This Week on A113Animation (13th - 19th May, 2013)

With our recent expansion, and the fact that the film industry is prepping itself for a big summer, there's a lot happening here on A113Animation.com at the moment. As such, here's a brief recap of what went down this week:

News

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: With Marvel-mania in full force right now (Iron Man 3 recently smashed past the billion dollar mark worldwide), ABC and Joss Whedon are prepping their Avengers spin-off, Coulson-revivin' TV series, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., which will air in September. We first got a brilliant short promo, and then a full trailer, a couple of clips and a gallery of images too. Check that out here!

Toy Story of Terror details and first look: Also airing later on the year in ABC is Pixar's Toy Story Halloween special, Toy Story of Terror! This week we got a first look at the spooky half hour short, as well as cast, crew and plot details: the special, directed by BURN-E's Angus MacLane, will revolve largely around Jessie and will feature a kinda-returning character, Combat Carl, voiced by Rocky's Carl Weathers. Check out all we know about that short here.

New Despicable Me 2 poster: Illumination rolled out a new Minion-packed poster for their upcoming sequel, Despicable Me 2. Directed by Pierre Coffin and Chris Renaud, and starring the voices of Steve Carell, Russell Brand, Kristen Wiig and Steve Coogan, Despicable Me 2 arrives in cinemas on 28th June (UK)/3rd July (US). Check out the new poster here.

Rio 2 teaser: Blue Sky Studios will release a sequel to their 2011 hit, Rio, returning the cast (including Jesse Eisenberg and Anne Hathaway) and the director (Carlos Saldanha) to the series, next year. This week, Fox rolled out the first teaser trailer for the film (originally in Portuguese, then in English), also giving us our first glimpe at Blue Sky's new Scrat-tacular logo. Check the teaser out here.

Howl and Totoro hit Blu-ray on 21st May: Disney will soon release two of Studio Ghibli's most beloved classics in high definition: Howl's Moving Castle and My Neighbour Totoro will arrive on Blu-ray with a whole host of special features. This post also marked Mayra Amaya's first post for A113Animation - please make her feel welcome! Check out the cover art and set details for the releases here.

Sony to release Rovio's Angry Birds film in 2016: We've known about Rovio's planned feature animated adaptation of their popular Angry Birds game series for a while now, but news broke this week that Sony Pictures have acquired the distribution rights. The release date for the film has been slotted in at 1st July, 2016. Read the full story here.

Planes sizzle reel: Disney continue to make their Cars spin-off, Planes, look more and more appealing, continuing with a grand, beautiful sizzle reel this week. While they're neglecting advertising Frozen, the Moue House's marketing arm are making DisneyToon's aero-animated comedy look suprisingly good, complete with stunning visuals and mood-setting music. It does appear to spoil the whole plot though... Watch with caution here.

Brad Bird talks The Incredibles 2 and Star Wars: Ever since 2004, people have been clamouring for a sequel to The Incredibles, this week the film's director spoke to The Hollywood Reporter about the prospects of a sequel. Brad's an it-director at the moment, and he also spoke about turning down Star Wars: Episode VII. Check out the quotes and our thoughts on what other films we'd like to see Bird handle here.

Popeye pushed back to 2015: Sony announced this week that they've pushed Genndy Tartakovsky's CG Popeye adaptation back a year, to 2015. Sony Pictures Animation told us that the film remains "remains a priority project", but gave no indication as to why it had been pushed back. More details on SPA's current slate and the delay here.

Boxtrolls concept art: Ric Sluiter, an artist who previously worked on Circle 7's Toy Story 3 and Blue Sky's Epic, released some atmospheric concept art for Laika's next film, The Boxtrolls, this week. The film, a stop-mo/CG hybrid, is due to be released on 17th October, 2014. Check out the two sketches here.

Sword and Robin Hood hit Blu-ray on 6th August: There was a lot of Blu-ray news this week, and Disney announced that - as well as the Ghibli releases - they will be releasing two of their own animated classics later this year: The Sword in the Stone and Robin Hood will be released in HD on 6th August. Cover art and bonus feature listings were also released. Check it all out here.

Two new Blue Sky Studios films, Anubis and Ferdinand: As well as the Rio 2 teaser, Box Office Mojo revealed that Blue Sky Studios will be releasing two new films in 2016 and 2017. Both are based on existing books, and Ferdinand - based on The Story of Ferdinand - will be directed by Carlos Saldanha (Rio and Rio 2). DreamWorks also shuffled the release dates of B.O.O. and Trolls around. More details on all that here.

The Avengers 2: Joss Whedon's been talking all things MCU, including which characters might be getting introduced in 2015's The Avengers 2. The Firefly-creator also talked about whether or not we'll be seeing Iron Man in the sequel. That, and speculation about Jeremy Renner's potential non-return and the rumoured Black Panther movie, meant tis was a big week for Marvel news. Check it all out here.


Features

Munir's Disney Retrospective -- Animated Classic #18: The Sword in the Stone (1963): In his latest Disney Retrospective, Munir reviews Disney's animated Arthurian classic, The Sword in the Stone, which turns 50 this year. Check that review out here.

French Animation, Chapitre 3 - Persepolis: Damien's ongoing series reviewing classics of the French animation industry this week looks at the 2007 Oscar and BAFTA-nominated Persepolis. Check out that review here.





And if you haven't done so yet, please check out the pilot episode of the A113Animation Podcast, for previous news, an audio snippet of our Croods interview, and a group review of Marvel's Iron Man 3. More here.