Massive Link Round-up: 'Toy Story' short gets a plot, Awards, Postage stamps, and more!

Happy New Year, everybody!

Since Disney, etc.'s posting has been on a temporary hiatus as of late, this shall be a massive link round-up summarizing all of the important Disney, Pixar, entertainment, and "everything in-between" news from the last few weeks. Enjoy....

At the top of this post, you will find some wonderful mash-up art from DeviantArt user iamclu, courtesy of HeyUGuys. It is just awesome, ain't it?...


Rumors that a Toy Story short will be attached to Cars 2 have been all but confirmed. After it was leaked that the next short will include Ken and Barbie going to Hawaii, Mike at The Pixar Blog did some very thorough investigating and discovered an Amazon.com product page for a picture book based on the short. Here's the synopsis:

Bonnie is off to Hawaii, and Barbie and Ken are excited to go along on their first tropical vacation! But when they're accidentally left behind, it's up to Buzz, Woody, and the rest of the toys to create a Hawaiian paradise right in Bonnie's room.

Based on the latest animated short featuring the toys from Disney/Pixar Toy Story, this full-color storybook includes punch-out postcards that girls and boys ages 3-7 will love sending to their friends!

Read all about the short and its synopsis at The Pixar Blog here or Amazon here.



Above you will find a video tribute, The Beauty of Pixar, by Leandro Copperfield, who says that "Pixar's films have always been important in my life." It is a very well-edited video, and will remind you just how great Pixar is.


As we get further and further into this Awards season, more news of the Oscars are being leaked and announced. Recently, Variety has reported that Disney will not enter Randy Newman's Toy Story 3 score into the running for Best Original Score. Instead, they will focus their efforts on promoting his tune We Belong Together for Best Original Song. It really is a great song, and helps to lighten the mood of the film while it plays during the closing credits. Not only that, but it is a great song on its own. It definitely deserves one o' them little gold guys. Also, I think it is a smart move for Disney not to enter Newman's score--there are tons of great scores this year, and I doubt the Academy would vote for a score that is simply (yet expertly) an extension of two already-existing scores.


You may have heard of Disney's brilliant "For Your Consideration" ad campaign for where they are comparing stills from Toy Story 3 to past Best Picture winners including The Sting, Lord of the Rings, The Sound of Music, Platoon, Shakespeare in Love, and Slumdog Millionaire, among others. They are very funny, and I hope they manage to snag Pixar the Best Picture nom and, with some luck, the award itself. Go to the Disney Awards site here to see the newly-released series of advertisements, as well as an additional (and boldly hilarious) one here.


Current accolades for Toy Story 3 include: being at the top of Moviefone's list of the best films from 2010, being at the top of Rotten Tomatoes' list of the best films from 2010, being on Quentin Tarantino's list of the best films of 2010 as well as Edgar Wright's top 5 list, a Golden Globe nom for Best Animated Feature, being one of the films honored on AFI's list of the top ten films of 2010, and being at the top of Time Magazine's list of the best films from last year. With all of that under its belt, how can you say that it won't win that Best Picture Oscar? I think it will. It just has to...


While we're on the topic of Pixar, it's worth noting that the U.S. Postal Service has announced that later this year, a collection of commemorative Pixar stamps will be released. They'll be in sheets of twenty, include the above five designs, and instead of having a set value, they'll be valid for every first-class letter forever. Expect to see them on August 19 later this year.



Above, you will find a behind-the-scenes video for the upcoming animated film Rango. The short video, which features Johnny Depp, is very interesting, showing how director Gore Verbinski coached the voice actors while also incorporating their movements into a type of mo-cap/animation hybrid. It's really quite interesting...

The headline How Disney Designed The Military's Electromagnetic Launch System says enough about this article. A bizarre, surprising, and thoroughly engaging read... Check it out here.

In an interview with Collider, David Fincher let loose the information that his upcoming remake/adaptation 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea will be in 3D. Although I hate 3D with a fiery passion, I am very, very excited to see a version of Jules Vernes classic story told with modern effects by one of my favorite directors. Read the full interview here.


Tron: Legacy was visually-stunning, but was quite under-whelming. The story was weak, the acting was dry (although I appreciated seeing Jeff Bridges returning to a Dude-type philosophy on the big screen), and the overall feel of the movie just didn't do justice to its original counterpart. I couldn't even follow the Light Cycle scene well enough to enjoy it! I certainly agree with RT's 49%. However, it is doing decently at the box office, having made over $130 million so far. They still need $40 million more to make their money back, but I'm sure that they will...



