of the ocean.  Thor: The Dark World premiered a second trailer as well as two new scenes.  One scene is the extension of the one from the trailer where Thor shows up and decimates the giant rock dude.  The other scene shows Natalie Portman in Asgard.  She is laying on some table and they are inspecting her, she is hosting some type of virus, Odin (Anthony Hopkins) commands that she leave because she doesn't belong there, but when the guards try to escort her out the virus sends out a powerful burst of energy, that Thor suggests is protecting her, or else protecting itself.  I'm sure these movies will be fun and make hundreds of millions of dollars in the global box office, but let's be honest.  Theres nothing here that we haven't seen before, nothing new original, or spectacular.  They look like every other Marvel movie.  And then they talked about Guardians of the Galaxy.  Now this movie actually looks like it's got potential.  Marvel is finally trying something new.  The trailer premiered featuring a ragtag group of rogues and renegades with snarky attitudes and a sense of humor.  The setting, plot, and everything else were kind of a mysterious blur, but the feeling alone that the trailer gives you says that this movie will stand out amongst the current Marvel films.  Finally, a completely unnecessary teaser for The Avengers: Age of Ultron premiered.  It was basically just an animation of closeup shots of different Marvel heroes suits and outfits getting battered and crushed, with some random voiceovers.  It was basically just a pointless gimmick to get people hyped up for the movie that's still 2 years away.

Walt Disney Pictures presented their lineup for the next few years and previewed footage from Maleficent, starring Angelina Jolie as the famous wicked witch and Elle Fanning as Sleeping Beuty from the classic disney animation Sleeping Beauty.  There is nothing about this film that is remotely appealing to me.  Because we know the end of Sleeping Beauty, so this is either going to be really depressing or just dark, because it follows the witch as the main character.  Also announced was a live action version of Cinderella.  Preview footage was shown from The Muppets Most Wanted, which looks a little more like a classic Muppets movie than the previous one.  This one will include Ricky Gervais, Tom Hiddleston, Tina Fey, and will once again feature the music of Brett McKenzie

Perhaps the most fascinating announcement of this entire panel was "Tomorrowland."  Originally teased under the name "1952," the project was teased by its producers, Brad Bird and Damon Lindelof, who had supposedly found a box in the morgue (artifacts and storage) in the basement of Walt Disney Studios.  The two took center stage and revealed the contents of the box.  The box, essentially unseen and unknown for the past 60 years, is essentially a mystery box of puzzles put together by the imagineers and perhaps Walt Disney himself.  On the box and everything inside the box was an insignia, marking clues to this "puzzle."  Some of the most incredible items revealed were: a picture of Walt Disney with Amelia Earhart, and the date on the picture was years after she had presumedly died.  Just when I was getting really excited about a new conspiracy theory, they revealed that further research showed that Disney's

face had actually been manipulated to be added into the photo (basically Photoshopped from the 1940's stone age before Photoshop existed).  Next was revealed a blueprint of the original plans for the "It's a Small World."  The mysterious insignia was drawn on one location of the blueprint next to a random number.  After looking up this number, they found out that it was actually referencing a specific type of black light.  After getting this black-light and shining it over the paper, the blueprints revealed a massive basement below It's a Small World.  The basement included rooms, maybe labs, and some type of theater.  Lindelof and Bird never said whether or not they checked out the ride to try and find out if in fact there actually is some mysterious basement underneath the ride that hasn't been entered for decades.  All they said was "what if?"  The final piece was an old scratched up film reel.  For the first time ever, this footage was publicly shown, which revealed an animation about a future utopia envisioned by Walt and the Imagineers.  If I'm not mistaken, one of the shots in the animation looked like one of the rooms from the It's a Small World blueprint.  The reel cut out at various spots, to which Bird and Lindelof claimed was due to how scratched up the reel was.  I don't believe them.  The way that footage was skipped through in their looked like it had been manipulated, as if specific parts were left out, which is highly likely since the footage that was cut out could have been completely related to the plot of the film.  A floor exhibit was also available at the convention center to view these and other components of the box up close.  All of the elements inside of the "1952" box were the inspiration for the movie Tomorrowland. Meet the Robinsons.  If you want any further details, please check out the excellent coverage reported by SlashFilm.  You can also download the free exhibit app here.

