As you may have heard, Disney will soon have its own streaming service called Disney+, or Disney Plus. On Friday, August 23, 2019, Disney held a panel at D23 Expo to talk about what would be available on Disney Plus, highlighting the original programming that would be coming.
As we mentioned before, we were unable to obtain reservations to any of the panels we wanted to attend, including Disney Plus. However, we are D23 Gold Members, so I was able to get in line early enough after leaving the Disney Legends Awards Ceremony a little early, and still make it into Section B of the Gold Member Priority Queue.
Being that this was the first time there’s ever been a Disney Plus panel, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I had attended the Live Action panels at D23 Expo before, where they have you seal away your phones, cameras, and any other electronic devices in an envelope. Since this was a panel that seemed similar to the Live Action panel in that there would likely be exclusive footage shown, I suspected that we would have to do the same with our electronic devices. However, surprisingly, that was not the case. Instead, a message appeared on the screen prior to the panel starting that basically said you can take pictures of everything happening on stage, but not to record the video footage that was shown. These are the same rules as San Diego Comic-Con, so that was a nice surprise.
One thing I found amusing was that a few minutes before the panel started, Bob Iger (the CEO of the Walt Disney Company) walked by with some other Disney execs to go sit in the reserved seating section that was behind us. When this happened, several people around us started taking pictures of him as he walked by, and even after he had sat down! Note that this happened again just before the Saturday morning panel, but since our phones and cameras were sealed away, no one could take pictures. All they could do was stare in awe.
The Disney Plus panel got started a few minutes late, but when it did start, it started with a bang. There was an all out performance of “We’re All in This Together” from High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. People were singing, dancing, playing instruments, and the drummers even came down into the aisles! I’ve never seen the original High School Musical, so I wasn’t familiar with the song, but it was an exciting way to kick things off.
Yvette Nicole Brown would be the host of the Disney Plus panel. She brought out Kevin Mayer, Chairman of Direct-to-Consumer and International at the Walt Disney Company. He talked about what would be available on Disney Plus when it is released on November 12. Kevin revealed that is contents will include the entire Pixar library, Star Wars and Marvel films, the entire collection of animated Disney classics from the vault, live action Disney films from Bedknobs and Broomsticks to Maleficent, Disney Channel movies and series, National Geographic series and films, and The Simpsons. We then watched a video teaser of what we could look forward to seeing.
Kevin also talked about the awesome deal we had signed up for at the Disney Plus booth on the Show Floor earlier that day, where you get 3 years for Disney Plus for $140.97, which is a $23 per year discount off of the regular annual price. Plus, those who signed up at D23 Expo would be part of the Founders Circle and get a free Founders Circle pin.
Disney Channel
Next up, Gary Marsh, President and Chief Creative Officer for Disney Channels Worldwide, came out on stage to talk about the Disney Channel content that will be available: over 5,000 episodes of Disney Channel and Disney Jr. content, plus over 100 Disney Channel original movies.
Phineas and Ferb
He announced that all episodes of the Phineas and Ferb series would be available on Disney Plus, as well as a new original movie, Phineas and Ferb The Movie: Candace Against the Universe. In the movie, Candace is abducted by space aliens, and Phineas and Ferb set out to rescue her.
Lizzie McGuire
Gary also announced that there will be a new Lizzie McGuire series, helmed by original creator Terry Minsky – and that Hillary Duff herself would be reprising the role of Lizzie McGuire! Hillary Duff came out on stage to tell us more about it. She will be playing the almost 30-year old version of her character, and has her dream job being an apprentice to a fancy New York City decorator, as well as has her dream guy and dream apartment. However, she is still dealing with the 13-year old animated Lizzie in her head.
High School Musical: The Musical: The Series
Gary explained to us the reasoning behind the title of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. What happens in this series is that the school where the original High School Musical movies were filmed realizes that they’ve never done a theater production of High School Musical, so they decide to finally do so. We also got to watch a first look of it.
Forky Asks a Question
Yvette brought out Tony Hale, who voices Forky in Toy Story 4, to tell us a little about a collection of shorts called Forky Asks a Question that would be coming to Disney Plus. Tony had quite a few of his own questions to ask. We then got to watch a first look, wherein Forky is trying to get an answer to the question: What is money? He talks to Hamm to find out. It was pretty funny.
Monsters at Work
Aisha Tyler and Ben Feldman then came on stage to talk about Monsters at Work, which is based upon the Monsters Inc. films. It is an office comedy set at Monsters Inc. Aisha will be voicing the mother of Ben’s character, who has just graduated college and started his job at the scare factory – but it turns out to be on the day that scare power switches to laugh power! So he has to figure out how to navigate through this change.
Marvel Studios
Changing gears, Kevin Feige, President of Marvel Studios, came out to talk about what Marvel was bringing to Disney Plus. He announced that Avengers: End Game would be available on December 11, and that everyone in the audience would be receiving an exclusive “We love you 3000” button! Yay for cool swag!
What If…?
