Amidst all the good news about the upcoming Disney+ streaming platform, and its almost endless catalog of movies from Disney animation, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, and National Geographic, thousands of episodes from Disney Channel TV shows, and its (mostly) new, original content, there’s still some bad news. And, partially because it’s newsworthy, and partially because I’m still bitter at Disney+ for making me use the + symbol (why am I still mad about that?), we’re going to discuss the not-so-great headlines that last night began plaguing the Mouse House. It’s not just about Muppets, I can assure you.
However, the Muppets are the most important part of the equation, so we’ll talk about them first: Disney has officially chosen to scrap an idea for a Muppets comedy series posed to them by Josh Gad, star of Frozen and its upcoming sequel, Frozen 2. The project, titled Muppets Live Another Day, would have been a sequel to the 1984 hit, The Muppets Take Manhattan, taking place soon after the events of that film. Adam Horowitz and Eddy Kitsis had already been brought onboard to help Gad write and produce the series: apparently, creative differences with Disney executives forced the three showrunners to leave – but now, instead of doing anything with the property, Disney+ has chosen to throw out the idea entirely. We don’t know anything about the disagreements that caused the rift, or whether this is because of Disney’s decision, announced recently at the D23 Expo, to reboot Jim Henson’s The Muppet Show: perhaps two would have been too much Muppet material for the streaming service? Either way, this does make one wonder whether Josh Gad will run into this problem again as he sets out to produce a live-action remake of Disney’s The Hunchback Of Notre-Dame – it’s not easy being Olaf.
At the same time, a smaller bombshell dropped: Disney has scrapped a comedy series titled Four Dads, which would have been their first property focused on LGBTQ characters – while this story hasn’t been making the rounds as much as the Muppets, it’s potentially more devastating. Disney’s commitment to diversity, and especially LGBTQ representation, is still weak: while a Love, Simon spinoff series based on the gay romance film of the same name is coming to Disney+, it is rumored to be significantly different from the film. And as for gay characters in Disney films, they’re few and far between (and when they do show up, they’re stereotypes: next year’s Jungle Cruise will mark the appearance of Disney’s first officially out gay character, portrayed by a straight actor – the character is rumored to be very campy, effeminate, and played for laughs: great work, Disney).
These aren’t the first Disney+ shows to get tossed in the trash. Back in August, it was reported that Book Of Enchantment, a series about the origins of iconic Disney villains such as Ursula, Maleficent, The Beast, and The Wicked Queen, was scrapped because the studio felt it was too dark, even after significant rewrites by Jason Reed, who apparently tried unsuccessfully to insert more humor into the show’s scripts. Personally, that whole idea sounded really cool, so I’m not forgiving Disney for this one – even if they do feel like Disney+ should be squeaky-clean: I mean, seriously, how dark could it have been?
The three cancellations may not have much in common, but it certainly looks like Disney has a very clear picture of what their streaming service should be: whether it’s a good picture is hard to tell. Will we end up missing these shows in the long run? Share your thoughts in the comments below!