Once the public face of squeaky-clean, harmless family entertainment, the Walt Disney Corporation has evolved into a widespread conglomerate known as much for the properties it controls as the films it produces. With subsidiaries including Marvel Studios, Lucasfilm, National Geographic, A&E, 20th Century Fox, ESPN, Hulu, and Pixar, Disney has a commanding control of some of the world’s most lucrative franchises, plus an extensive library of film and TV classics. Its streaming service Disney+ signals a new interest in controlling its own online distribution, setting aside decades of licensing partnerships. Follow along with The Verge as we look at Disney’s new films and shows, and its strategies for dominating the box office and the streaming dollar.
Live-action Star Wars show The Acolyte will bring the High Republic era of the franchise to TV for the first time on June 4th.
StarWars.com announced the show’s premiere date with this less-than-subtle bloody lightsaber poster, reading “In an age of light a darkness rises.” Spoooooooky. Also, the site says to expect the series’ official teaser trailer tomorrow.
You can easily watch most of Sony’s live-action Spider-Man movies on Disney Plus if the mood strikes you. But if you’ve been yearning to see Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, and Tom Holland’s Peters Parker back on the big screen, you’ll have a shot at catching all eight of the past Spidey films in select theaters beginning April 15th.
There’s a lot in this Wall Street Journal profile of ESPN boss Jimmy Pitaro. The switch to streaming; the Hulu for Sports plan; the battle over ever-more-expensive sports rights. But the undercurrent here is pretty clear: if ESPN can make all that work over the next couple of years, Pitaro might get Bob Iger’s office. (But that’s a really, really big if.)
It’s kind of telling how X-Men ‘97’s creator / showrunner Beau DeMayo isn’t featured in this new sizzle reel hyping up the show before its March 20th premiere, but the cast seems pretty excited to be back voicing their iconic roles.
The 2024 Vergecast streaming draft
What are the good streaming services? Why does Alex Cranz think Netflix is going to go away? What is Mubi, anyway? All the big questions on this episode of The Vergecast.
An alternate game feed on ESPN Plus, Disney Channel, Disney XD, and Disney Plus will present today’s Bruins vs. Penguins matchup as the NHL Big City Greens Classic 2. It goes beyond Nickelodeon’s slime-filled Super Bowl feed by using NHL EDGE positional data and Hawk-Eye optical tracking to turn real action into an animated version.
Sportico explains that to control their animated avatars, commentators have replaced the motion-capture suits they wore for the first game with Meta Quest Pro headsets.
Charter’s Spectrum TV Plus customers can now access ESPN Plus (which usually costs $10.99 / month) with their cable subscription. It’s all part of the bundle Charter announced with Disney last year, which also brought Disney Plus to Spectrum customers in January.
Pixar’s first Inside Out film led with a cast of emotions most young viewers could probably identify as things they’d experienced themselves. But Inside Out 2’s introduction of feelings like Ennui (Adèle Exarchopoulos), seems primed to leave teens with a new way of articulating that dreadful, existential je ne sais quoi they’re always feeling.
The film hits theaters on June 14th.
Disney Imagineering tells us the ride will now have more than 250 different variations, up from... well, it depends:
Currently, there are reported to be 4 opening segments, 5 primary destination segments, 7 hologram segments, and 5 ending destination segments which can be combined in different ways, while still taking into account the separation of different eras of the Lucasfilm portfolio.
Grogu and company will be added on April 5th at Disneyland, Disney World, and Disneyland Paris.
At the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference in San Francisco, Disney CEO Bob Iger summarized his gameplan for Marvel and Disney movies to get more butts into theater seats, as reported by Deadline:
“A lot of people think it’s audience [superhero] fatigue. It’s not audience fatigue. They want great films. And if you build it great, they will come,” he said. He noted that has made nearly $30 billion from 33 films. “We got to return to something akin to that. And I actually am confident that we will.”
A string of bad superhero movies certainly isn’t helping, though, even if they aren’t all from Disney.
We’re just a few days out from the Disney Plus debut of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour concert film, but in case the March 14th premiere somehow slipped your mind, there’s a new trailer to get you hyped back up.
Fubo sued Warner Bros. Discovery, ESPN, and Fox last month over their planned live sports streaming service. Here’s what Fubo CEO David Gandler had to say about the lawsuit during a conference call:
This is a duel to the death. It has been when we started this company. We’re fighting for consumers. We’re fighting for our customers. We’re fighting for the tens of billions of dollars that are wasted annually on consumers paying for the same content multiple times. This is a very important process. We are sticking to our principles, to our guns. We are continuing to walk and chew gum at the same time, as you see in our numbers.
That’s according to data analytics firm Antenna, which reported that streaming subs grew year-over-year in 2023 — albeit more slowly than previous years — but cancellations were up by 36.2 million versus 2022, and weren’t far behind the number of new subscribers.
That much churn isn’t surprising, given all the rate hikes and crackdowns on password sharing.
ESPN will start feeding VR content to the Meta Quest Xtadium app soon. That includes “immersive 180-degree VR” sports highlights from NCAA basketball and football games, interviews, and other content.
ESPN also says it will launch a Meta Horizon Worlds experience this summer. Whatever it is, it’s bound to make more sense than the ESPN phone.
The Department of Justice is planning to review the upcoming sports streaming app from ESPN, Warner Bros. Discovery, and Fox, according to a report from Bloomberg. Sources tell the outlet that regulators will look into whether the service will harm consumers, competitors, and sports leagues once the joint venture is finalized.
One live streaming service, Fubo, has already slammed the sports streaming app, saying it “could dictate market terms in a manner that may not serve the broader interests of consumers.”
The show, originally pitched by showrunner Leslye Headland as “Frozen meets Kill Bill,” will be out in Summer 2024, according to Collider. Disney had previously only confirmed it as coming this year.
Fortnite is winning the metaverse
Epic’s new partnership with Disney is just one more step in building out its virtual realm.
Disney CEO Bob Iger had previously targeted next year for the launch of a streaming version of ESPN’s main channel (no watered-down ESPN Plus, just ESPN).
Now that the deal for a sports streaming Voltron with Warner Bros. and Fox is sewed up, Iger said to CNBC’s Julia Boorstin that direct-to-consumer ESPN could launch in late August 2025, and confirmed to investors that it will be available in a bundle with Hulu and Disney Plus.
The animated sequel follows Moana and friends on yet another journey at sea, as they venture “into the dangerous, long-lost waters” of Oceania. It hits theaters on November 27th.
ESPN, Fox, and Warner Bros. are putting together a juggernaut sports streaming app
Some of the biggest companies in sports broadcasting coming together could help fix sports streaming, or it could be more of the same.
A mix of 42 popular Disney flicks, including Finding Nemo, Avatar: The Way of Water, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens are headed to the Vision Pro headset in 3D. Disney Plus subscribers will get access to the whole catalog, but non-subscribers can still rent or buy 3D movies from the Apple TV app.
The Awesomer pointed to this screen recording of someone doing just that on YouTube. But that’s no fun, so here’s an Internet Archive link to the requisite files, uploaded the day Steamboat Willie’s version of Mickey Mouse entered the public domain this year.
It’s not necessarily the best way to experience this version of Mickey Mouse, but it’s certainly a way.
Former TechCrunch EIC Matthew Panzarino got to touch it — something we’d heard was beyond the reach of mere mortals who don’t work for Disney Parks.
It looks just as mindblowing as ever. I am so damn jealous. Here’s how the lightsaber likely works.