Something that went rather unreported last week when Disney updated their 2022 and 2023 slate is that Disney actually removed 6 films. 2 films from 2022 and 4 from 2023 lost their reserved dates.
There are two reasons this happened:
- The continued dominos falling from all the pandemic delays resulted in their film pipeline slowing down. Shrunk has hit one heck of a snag as it was originally intended to have already filmed and instead it hasn’t even started. Rachel Zegler’s Snow White is behind where Disney intended and Little Mermaid was definitely the plan for Memorial Day 2022 before Bob’s Burgers got the slot.
- Their pandemic-era decision to pivot more heavily towards streaming resulted in numerous films earmarked for theatrical releases now being developed for Hulu or Disney+. Films affected include the 2022 Disney+ Original films Peter Pan & Wendy, Disenchanted (Enchanted 2), and Pinocchio. There are likely more. This shakeup means the theatrical slate is smaller and so Disney dropped dates.
All 4 dates dropped from 2023 are 20th Century Studios. We had to expect a reduction in theatrical fare from them after Disney released their pre-purchase pipeline and with the pandemic shift we’ll likely see the former Fox brand evolve into being primarily a Hulu / Star and Disney+ content farm.
While comparing their slate as it stood in June 2021 to the September 2021 update we also noticed they had re-assigned 4 Disney Live Action films in 2022 – 3 to Searchlight and 1 to 20th. The first part makes a lot of sense as Searchlight did not have any dates reserved. Disney has about 5 that will be done by next year and it would be strange to hold them back unless Disney is gonna throw some on Hulu. Of course, it’s a dream that Disney would bring Searchlight Originals to Disney+. Maybe if they were about superheroes.
Visual Representation Of 2022 Slate Changes
We make some predictions as to which films will fill the untitled slots in some instances.
Visual Representation Of 2023 Slate Changes
We make some predictions as to which films will fill the untitled slots in some instances.
As you can see they still have no Searchlight films scheduled for 2023 and only 2 20th Century films. Like we said before, expect a lot more content from 20th Century to appear on Hulu and Disney+ starting in 2023.
What do you think about these slate changes? Are they bonkers? Are they sensible? Are you sad 2022 is Disney Live Action-less? Are you sad 2023 is almost 20th Century-less?
Drew Ryan is a film, TV, and Disney geek. He has degrees in English, Student Personnel Administration, and Library & Information Science from Lawrence University, Concordia University-Wisconsin, and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Interested in the minutia and licensing of streaming service content, he is always publishing lists, suggestions, and advocating for Disney’s missing library to be added to Disney+. Drew subscribes to Disney+, Hulu, Netflix, HBO Max, and Paramount+. You can find him waxing nostalgic over classic Disney Channel or geeking out over Marvel, CW shows, & Disney on Twitter.
