Greetings from Las Vegas,
where Licensing Expo 2014 officially gets underway later this morning.
Photo by Jim Hill
As you wandered through the upper floors of the Mandalay
Bay Convention Center
yesterday, you couldn't help but notice the folks who were hurrying to get the
hall ready for today's events.
Photo by Jim Hill
Either by hanging banners or by using forklifts to carefully
put heavy three-dimensional promotional pieces into place.
Photo by Jim Hill
Mind you, not everyone was willing to wait 'til Tuesday to
start talking up next year's projects. If you descended into the bowels of this
building, you soon came upon banner after banner …
Photo by Jim Hill
… which not only hyped The Walt Disney Company's numerous film
franchises …
Photo by Jim Hill
… but its many & varied TV properties as well.
Photo by Jim Hill
And speaking of TV properties, you may have heard about
"Descendants," that Disney Channel Original Movie which will debut in
2015.
(Clockwise from bottom left) Dove Cameron as Mal,
daughter of Maleficent; Booboo Stewart as Jay, son
of Jafar; Cameron Boyce as
Carlos, son of Cruella
de Vil; and Sofia Carson as Evie, daughter of the
Evil
Queen. Photo
by Bob D'Amico. Copyright
2014 Disney Channel. All rights reserved
Well, according to what I was told today by DCP officials,
Disney "Descendants" isn't a one-off Disney Channel Original Movie.
There is already serious talk about a second TV
movie. Not to mention a bunch of short films to help bridge the gap
between the original airing of "Descendants 1" and "Descendants
2."
Yes, Disney had a lot to reveal at yesterday's event. And
we'll get to those stories in the coming
weeks here at JHM.
(L to R) Iron Man; Mike Pasciullo, the Senior Vice
President of Marketing for Marvel Studios
& Television at Marvel
Entertainment; John Lasseter, Chief Creative Officer for Pixar & Walt
Disney Animation Studios; Buzz Lightyear; Josh Silverman, Vice President of
Global
Licensing for Disney Consumer Products; Mickey Mouse; Howard Roffman,
Executive
Vice President of Franchise Management for Lucasfilm and a
pair of Stormtroopers.
Photo by Al Powers / Invision. Copyright Disney
Enterprises, Inc. All rights
reserved
But in the meantime, for those of you who are still bitching
& moaning about the key creative concept behind Disney "Descendants"
(i.e., that the sons & daughters of the classic Disney Villains have to
choose their own paths), let me remind you that things could have been so much
worse. "How much worse?," you ask. Well, what if the Mouse had
decided to cash in on the popularity of "The Walking Dead" by doing
some sort of mash-up of the undead & the Disney Princesses.
Photo by Jim Hill
Mind you, Mickey would never ever do that to its cadre of
princess characters. But that doesn't mean that someone else wouldn't.
Photo by Jim Hill
Ladies & Gentlemen, I give you Snow White, Cinderella
& the Little Mermaid from the "Once Upon a Zombie" series. And
trust me on this one, folks: You really don't want to see the Sleeping Beauty,
Alice in Wonderland or the Rapunzel zombies that were also on display at the Mandalay
Bay Convention Center
earlier today.
Photo by Jim Hill
My apologies for this article being so short. But I have to get up in three
hours to then go cover Jeffrey Katzenberg's keynote address at the 2014
Licensing Expo. Which will hopefully reveal what DreamWorks Animation has in
the works for 2015 & beyond.
Photo by Jim Hill
Your thoughts?