It's been a hit-and-miss few years for Disney, but the House of Mouse now hopes to return to what worked before Bob Chapek took over. That means bringing Star Wars back to theaters, a quality-over-quantity approach to the MCU, and the return of animated franchises which are guaranteed to be box office hits.
Earlier this year, CEO Bob Iger confirmed plans for new Frozen and Toy Story movies. While Jennifer Lee won't return to direct the former alongside Chris Buck due to her commitments as an executive, the threequel is rapidly starting to take shape at Disney. However, it seems a fourth instalment is also in the works!
Talking to Good Morning America co-anchor Michael Strahan earlier today, Iger said, "Well, I’ll give you a little surprise there, Michael. 'Frozen 3' is in the works and there might be a 'Frozen 4' in the works too. But I don’t have much to say about those films right now."
"But Jenn Lee, who created 'Frozen,' the original 'Frozen' and 'Frozen II,' is hard at work with her team at Disney Animation on not one but actually two stories."
Whoa.
It sounds like the plan might be to make these back-to-back, a smart move to reduce what proved to be a sizeable gap between the first two movies (Frozen was released in 2013 and the sequel, Frozen II, didn't follow until six years later in 2019).
It's already been more than four years since that second chapter and even the kids who visited Arendelle in theaters for the first time with that follow-up are now growing up fast!
Earlier this year, Lee - who is Disney Animation's Chief Creative Officer - said, "Every morning last week they carved out space for me to work with the creative team on [Frozen III] and I am blown away and I am so excited. I don’t know what I’m doing on it yet - I’m not doing nothing - except doing what I do now, which is we work on every project as as team and I’m in there with creative. But with ‘Frozen,’ just a little bit more."
Frozen made $1.2 billion, with the sequel later grossing $1.45 billion and becoming the second-biggest animated movie in the process. Very little has been revealed about the third instalment, though we know Buck will be directing on his own and that the core cast - Kristen Bell, Idina Mendel, Josh Gad, and Jonathan Groff - are all set to return.
Stay tuned for updates.