 My speculation is that the film will become "the story of Disneyland's Tomorrowland," and will feature a plot revolving around an inventor in the 1950's who is trying to create a better future, perhaps with a feeling of Retro-futurism, and some crossover themes with

The conclusion of this panel was with Disney's Oscar-bait, Saving Mr. Banks.  I'll admit, I've certainly had some reservations about this one.  I mean it seems a little egotistic, right?  The first trailer wasn't all that appealing, and it sounds like Disney's attempt at making an Argo.  But nonetheless, the scenes previewed from the movie do look pretty great.  The film centers around Walt Disney (Tom Hanks) attempting to get the rights to make Mary Poppins, with the approval of its up-tight author (Emma Thompson).

As much as I love seeing never-before-seen footage, hearing brand new entertainment news, all of those things will eventually be forgotten, to one day be shadowed by the next big convention.  The news is here one day and gone the next.  The entire highlight of D23 was at the end of Saturday when Richard M. Sherman and Alan Menken performed their music for three hours, told us stories, and mesmerized us with the magical music that is so entwined with growing up as a child in America.  Sherman took the stage first, at 85 years of age, his personality was brilliant and charming and so thankful to be there.  He told us stories of each of many hits that he played, stories about working and being friends with Walt, and he sang and played the many famous themes he's written through the years - The Parent Trap, Mary Poppins, The Jungle Book, Winnie the Pooh, The AristoCats, and plenty more.  I sat in the balcony, and saw John Lasseter sitting directly in front of me on the main floor, and I swear that guy got up and had a standing ovation for every song Sherman performed.  It was really cool to see that, to know first-hand how much this guy's music had been a part of Lasseter.  Then Menken took stage went through his repertoire of hits from The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Newsies, Aladdin, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, Tangled, and many of his Broadway hits as well.  Both of these guys were phenomenal and welcomed with extensive applause and a dozen standing ovations.  I'm sure I wasn't the only one who felt so blessed to be apart of that nostalgic moment, flooded with so many emotions and memories from childhood, hearing the music from movies that I loved as a child and still love today.  It was a once in a lifetime experience.

I did not attend Sunday, the third and final day of D23, so please Google that if you want to find some more info on that day.

The exhibit hall located on the main floor of the convention center had a lot of great exhibits, including the Tomorrowland one previously addressed in this article.  Probably the best exhibit was the Disney Imagineering, which was a completely sectioned off area of the exhibit hall (of course prefaced by a lengthy line, but well worth the wait).  Just inside were a slew of boxes with labels referencing Star Wars, including Orange Harvest, which references Blue Harvest, the codename for the Return of the Jedi while it was in production, and also referencing Orange County, where Disneyland is located.  The rumors are true about an addition of Star Wars elements to the Disney theme parks, we are just not sure exactly where or to what extent.  Also teased was a section devoted to the Avatar universe which clearly is acknowledging the rumors of an Avatar land or ride being built.  There were also hundreds of magnificent displays and artifacts from various Disney rides, robotics, paint, planning, architecture, etc.  It was an Imagineer paradise.  Dozens of Imagineers were there and were incredibly friendly, showing off and explaining some of their creations.





The extensive presentations, announcements, and previewed footage and artwork from all of Disney's
upcoming project explained their absence at this year's Comic Con.  For those of you who attended SDCC 2013, you probably noticed a complete lack of anything Disney, and personally I think this was a poor move on their part, but I would presume their reasoning was to draw larger crowds and excitement for their own convention, D23 2013.  Frankly, I'm okay with the lack of Star Wars news, I'd rather have them really perfect things before showing them to the public, and knowing how JJ Abrams tends to release anything about his projects, that's how it happens.  But it looks like the next time for some huge Star Wars hype to be announced will have to be Comic Con 2014.