Sorry for the delay, folks; I know all five of my regular readers were on pins and needles (hi, mom!). See, GreenReaper emailed to tell me that Fred had linked back to my Cinderella review on the new Cartoon Research site, and just like the time he emailed me about some video game site which quoted my Pokémon Black 2 and White 2 review, my computer died. Obviously, there's some connection here. Anyway, it's all their fault. Shame on you guys.

Chappell Ellison reports on the Cartoon Brew website that the 1989 Capcom DuckTales video game is being remastered for a Summer 2013 release. The game will feature enhanced background graphics, and as much of the original voice cast as possible, including 90-year-old Alan Young as Scrooge McDuck.

DuckTales Remastered is being marketed for nostalgic new parents as much as for a new generation of players.

Young parents who grew up playing DuckTales on NES will leap at the chance to reintroduce the game to their kids on the contemporary consoles of today.

The Cartoon Brew report includes a 2’03” trailer for the coming improved rerelease.

The Cartoon Brew reports that Ellen DeGeneres, who voiced Dory, the regal blue tang fish with short-term memory loss in Pixar’s 2003 Finding Nemo, has announced that Pixar has asked her to reprise her role in the forthcoming sequel, Finding Dory. It will also be directed by Andrew Stanton, who directed Finding Nemo. Its tentative release date is November 25, 2015.

Finding Nemo is Pixar’s #2 grosser, behind only Toy Story 3.

Disney Interactive’s Epic Mickey video game was pretty popular — it even won an Ursa Major Award for Best Anthropomorphic Game. Admittedly, some folk complained about the fact it was only available for the Nintendo Wii system, but it sold well enough to be considered a moderate success in the gaming world. The follow up, Epic Mickey 2? Not so much, in spite of the fact that 2 was made available for many game platforms. Now comes the word (according to various articles) that sales of Epic Mickey 2 since its November 2012 launch were poor enough that Disney has decided to shutter Junction Point, the Texas-based game design firm that Disney purchased in 2007 to develop both the Epic Mickey games. From this point forward, Disney Interactive will instead focus their attention on Disney Infinity, the new figurine-based multi-character game (similar in some ways to Skylanders) which will premier in June.

image c. 2013 Disney Interactive

This game is a nostalgia trip. Much like the original Epic Mickey, it highlights a diverse cast of classic Disney characters that don’t always get the spotlight; sure, there’s a matchmaking questline that unites Donald and Daisy Duck as romantic partners, but there’s also one featuring Clarabelle Cow and Horace Horsecollar. When was the last time you saw those two characters featured?

Well, probably the last Epic Mickey game; you also get that nostalgic kick just listening to the opening screen music if you’ve already played the first game. The world of the Epic Mickey, Wasteland, is a bizarre world of forgotten and buried cartoons; at one point, I found myself looking at a bizarre new form of sedimentary rock formed of discarded Disney paraphernalia. It’s a nice place to visit; I’m not sure if I want to live there, though. It’s strangely creepy.

And the camera still stinks, too.

SPOILER ALERT: I have tried to hide late game plot revelations as best I can, and believe I did an alright job. However, I totally spoil the ending of the first Saw movie after the break.
Update (Jan 29): Disney shutters Epic Mickey creator Junction Point Studios

Walt Disney Pictures have announced several upcoming feature films, and among them is the sequel to the successful 2011 re-launch of The Muppets. Currently titled The Muppets… Again, the new film is scheduled for release in March of 2014. According to The Muppet Wiki, “The film is planned to be a ‘comedy caper’ set in Europe.  Ricky Gervais will star as ‘a male lead whose intentions are always in question’ along with Ty Burrell as an Interpol inspector, Tina Fey as a ‘Russian femme fatale,’ and a ‘slew of cameos’”. [Oh like they ever have that in a Muppet movie!] The sequel will be again directed by James Bobin, and scripted by Nick Stoller, who co-wrote the 2011 film with star Jason Segel.

image c. 2013 Walt Disney Pictures

Cartoon Brew has a new 3’04” trailer for Disney’s forthcoming video game, Disney Infinity, coming in Summer 2013, that apparently has every Disney and Pixar character in it that are not already in the other Disney “team” video games such as the core funny animal stars and the Princesses. Anthropomorphic characters? Plenty of 'em!

This handheld spinoff of the Epic Mickey games features Mickey Mouse as Mario in an old-school side-scroller with cel-animation style visuals. What he’s doing in a 2D game with 2D visuals on a console with “3D” in its name is a mystery.

I’m sorry. That came out a bit grumpy. You see, I really liked this game. Up to a point. Then that point came and I was very disappointed in it. This made me re-examine the game a bit more harshly than I expected, but it all really is sour grapes.

That Disney will follow up its/Pixar’s CGI anthropomorphized Cars with the forthcoming CGI anthropomorphized Planes, starring Dusty, the old-fashioned single-prop crop-duster plane who wants to compete with the fastest jets in an around-the-world air race, isn’t exactly news – it was announced in June 2011 as going direct to video in Spring 2013. But now, according to Cartoon Brew, in the wake of the announcement of DreamWorks’ June 2013 Turbo, about the snail who wants to be an auto race track speedster, Disney has decided to make Planes a theatrical release, on August 9, 2013. At least the plane looks cuter than the snail.

