"To everybody in the article comments snarking that all Disneytoons ever did was shitty sequels, fuck you.
This is sad. A lot of expanded universe-building took place under the Disneytoons banner and it’s pretty much my alma mater.
Without Disneytoons, we wouldn’t have The Lion King trilogy, Goofy Movie and Extremely Goofy Movie, Aladdin & the Prince of Thieves [sic], Wendy & Peter reuniting, Pixie Hollow, 3 Musketeers and Patrick Stewart as Bambi’s dad.
Yes, it was a cash cow franchise. But damn if we didn’t sweat blood to make the best cash cows we possibly could."
This is sad. A lot of expanded universe-building took place under the Disneytoons banner and it’s pretty much my alma mater.
Without Disneytoons, we wouldn’t have The Lion King trilogy, Goofy Movie and Extremely Goofy Movie, Aladdin & the Prince of Thieves [sic], Wendy & Peter reuniting, Pixie Hollow, 3 Musketeers and Patrick Stewart as Bambi’s dad.
Yes, it was a cash cow franchise. But damn if we didn’t sweat blood to make the best cash cows we possibly could."
—Disney Australia alum Amy Mebberson
speaking out in defense of Disneytoon Studios upon hearing the sad news of its current state.
speaking out in defense of Disneytoon Studios upon hearing the sad news of its current state."The structure of Disneytoons was less rigid than feature. I was allowed to try my hand at character design as well as keeping an eye on the animation and clean up. Many feature people, after the big layoffs, found a new home at disneytoon for a few years. Yes, there was a lot of snobbery around about these sequels, but the parameters were very tight for filmmakers. The story had to fit in somehow with the main feature and that left the possibility for character arcs very limited. Management was often the biggest stumbling block for directors to have a real voice, but there is a lot of good work in them in animation, backgrounds etc. and they are a cut above most other traditional offerings."
—Animator Andreas Wessel-Therhorn on working at Disneytoons
"Can you tell we loved our time at DisneyToon Studios and Tink? Again, it’s teeming with the best talent in the business. Look up some of the names in the credits of the Tinker Bell films, and you’ll find names that worked on some of Disney’s most revered animated films. The Little Mermaid (1989), The Lion King, Aladdin – virtually all of these classics and more are represented by talent in the DisneyToon franchises. And many of these people were with us at Circle 7. So no, there’s no “mixed emotions” at all. Quite the contrary."
—Bob Hilgenberg and Rob Muir on working at Disneytoon Studios
