Here's All The News Announced At The Walt Disney Animation Studios/PIXAR Panel At D23 2017

The bi-annual Disney centered convention D23 is going on this weekend and today they held their panel centered exclusively on their two animation studios, PIXAR and Walt Disney Animation Studios. Expect some news on the next two PIXAR movies, Coco and The Incredibles 2 and also the 2018 Disney Animation movie Wreck-It Raph 2. What else will be there? Expect some news from the single features each studio expects to put out in 2019; Toy Story 4 for PIXAR (I guess we'll find out if that film is even still happening given how much it's been delayed since it was announced four years ago) and Frozen 2 for Disney Animation. I'm personally hoping to get some plot details on the two completely original movies PIXAR has planned for 2020.

An image from the new Planes film from DisneyToon Studios due out in April 2019

A NEW FILM FROM DISNEYTOON STUDIOS RETURNS AUDIENCES TO THE BELOVED PLANES UNIVERSE

DisneyToon Studios (whose presence at this panel was a total surprise), the animation branch previously responsible for all those direct-to-video sequels to Disney classics like The Lion King II and Lady And the Tramp II from the first years of the 21st century as well as the computer-animated Tinker Bell and Planes movies, have had a project penciled in for April 2019 for a while now and they revealed what it was today. The film itself is a new spin-off in the Planes all about "the next level of aviation" that is currently without a title. It will involve Space and good God, can't we let this franchise go? I forgot the two Planes movies even existed until just now!

WHO WANTS SOME STORY DETAILS ON WRECK-IT RALPH 2?

Walt Disney Animation Studios 2019 sequel Frozen 2 got no new information (not even a title) revealed at D23 this year but we did get some new information on the newest Wreck-It Ralph adventure. Looks like the plot concerns the arcade Wreck-It Ralph and all his friends live in getting internet access and Ralph and Vanellope interacting with the world of the internet. Lots of jokes about Facebook and Skype will ensue, I'm sure. One of the new characters is a lady named Yesss! (Queen?) voiced by Taraji P. Henson who is associated with a parody of Buzzfeed. More Taraji P. Henson is always good though haven't we kind of parodied Buzzfeed to death? They're also apparently gonna get all meta/self-promotional by visiting OhMyDisney.com. That sounds like it'll be either rife with comedic possibilities or the worst bit of cringe-inducing product placement since Mac And Me, though that fact that there's a moment where all the Disney Princess walk together (all of them are apparently computer-animated including all the hand-drawn animation ones) makes it sound like there could be some cute gags here.

DISNEY PRINCESSES UNITE!

All the surviving voice actors of the various Disney Princesses showed up on-stage to take a big group photo that, when they put it online, I'm sure will go viral faster than the Bubonic Plague.

THE INCREDIBLES 2 BLASTS OFF

Now that Walt Disney Animation Studios was done for the day (I guess this means no new stuff on their November 2020 movie Gigantic, which was showcased at D23 two years ago prior to it getting an additional director and some rumored major creative overhauling), it's time to move on to PIXAR, which started their portion of the panel off with our first look at The Incredibles 2. Brad Bird (who is writing and directing this movie, reprising the duties he had on the first film) showed off a tongue-in-cheek featurette about how much Edna Mode has influenced the fashion world (that's directly below) and the new character models for the various Incredibles characters.

Edna Mode is always a la mode. One of the world’s most visionary designers is back in Incredibles 2. #BravoEdna. pic.twitter.com/OPAxuh9aoc

— Disney•Pixar (@DisneyPixar) July 14, 2017

We also got the very first story details on the movie, namely that Elastigirl A.K.A. Helen Parr (Holly Hunter) is the lead character of this adventure. Craig T. Nelson, Sarah Vowell and Samuel L. Jackson are all returning from the first movie while Huck Milner is playing the role of Dash this go-around. A brief scene was also shown from the movie.

LET'S PLAY WITH TOY STORY 4

So....this is still happening. OK, so, this one's still set for June 14, 2019 but no longer has John Lasseter directing. Josh Cooley will make his feature film directorial debut on the project after previously just being co-director on the film. A featurette was shown demonstrating the crew working on the film and some voice acting.

HOW ABOUT A NEW PIXAR FILM?

Just as Inside Out and The Good Dinosaur both got announced without titles at the 2011 D23 convention, this year's D23 convention had a brand-spanking new original PIXAR movie announced without a proper title. Currently, the movie is called The Untitled PIXAR Film That Takes You Into A Suburban Fantasy World. Dan Scanlon, the director of Monsters University, is the writer and director on this project and is inspired by how his father passed away when he was just one year old. The premise concerns two brothers who, while going to learn about their dad, discover a society populated entirely by fantasy creatures. So it sounds kind of like Zootopia but instead of animals living in a normal society, it's trolls and fairies.

Alright, that's it! Thank you for reading, we'll meet back here in two years time for the next D23 Animated Disney movies panel! That sounds like a long ways away, but then again, the 2017 D23 panel sounded so far away when I penned a live recap of the same panel back in 2015!