This is not Disney's first anthro airplane. Remember Pedro, the little mail plane trying to cross the Andes in Disney's 1942 Saludos Amigos? You don't? Oh, well ...

Disney and Pixar have announced an interesting change to their 2013 movie line-up. This is from Jerry Beck over at Cartoon Brew: “Disney has decided to chase after Dreamworks’ Turbo next summer with its new “Cars-inspired” movie: Planes. Disney has just announced it will release this film theatrically on August 9th, 2013. Originally designed to go direct-to-DVD, Planes will now play in theaters all over the U.S. Jon Cryer is voicing the lead plane, “Dusty”; Klay Hall (Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure), an aviator himself, is directing.” In the same article Cartoon Brew also re-posted the original trailer for Planes, in case you missed it before.

image c. 2012 Disney/Pixar

Here’s something new that Disney art and story collectors can look forward to this February: Walt Disney’s Mickey Mouse Tales, coming in hardcover from Random House. “Originally published in Good Housekeeping magazine, these legendary one-page features translated Disney’s newest releases into rollicking comic poems illustrated by master Disney painters Tom Wood and Hank Porter. This collection of 50 of the funniest and most fascinating features are presented in a hardcover family-friendly book to Disney fans of all ages. A trip back to Mickey and Minnie’s musical heyday, these beautifully illustrated and condensed re-tellings of some of Disney’s most delightful shorts will entrance fans young and old.” Check it out at Cheap Graphic Novels.

image c. 2012 Random House

You know how you don’t judge a book by its cover? Well, in the same vein, you don’t judge a movie by its trailer. So, anyway, Rise of the Guardians went from winner to not even showing up on my Oscar guess list, while Wreck-it-Ralph pulled the opposite trick. On one hand, this is a disappointing year; on the other, it’s a fun year to predict, because nothing is certain.

Note: Obviously, this is a bit late and out of date, but I was unable to post this last month due to computer issues, and the opinion part of it is still mostly valid, so I’m submitting it late. If you’re reading this, the editors decided to let it in; if you’re not, well, uh, you’re not.

The Cartoon Brew website has been covering the partnering of Barneys New York, a luxury haute couture shop, with the Disney organization to feature some classic Disney characters wearing exclusive Paris fashion styles, as part of Barneys’ Electric Holiday campaign, debuting at Barneys’ Madison Avenue store on November 14.

Women’s Wear Daily reported on August 29,

When unveiled to the public on Nov. 14, Barneys’ Madison Avenue flagship will feature a three-dimensional electric light show; a moving art short film in the window displays that will turn Disney’s most favorite heroes into runway supermodels and fashion regulars into Disney types, and an original score by Oscar-winning composer Michael Giacchino. […] The theme is a riff on Disney’s famous electrical parade, as well as the special lighting installations so central to the New York holiday season and the flashbulbs of fashion runways. […] The short film centers around Minnie Mouse’s fantasy to be at the Paris shows. There she comes across key Disney characters — Mickey Mouse, Goofy, Daisy Duck, Cruella de Vil, Princess Tiana and Snow White — all decked out in unique designer clothes as they make their way down the runway.

The announcement was also covered by the Los Angeles Times, Retailing Daily, Fashion Weekly, and others.

But the Cartoon Brew has the exclusive on the controversy that this is causing. The online Change.org is soliciting signatures for a petition to “leave Minnie Mouse alone”.

Disney’s 1973 Robin Hood with Robin as an anthropomorphic fox has been revered by Furry fans for decades. Many early fans credit it as what first got them interested in anthro animals.

This is us. Animation veteran critic Martin “Dr Toon” Goodman has just written an article for the Animation World Network on “The Animation Critic’s Art: Taking the Heat”, in which he reveals that in 2003, he was asked to name the worst Disney feature ever made. He chose Robin Hood.

Many Disney fans have since reviled him, but in subsequent pages he defends his choice. And, from an animation if not a Furry standpoint, he argues a good case. What do you think?

This article is also pertinent to all the discussion lately on whether there should be more criticism in Furry fandom. (And don’t miss my AWN review of The Art of Rise of the Guardians.)

The Anthropomorphic Literature and Arts Association (ALAA) has inaugurated its Hall of Fame with its first three inductees, announced tonight at a ceremony at the Rainfurrest 2012 convention in Seattle.

The ALAA Hall of Fame is intended to honor those so prestigious that it is impossible to imagine the field of anthropomorphics without them. A person - a character - a book - a film - a comic strip - a Hall of Fame honoree is as well known to the general public as Sherlock Holmes, Superman, or William Shakespeare.

The inductees to the ALAA Hall of Fame are chosen by a vote of the fifteen members of the ALAA Committee during July, with runoffs extending into August if necessary. There are many potential honorees, and those outvoted in one year may be renominated in future years.