First up for Marvel’s offerings was What If…?, an animated series that imagines “what if” certain things were different in the MCU. He brought out head writer Ashley Bradley and director Bryan Andrews to talk about the series. It was revealed that almost the entire cast of the MCU will be voicing their animated counterparts.
Although we got to see a brief teaser of What If…? at San Diego Comic-Con the prior month, the teaser we saw at the Disney Plus panel featured much more footage. This footage included Peggy Carter taking the Super-Soldier Serum instead of Steve Rogers, and becoming Captain Britain, wielding a shield with the UK flag and wearing a British outfit. We also see that Skinny Steve is still around, and operates some sort of mech suit. Additionally, we saw a zombie Captain America and what appeared to be T’Challa as Star-Lord. Following the footage, Hayley Atwell came out on stage to talk about returning to voice the role of Peggy Carter and commented, “Captain Carter, she knows her value, doesn’t she?” She marveled at the fact that she’s been doing this role for 10 years, and credited the fans for bringing her back.
Loki
The head writer of the upcoming Loki series, Michael Walter, and director Kate Herron came out to talk a little bit about it. We learned that it will be a six-episode series and will explore questions such as where Loki went after picking up the tesseract in End Game. Unfortunately, Tom Hiddleston was unable to make it to D23 Expo, but he sent a video message.
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
Next was The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. The head writer, Malcolm Spellman, and director Kari Skogland came out to say a few words, followed by the Falcon and the Winter Soldier themselves, Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan. It was also announced that Sharon Carter would be appearing on the show, so Emily VanCamp came out and said a few words about her return. Additionally, a new character was announced, John Walker, who will be played by Wyatt Russell, who joined the rest of the cast members on stage.
WandaVision
The writer and the director of WandaVision, Jac Schaeffer and Matt Shakman, then came on stage to tell us a bit about the show. They showed us some footage to give us a little “flavor” of what the show would be about. They haven’t started shooting yet, so there wasn’t any actual footage from the new show. It was basically existing footage of Wanda and Vision from the MCU films intercut with footage from the black and white Dick Van Dyke Show. They explained that WandaVision is inspired by The Dick Van Dyke Show, and will be “half classic sitcom and half full MCU spectacular.” Stars Elizabeth Olsen (Wanda) and Paul Bettany (Vision) also joined them on stage. Elizabeth described the show as “wacky and fun” and Paul said that it was funny. We then learned that Kat Dennings will be reprising her role as Darcy Lewis from the Thor movies, Randall Park will be reprising his role as Jimmy Woo from Ant-Man and the Wasp, and Kathryn Hahn will be joining the cast as the “nosy neighbor.” All three came out on stage.
Three New Series
Kevin Feige wrapped up the Marvel portion of the Disney Plus panel by announcing three new series coming to Disney Plus that had not been previously announced: Ms. Marvel, Moon Knight, and She Hulk.
The World According to Jeff Goldblum
Jeff Goldblum joined Yvette on stage to talk about his new unscripted show from National Geographic, The World According to Jeff Goldblum, of which there will be twelve episodes. Some of his favorite things he did included ice cream and tattoos. We then got to watch a trailer for the show, which is basically about Jeff Goldblum just being Jeff Goldblum, exploring the world and asking questions, even breaking out into song. You can watch that trailer below.
Encore!
After that, Kristen Bell came out to talk about her upcoming show, Encore!, which explores “celebrating regular people” as former high school musical casts of all ages are reunited for an encore performance. We also got to watch the trailer for it, which you can check out below.
Stargirl
Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures president Sean Bailey then came out to talk about the upcoming film Stargirl, which is based on the young adult novel of the same name. It’s a coming of age story about a 16-year old boy named Leo whose world is “turned upside down” when the “free-spirited” Stargirl shows up at his high school. Sean brought out the stars Grace Vanderwaal (who had won America’s Got Talent in 2016) and Graham Verchere to say a few words about their characters. The two agreed that the film passes on the message to “stay yourself.” Sean also revealed that Giancarlo Esposito will play a mentor and father figure to Leo. We then got to watch a “first look” from the film, with the song “Be True to Your School.”
Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made
Then we got to see some footage from a cute upcoming movie called Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made, based on the book of the same name. It’s about a little boy who operates his own detective agency — and his partner is a polar bear! In the scene we watched, Timmy investigates the death of the class hamster. We also saw that Timmy has a big imagination.
Lady and the Tramp
A movie that will be available on Disney Plus upon launch is the live action Lady and the Tramp film. We learned that the cast is led by the voices of Tessa Thompson and Justin Theroux, Janelle Monae will sing the classic song “He’s a Tramp” from the original animated film, and Yvette Nicole Brown herself will be playing Aunt Sarah. Yvette even brought out the dogs on stage that play Lady and the Tramp, Rose and Monte! Then we got to watch a trailer for the movie, which you can see below.
