We Want The D

As you may know, dear listener, we don't do Pixar movies on the podcast. But we do talk about Disney-released spinoffs from Pixar movies. Which of course means it was only a matter of time before we got to PLANES, the Cars-adjacent franchise that mostly exists to sell toys. But you may also know that a film set in a world populated entirely by living vehicles is going to capture our hosts' imagina...

It's the last of the Disney TV shows that got their own theatrically released movies, and we saved the most grostesque for last. TEACHER'S PET features big Nathan Lane energy as a dog who desperately wants to be a boy, an insanely stacked voice cast, and just about the ugliest animation our hosts have ever seen. 

It's remarkable that, after watching enough Disney movies from the 1960s, it stops mattering how unique or strange a premise is. Take MONKEYS, GO HOME! A movie that begins with Dean Jones moving to Provence, France and turns into a movie about undercutting wages for the local olive-harvesting workers and replacing them with slave labour via four chimpanzees. A bizarre premise by any definition, ye...

Our hosts certainly aren't above jumping on the latest trends, so get ready to talk about Bruno, cause it's ENCANTO week. The latest Disney animated feature that is tearing up the soundtrack charts, capturing hearts and minds, and making you feel extremely sad when a house falls down. The songs will get stuck in your head, the arepas will make your stomachs rumble, and the family drama will be fru...

Y'all know that our hosts are all big fans of Jed. You know, the dog performer from classics such as The Journey of Natty Gann and White Fang? So it's sad to say that his final performance was in the...let's say lackluster Disney sequel WHITE FANG 2: MYTH OF THE WHITE WOLF. The most we can say about it is that at least it looks like a relatively easy time for ol' Jed, cause despite being the title...

It's a rollicking river adventure this week as we watch the latest Disney movie to be based on a theme park ride, JUNGLE CRUISE. It's hard not to have at least a bit of a good time with this film, given how much it begs, borrows and steals from other beloved classics in the action-adventure genre, but it's got plenty to recommend itself on it's own! Like...Paul Giamatti and Jesse Plemons doing bro...

How do you solve the problem of wanting to make an origin story for a villain whose only trait is a homicidal urge to murder animals and wear their skins? Well, if you're Disney, it's rather simple: cast Emma Stone, give her a tragic backstory, and then (and here's the important part) completely abandon any intention of having her turn into a puppy-strangling maniac. This CRUELLA may not be destin...

Bob and Margaret is an adult animated television series created by David Fine and Alison Snowden. The show revolved around a married English couple named Bob and Margaret Fish, a middle class 40-ish working couple with no children and two dogs. Bob is a dentist and Margaret is a chiropodist. Bob and Margaret struggle with everyday issues and mid-life crises. Stories often revolve around the mundan...

In the pantheon of Disney Channel Original Movie icons, Galleria, Chanel, Aqua and Do may just be their own Mount Rushmore. And it's easy to see why; THE CHEETAH GIRLS is an earnest story of friendship, self-acceptance and conflict resolution that stands up with even the best episodes of Degrassi: The Next Generation. It also has some wild examples of teen slang, awful early 2000s fashion and we'r...

When you think about it, Disney has a pretty decent track record with adventure movies. So THE ISLAND AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD could have been a welcome reprieve from the usual 70s fare of films about dogs and old people. Could have been, but wasn't. Instead, it's a surprisingly dull affair, thanks to an uninteresting plot, and even more uninteresting characters. 

Much like the miracle substance itself, FLUBBER is a Disney movie that seems to defy understanding. In most ways, it's a surprisingly faithful remake (to its own detriment) of the 1961 Fred MacMurray vehicle it's based on. But it's in the small changes where the insanity happens. A flying robot in love with her creator, henchmen played by serial killer Buffalo Bill and the hardest screw to ever wa...

Oh, to see the world through the eyes of this dog. A dog who loved an old shepherd so much he'd follow his slowly-dying body from the moors to the streets of Edinburgh to the Greyfriars Kirkyard. Who then was fed by a guilt-ridden restaurant, bathed by a graveyard caretaker, and played with by poor children. Who was then...dragged before the the magistrate in an ownership dispute, but got to play...

