Awesome Disney

In 1987, Disney Imagineering teamed up with George Lucas to create Star Tours. The Star Wars-inspired thrill ride took passengers on a misdirected flight to Endor. While it’s not the same without the motion simulator, it’s still fun to see this digital remaster of the 70mm film that was created for the ride. A new version of the ride has more than 250 story variations.

Here’s a different take on Disney’s Steamboat Willie now that it’s in the public domain. d o g took Ub Iwerks’ 1928 classic cartoon and converted it into retro pixel art animation. You can play the video now, or, of you’re feeling more ambitions, load up the DOSbox emulator and load this XDV file into XDC Play.

Now that Steamboat Willie is in the public domain, it didn’t take long for a bunch of horror interpretations to start popping up. This upcoming fan film from Fewture Studios has plans to scare audiences with a creepy abandoned version of Willie’s steamboat with what we can only imagine is a murderous Mickey Mouse.

Research Fellow and Imagineer Lanny Smoot is only the second Disney cast member to be inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. The first was Walt Disney. In this video, Lanny shows off a few of his incredible creations, including an amazing interactive “Holotile” floor that moves beneath your feet.

Loki starts jumping randomly through time and sees some terrible things happening. Season 2 of the Disney+ hit series channels Quantum Leap as the God of Mischief and Mobius team up to save the universe from yet another variant of Kang the Conqueror. Ke Huy Quan joins the cast as the TVA’s equivalent of James Bond’s “Q.” Drops 10.6.23.

In celebration of 100 years of Disney animation, this keepsake box of collectibles holds postcards of 100 Disney and Pixar characters, from Mickey Mouse to the adventurers from Strange World. All the most memorable heroes, sidekicks, and villains are here, in full color, in still images from the original cartoons and film classics.

To celebrate 25 years on Broadway, the cast and musicians of The Lion King stopped by the NPR offices to perform a series of songs from the award-winning musical. Their warm and enveloping performance of songs like Circle of Life, They Live in You, and Can You Feel the Love Tonight will bring sunshine to even the darkest day. HAKUNA MATATA!

Hyundai’s IONIQ 5 EV swept the 2022 New York Auto Show awards. This week Hyundai did it again with the IONIQ 6 and unveiled the IONIQ 5 Disney100 Platinum Concept car, the first-ever collaboration between Disney Imagineering and an automaker. A limited-edition production version will commemorate Disney’s 100th anniversary.

Now that Din Djarin has reunited with his pint-sized companion, The Mandalorian’s third season sets the duo on a journey toward Mandalore. Set against the backdrop of the rise of the New Republic, our heroes find themselves pulled into new conflicts as Grogu hones his skills. The season kicks off on 3.1.2023 on Disney+.

VFX artists have been making actors look younger or older for a while, but the effect is costly and labor-intensive. Researchers from Disney, ETH Zurich, and UW-Madison are showing off an AI tech called Face Re-aging Network (FRAN), which can perform the feat in five seconds per frame. It seems better at aging than de-aging, though.

Disney+ and Lucasfilm revisit the magical world of Willow with a new TV series. Warwick Davis reprises his role as the unlikely hero in an epic battle of good vs. evil. The trailer looks wonderful, though we will miss Val Kilmer’s Madmartigan. Premieres 11.30.22.

Cosplayer and Disney fan Tina Elliott stole the show at the 2022 D23Expo with an outfit based on the Dumbo the Flying Elephant ride at Disneyland. The costume surrounded Tina with a motorized mini version of the classic amusement park ride, and won her top prize for her category and the Fan Favorite award.

Nick Fury is back on Earth after working with the Skrulls in deep space for years. Now, these shapeshifting aliens have infiltrated our planet and are hiding in plain sight. Samuel L. Jackson is joined by Ben Mendelsohn, Cobie Smulders, Martin Freeman, and Don Cheadle in this new Disney+ series slated for 2023.

Even though we know Cassian Andor’s fate, we’re excited to learn his backstory. In this epic new Star Wars series, Diego Luna revisits his Rogue One character to tell the story of the birth of the rebellion against the evil Empire. Premieres on Disney+ on 8.31.2022.

Disney+ returns to the world of Big Hero 6’s with a new animated series. Interested only in helping, our inflatable robot pal Baymax spends each episode trying to fix a physical issue that his systems identified and ultimately finds deeper meaning in each interaction.

Ewan McGregor reprises his role as Obi-Wan Kenobi in this new Disney+ series. It takes place ten years after the end of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, as the Jedi Master hides on Tatooine to watch over Luke Skywalker and face his demons after his failure with Anakin. Premieres 5.27.22.

If you’ve ever visited one of Disney’s theme parks, you have been tricked. The parks frequently employ an optical illusion known as forced perspective to make structures look bigger or smaller than they actually are. Art of Engineering explains the trickery and why our brains get so easily fooled by it.

If Winnie the Pooh was more like the bear from The Revenant, he might look something like this imposing creation from artist North of the Border. He built this bear from scratch using a wire and foil armature, then sculpted and painted its clay body. Even Heffalumps should not mess with this Pooh Bear’s Hunny pot.

Musician 826aska performs a spirited arrangement of the track Friend Like Me on her electronic organ. While we will always miss Robin Williams, her version serves as a delightful and uplifting tribute. If you enjoy Disney musicals, check out her arrangements of A Whole New World and Circle of Life too.

The Mandalorian brought back Boba Fett, now head to Tatooine to see how the bounty hunter rules the underworld now that Jabba the Hutt is no longer head cheese, and Bib Fortuna is dead. The series premieres on 12.29.21 on Disney+.

In this Halloween special, The Muppets find themselves as guests in Disney’s famed Haunted Mansion, challenged with surviving one night inside of its creep-filled walls. They’re joined by Will Arnett, Yvette Nicole Brown, Darren Criss, John Stamos, and another famous Henson, Taraji P. Premieres 10.8.2021 on Disney+.

This boxed set makes a great gift for Disney fans. It includes 100 postcards, suitable for framing, note-writing, or mailing. Each one is printed with a unique poster from Disney’s massive catalog of movies and shorts. All the classics are there, from Lady and the Tramp to Pinocchio to One Hundred and One Dalmatians.

We were never ones to color inside of the lines, so we can appreciate illustrator Jordan Persegati’s out-of-the-box reinterpretation of Disney’s Frozen Ultimate Colouring Book, which he transformed into a demonic work of horror, complete with trypophobia triggers.