Let's conclude this New Year's link round-up with a bang. Watch the above video of the "Fountains and Fireworks" show that was shown at Disney's California Adventure a couple of nights ago...

And that's all there is to post about for now! You are now completely up-to-date on all Disney, Pixar, entertainment, and everything in-between news. I hope you enjoyed it, and be sure to keep checking your favorite blog for all of the best news...

And once again, Happy New Year!

Read More...

Comic-Con Day #2: More Del Toro, Tron, and Ruffalo as 'The Hulk'

Day 2 from Comic-Con didn't bring many surprises. Nothing like Del Toro's announcement regarding The Haunted Mansion, or the sad news about The Hobbit. Still, there were some interesting things you might want to know coming out of San Diego today...

First, I'll keep you up to date on Del Toro--both on his Haunted Mansion project, and everything he's working on. Above you will find the official, just-released logo for the film. To read the full press release that accompanied the very cool and stylized logo, head over to /Film here.

Supposedly, the visionary filmmaker will only be writing and producing the theme park-inspired film, and not directing. Instead, he has a horror film and a stop-action Pinocchio in the works. I am excited for those. To read more about Del Toro's announcements of the day, click here.

Tron, Tron, Tron. You began as such a simple idea but have exploded into a cult phenomenon. Comic-Con loves you, I love you, and we all love hearing news about you. Oh, Tron, why must we wait longer to see you in your brilliant, computer-generated wonderfulness? Well, since we can't see you until December 17, we thank you for the above brand new still taken from the movie.

If that doesn't get you excited to see Tron: Legacy, I don't think anything will.

There was big news regarding The Avengers announced yesterday, and some new news today. Several weeks ago, I was very sad to discover that Edward Norton would not be reprising his role as The Hulk for Marvel's Avenger's film. He is my favorite actor, and I thought he made a great Bruce Banner. But, instead, Marvel has all but made it official that the new Hulk will be *sigh* Mark Ruffalo. Sure, he's an OK actor. Maybe even good occasionally (like in Shutter Island), but as the Hulk? Pa-lease. Don't make me laugh. They definitely should have stayed with Norton. Oh well, at least Ruffalo will be led by superstar Mr. Joss Whedon.

Above you will find a trailer for the recently announced DC Comics spinoff flick Red. Does it look a lot like the A-Team movie? Yes. That one Losers movie released a few months ago? Definitely. But, unlike those two films, this one actually looks good. And more action-y. Plus, it's starring Bruce Willis, John Malkovich and Morgan Freeman.

Sign me up for two of those, please.

Remember yesterday how I said I'd have loved to be at that panel with J.J. Abrams and Joss Whedon? Well, I couldn't be there. The next best thing to being there would have been a video of it. Well, we don't have that either, but we do have the next best thing after that: a transcription. Click over to /Film here to read through it. They talk about all kinds of different great stuff. It is definitely worth the read.

That's all there is to post for now, but as Comic-Con wraps up, I'm sure the studios will throw some more curve balls at us. Stay tuned here for all the latest Comic-Con, Disney, Pixar, and Movie news.

Read More...

Pixar Lends a Hand to 'Tron'

A film has to tell a good story and have a solid screenplay. Everything--the special effects, actors, jokes--should come after, and should cater to the movie's story. And no one in the film industry (and perhaps the world) knows more about story than the brilliant folks at Pixar. It is for this reason that the team behind Tron: Legacy asked Pixar if they'd lend a hand and beef up their script.

It was back in early March, and director Joe Kosinski decided that even though they'd finished up filming, his movie just wasn't good enough. So, he scheduled some re-shoots focused purely on giving the sci-fi flick more character, story, and heart. But first, he'd see what the masterminds in Emeryville thought of his nice little movie. He held a Tron: Legacy screening for John Lasseter, Ed Catmull, Brad Bird, TS3 screenwriter Michael Arndt, and others from the Pixar brain trust.

Following the screening, Disney hired Arndt and Bird to write some pages for the six-day reshoot, which took place last month. Sean Bailey, Disney’s president of production, had this to say on the collaboration:

What I give Joe and the filmmaking team immense credit for, is this was all born out of how do we give the fans the best movie we can. We were very fortunate that Pixar wanted to play a part in it.

This is certainly a good sign. I was weary of how Tron: Legacy would end up, but now that Pixar's Midas' Touch has graced the film, I'm a little more optimistic.

We'll know for sure come December 17...

Source: EW

Read More...

'Tron Legacy' Trailer

There's not much else to say. Enjoy.

Read More...