Inevitable “Frozen 2” Finally Greenlit

It was mere days ago (only two) that the producers and co-director of Frozen appeared at a press conference hyping the short Frozen Fever and said there were no plans for a Frozen 2 at that time. 48 hours later, this very morning at a shareholder’s meeting, Bob Iger and John Lasseter finally copped to it: yes, they’re going to make another one. They weren’t specific beyond that, but the greenlight could have very well come down hours ago.

I’m all for respecting the creative process above all other concerns, but I’ll be honest and say the silence coming from Disney as to whether anything else would be done with Frozen besides a 7-minute short felt bizarre. To be a multinational corporation and ignore THIS kind of cultural phenomenon is nothing short of insanity. (How do Capcom and Square DO THIS all the time? It must take a lot of willpower.)

No doubt cash was a motivation here. But it’s a different Disney than the dark days when Michael Eisner went after every quick buck and short-term-gain plan he could grab at. Sequels from the company these days are not rushed out as quickly as possible and then forgotten about — time is taken to craft them right. The fact that they had to think about a sequel for longer than a second is a good enough sign. As for Cars 2, Cars 1 wasn’t that good either.

Anyone who says “Walt never would have done this” doesn’t know much about Walt. He never made a sequel to his animated films, but he DID pimp out his characters with shameless impunity whenever they got popular. Fun and Fancy Free has Jiminy Cricket hosting the wraparound segment, for no other reason than people wanted to see Jiminy again. Tinkerbell appeared in plenty of places after Peter Pan wrapped production, most famously in Walt’s “Disneyland” TV show.

And if you’re still pessimistic, just be grateful I never typed “those three words” anywhere in this news bite.