We haven't been shy about our general malaise toward Disney's modern predilection for remakes and sequels that feel a bit creatively bankrupt. So imagine our surprise when we watched one of their first ever sequels, SAVAGE SAM, and discovered it's not necessarily a new trend. Ostensibly a sequel to the classic trauma vehicle Old Yeller , this movie is less a fraught coming-of-age tale about a boy...

We're closing out another decade of Disney this week with THE LITTLEST OUTLAW. The story of a little boy and a frightened horse attempting to avoid the wrath of a Mexican General and stepfather who's a real piece of work. It's not entirely unpleasant, at least until it starts extolling the virtues of bullfighting. And because we're finished with the 1950s, we also reminisce about the highs and low...

Has someone at Disney been listening to us? Seems that way, since RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON gives us a lot of what we've been wanting from modern Disney. An original story instead of a sequel or a remake? Check. A "let's get a team together" structure filled with interesting and fun characters? Check. A con artist baby who can do martial arts? You better believe that's a check. This movie isn't per...

We close out our October Season run of programming by closing out a Disney Channel franchise with RETURN TO HALLOWEENTOWN. And while these movies may have always been dull, cheap and dumb to varying degrees, they've never been more incoherent than in this last installment. And we're not just talking about the fact that they replaced the lead actress and literally nobody else in the reoccurring cas...

It's a spooky October Season surprise as the Summer of Muppets returns from beyond the grave. The scariest combination of words in this Disney+ special may just be "corporate synergy" as MUPPETS HAUNTED MANSION plays more as a cross-promotional advertisement for a theme park ride than a natural fit for these beloved puppet characters, but hey - it's still the Muppets getting to do stuff, so it's a...

There's a feeling of October in the air, which can only mean one thing. It's time to return to Seabrook High School (AKA Jill's work building) for Z-O-M-B-I-E-S 2. And this time, there's werewolves. Who, in this universe, are all teens who wear the same jewelry and sew fur patches onto their clothes. Disney Channel Original sequels tend to be a bit better than their first iterations, but there's a...

Welcome to McFARLAND, USA - a small California town made up of a mostly Latinx community, and a new family lead by the latest in a long line of Disney old dads. Only this time, the old dad is Coach Kevin Costner and he's noticed that a lot of these local boys sure can run. Yes, it's another Disney sports movie, which of course means we're in for a good time; and maybe we'll learn one or two obviou...

We've watched a lot of sub-par Disney movies over the years, but there's something different about CHICKEN LITTLE. It's a movie with so many problems that there's no way they couldn't have been apparent to the people making it, and yet nobody seems to have cared to pump the brakes and try to correct them. The result is a montage heavy, dialogue light, weird looking, strangely cast, inexplicable me...

It's a classic tale of a family vacation gone awry in Disney's BON VOYAGE! A straight-laced father just wants to give his wife and children a holiday to remember, but all manner of entitled little rich boys, beach con-artists, and would-be cuckholders conspire against him to throw a wrench in their plans. And no, we didn't slip into an alternate universe where the Griswolds are somehow Disney char...

For the first and most likely only time, we're breaking protocol on the podcast for the grand finale of the Summer of Muppets. Because Disney hasn't made enough feature-length Muppet projects (yet), we're allowing ourselves to examine the small screen sitcom THE MUPPETS.. (the period is part of the title), which aired on ABC for one season back in 2015-2016. Was this a wonderful new forum for thes...

Based on the novel by S.E. Hinton, TEX is a thoughtful coming-of-age story about a wayward and wild teenage boy learning to think of people other than himself, and learning to be ok with saying goodbye to friends and family as they inevitably leave their small, rural Oklahoma town - even if he has to stay. If that seems a little too mature and grounded for Disney, just remember that the 1980s were...

There's no shortage of movies we've watched over the course of this podcast that involve Disney putting animals in harm's way. We are still pretty sure they killed at least one horse. But THE ONE AND ONLY IVAN portends a more benign future where Disney can make movies that star animals but without the need to for there to be actual animal performers. The downside is, they've finally hit that balan...

For our special Minnie Mouse-isode edition of our summer series, we take a look at the man behind the Muppets. From humble beginnings to picking up puppetry on a whim to breakthroughs in children's entertainment to a highly valued and sought-after multi-media company, Jim Henson's success is undeniable. But it's his attitude and philosophies that were imbued in his work that has allowed the Muppet...