News Roundup

Don’t have much time to post recently, if you haven’t noticed. But I’m working on it. If you happened to visit the new OrlandoSentinel website this morning you would have seen these three stories in the news.

The Weinstein Brothers are emptying the storage closet ahead of their departure from the Disney fold. A few films that have been caught in the often messy separation are now scheduled for their big screen debut. This includes a new Johnny Depp period film, Libertine.

There is also news on the Pixar and Disney relationship. Incumbent CEO Iger reports they are back at the table again. This relationship has proven to be profitable for both sides and I don’t think one should under estimate the branding power of having all your characters associated with one themepark giant. In any event both companies are facing a serious challenge from Sparky and his crew at Dreamworks. Madagascar managed a first place finish despite its name.

Hong Kong Disneyland is preparing to open in the late summer and it has already faced its share of challenges. You may have heard about the Shark Fin Soup controversy. SFS is often prepared in a manner that is cruel to the animals (cutting the fins off live sharks then releasing them to die). Disney has stated that they will serve the soup out of respect for the local culture which upset activitsts. Now Disney has stated they will only serve soup made from fins harvested in a non-cruel fashion (which I imagine means they’ll use the whole shark in some way).