Togo: The Untold True Story
We also watched some footage from Togo: The Untold True Story, which is an upcoming animated film about a how a man and his dog brave the Alaskan tundra to complete a life-saving mission. In the clip, the owner of a mischievous Alaskan sled dog, Togo, thinks the dog is untrainable, as Togo keeps finding ways to escape and get into trouble. Togo is supposed to be in an enclosure with other dogs, but he is able to get out. His owner (voiced by Willem Dafoe) thinks he has figured out a way to keep him in, but he just digs under and gets out anyway! But by the end of the footage, it seems that Togo joins his owner on an adventure. The film will be available on Disney Plus in December.
Noelle
Next up, we learned about a live action Christmas movie called Noelle, which stars Anna Kendrick, Bill Hader, and Billy Eichner. In the film, Bill’s character, Nick, is the son of Santa Claus, and is supposed to replace him. However, he runs from his duties, and his sister, Noelle, played by Anna Kendrick, tries to track him down in the real world and bring him back to the North Pole. Billy Eichner also stars in the movie as Nick and Noelle’s cousin, Gabe, and he and Anna came out on stage to say a few words. Then we got to watch a trailer, which you can see below. Noelle will be available at launch.
Muppets Now
It was announced that unscripted, short form series Muppets Now will be coming to Disney Plus in 2020. We watched a teaser of Kermit the Frog trying to tell us about the show, but another muppet from the legal department, Joe Legal, kept preventing him from telling us anything. It did sound like there would be celebrity guests, though they couldn’t tell us which ones.
Diary of a Female President
We watched some behind-the-scenes footage from the upcoming series Diary of a Female President, wherein a woman played by Gina Rodriguez becomes President of the United States, and we take a look back at her 12-year old self, played by Tess Romero. Both Gina and Tess came out on stage dressed in sparkly suits – so sparkly that my camera had difficulty focusing on them in the short amount of time they were up there! We learned that not only does Gina Rodriguez star in the series, but that she is an executive producer and directing.
Star Wars
The final portion of the Disney Plus panel was dedicated to Star Wars. President of Lucasfilm Kathleen Kennedy came out on stage and announced that Disney Plus will be home to the entire Star Wars collection, displaying a timeline of all of the Star Wars films and series, all of which will be available within the first year of launch, including The Rise of Skywalker. She also announced the return of the Clone Wars animated series, which will debut in February 2020.
Cassian Andor and K2-SO
She invited Diego Luna and Alan Tudyk on stage, who will be reprising their roles of Cassian Andor and K2-SO from Rogue One in an as yet untitled spy series. This was an unexpected surprise considering what happened to them in Rogue One. The two joked about potential titles and shared some playful banter, which made me excited to see them together again (even if we only actually see Alan Tudyk on screen as a robot!).
The Mandalorian
Finally, executive producer and writer Jon Favreau and director Dave Filoni took to the stage to talk about The Mandalorian, which will be available upon the launch of Disney Plus on November 12. Dave recalled when the two first met back in 2007 at Skywalker Ranch when he was working on Clone Wars, and Jon asked if he could see it. He told him yes, if he could see Iron Man. So the two were the first to see each other’s work!
Jon explained that The Mandalorian takes place after Return of the Jedi, when the Empire has fallen and chaos reigns, so it’s a dangerous world. He went on to point out that if you’re new to Star Wars, it’s a whole new storyline with all new characters starting in a whole new time frame. “But if you are a Star Wars fan, we got you,” Favreau said. They brought the cast out on stage, including The Mandalorian himself, Pedro Pascal, as well as Gina Carano, Carl Weathers, and Giancarlo Esposito, plus Taika Waititi, who will also direct an episode. Giancarlo gushed about this being a dream come true for him, and said that his position with the Empire is “indelible.” Taika, who plays IG-11, joked about how “droid representation” is important to him, and that bounty hunter droids are very misunderstood.
We then got to watch the first trailer for The Mandalorian, which looks amazing! If you haven’t seen it yet, you can watch it below.
Obi-Wan Kenobi
Lastly, to wrap up the Star Wars presentation, Kathleen Kennedy came back out on stage and had Ewan McGregor came out and join her. Ewan had Kathleen ask him if he was going to play Obi-Wan Kenobi again. So she did, and he answered, “Yes.” He was so relieved that he could finally say “yes” instead of things like, “Well, I don’t know, we’ve been talking…” or “Maybe if they called me, I’d be happy…” Kathleen revealed that they have all the scripts written and are ready to start shooting the series next year.
After one final teaser clip of the multitude of things we would get to see once the service launches, the Disney Plus panel ended with confetti being dropped into Hall D23 – which, upon closer inspection, were actually in the shape of plus signs! Very clever, Disney.
As we exited Hall D23 (over half an hour later than originally scheduled because there was just so much to reveal that it ran over), as promised, we were each given a “We <3 you 3000 button” as well as one other surprise: a Disney Plus hat! So that was pretty cool.
We then rushed over to Katella to get in the overnight line for Saturday morning’s Hall D23 panel. Stay tuned for our recap of that panel.
You can view more of our photos from the Disney Plus panel below.
