Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should. Disney, a company that has made a reputation for achieving the impossible in the world of entertainment, maybe needs to drink its own Kool-Aid and calm down a bit. Sure, you can take a few thousand acres of old orange grove in Southern California and turn it into the happiest place on Earth. That doesn’t mean you need to buy Lucasfilm, make Lightyear, launch a Star Wars hotel, or launch a cinematic universe off the back of every successful movie… like The Lion King.
Still, almost as if somebody had just asked “Alexa, what’s the fucking stupidest thing Hollywood can do all week?” here it comes – The Lion King Cinematic Universe (TLKCU). We are not even joking.
Despite 2018’s Alice Through the Looking Glass, and 2019’s Maleficent: Mistress of Evil proving that more is not necessarily better for this kind of thing, they are going to try again. 2019’s computer-animated, photorealistic version of The Lion King grossed more than $1.6 billion at the box office. There is already a prequel on the way – Mufasa: The Lion King – because absolutely nobody asked for it. Favreau directed the first. Barry Jenkins (Moonlight) directs this prequel.
But wait! There’s more! In an interview with The New York Times this week, Walt Disney Pictures president Sean Bailey says more is coming, they are planning a:
“…big, epic saga [like] Star Wars. There’s a lot of room to run if we can find the stories…”
I just can’t wait for The Book Of Timon And Pumbaa. The Last Hyena. The Rise Of Whatever The Hell Rowan Atkinson’s Bird Was Called. The live-action The Little Mermaid is sitting at $326 million at the global box office, with a new live-action Snow White in the pipeline alongside a live-action Lilo & Stitch.
They are also planning the same treatment for Moana. Seeing as Moana is pretty much a completely perfect movie as it is, there is only one outcome as Disney seeks to “improve” things.
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