Oh God.
Back in November, former Disney CEO Bob Iger stepped back up into the role of the Mouse House's chief executive. He replaced Bob Chapek, who had helped Disney push through COVID and overlooked the first years of Disney+. Business-wise, Iger was a great CEO. He is the one responsible for acquiring Lucasfilm, Marvel, 20th Century Fox, and ESPN, so he did some amazing things for the company.
Last night, he made some crazy big announcements. First of all, Disney unfortunately has to layoff approximately 7,000 employees. This awful news comes as a part of the company reshuffling and dividing itself into three divisions. They are making gigantic budget cuts and reorganizing their whole structure.
The first of the three divisions is Disney Entertainment. This is pretty self-explanatory. This is the movies. The TV shows. Disney+. And what else did he announce? A new Toy Story. A new Frozen. And a new Zootopia.
AAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH! WHY???
Okay, to be clear, I'm only mad about the Toy Story part. The other two are cool.
But I CANNOT BELIEVE they are making another Toy Story. Toy Story 3 ended the franchise perfectly. Then Toy Story 4 ended the franchise perfectly AGAIN. How are you going to screw that up by doing a fifth one??
This has me especially worried because Disney has taken a huge dip in quality since Toy Story 4. After 2019, none of their content has been as good. It hit it's peak with Endgame and Toy Story 4. Once Disney+ launched and we started getting more content from the Mouse House, it just wasn't as good. Pixar has been off its game. Soul, Luca, Turning Red, and Lightyear were all disappointments. Besides Encanto, Disney Animation hasn't been great. Like, what was Strange World? And I don't even want to get into Star Wars and Marvel, because I'll just get more frustrated.
Point is, Disney isn't what it was four years ago, and a new Toy Story cannot possibly live up to the heights of any of the first four movies. Now, I think a third Frozen and a second Zootopia are cool. I'm not surprised about Frozen (I haven't seen Frozen II yet but I've heard good things) and I'm excited for a sequel to Zootopia. I am now waiting for an Incredibles 3 announcement. I'd much rather that than Toy Story 5.
The other two divisions are the Disney Parks division and ESPN. There wasn't much announced regarding those two divisions. ESPN is hoping to renew its contract with the NBA. There was some talk of putting Pandora (Avatar world) in Disneyland. Lots of talk about money and stuff, but that's not really the big, meaty story here.
I will provide more updates as they come (if they come).