Disney News Round-Up! Five New Tidbits to Tide You Over!

Love fairy tales and mythology?
Fans of mermaids, dragons, unicorns, and other mythical creatures?
Enjoy when a beloved classic tale is retold?
A Twist in the Tail Thursdays features all this and more!

There has been SO MUCH news from Disney this week, that it felt perfect to pull it all together for today's A Twist in the Tail post!

First up...

Casting has begun for Disney's live-action The Little Mermaid movie. So far, I've seen news about (and IMDB has confirmed):

The internet has been swirling with chatter over Halle Bailey's casting as Ariel, and I think it's fantastic that Disney is finally being more diverse with its films and not just playing it safe anymore! I can't wait to see the rest of the cast!

Next up...

We just got our first trailer for Disney's first live-action movie of 2020, Mulan, and I'm in tears over how amazing it looks:


YouTube Link
It's funny; I never expected these live-action movies to be completely true to the movies. I never wanted them all to have music. Do you guys remember how crazy everyone was when they heard Aladdin WOULD have music after Cinderella didn't? And now that it has music, they can't fathom other movies NOT having music as well!?

Listen, for some movies, it works. For Mulan, I don't think it will. And while everyone will miss Mushu, sure, the movie will stand on its own legs without him. Mulan doesn't NEED a sidekick to make a name for herself! And it would look weird and cheap and cheesy in a serious live-action film, imo!

I'm so excited for this movie and have been for a long time. But now I REALLY am after seeing the first trailer!

And what you've all been waiting to hear...

The soundtrack for Disney's July 17th live-action movie The Lion King has been released, and to no one's surprise (at least, not to mine...), there's a new song for Nala featuring her voice actor Beyoncé! Fans of the Broadway musical already know that Nala can hold her own ("Shadowlands" is one of my favorite numbers in the entire show), and I mean, they wouldn't have casted Beyoncé if they weren't going to give Nala a new song, right?

The song is entitled "Spirit," and will also be featured on an album produced by Beyoncé entitled The Lion King: The Gift, which Disney's Instagram post states is "steeped in the sounds of Africa."

Listen now:

YouTube Link

No, wait, there's more...

We also got an official trailer for Disney's Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, in theaters this fall on October 18th!

There was a teaser trailer dropped earlier this year that didn't tell us much, so we didn't know what the movie was going to be about or why we needed a trailer.

Here it is:

YouTube Link
I still don't know if this is a sequel we need, but I am more willing to give it a try now that I've seen the trailer. I couldn't for the life of me deter

And hey, did you know that there is going to be a movie-world novel written by Cruel Prince author Holly Black out on October 8th?

More to come on that as well! So far, all we know is that it's a book that bridges the two movies together, kind of the way Melissa de la Cruz's Descendants: Isle of the Lost series does for The Descendants.

And speaking of The Descendants...

We have bittersweet news to share. Despite the fact that everyone has been so excited that the final movie is finally premiering in a couple of weeks on August 2nd and we get to see all the characters we've come to know and love and are anticipating meeting new characters, Cameron Boyce, the actor who plays Cruella de Vil's son Carlos and has been one of the four core characters in the franchise, passed away this weekend. He was only twenty years old. Boyce lived with epilepsy and had a seizure over the weekend that took his bright star from our world much too soon. It will make watching Descendants 3 a much more somber occasion, especially since the cast usually watches the premiere "live" on-air and chats during commercial breaks with viewers. I think everyone is hoping that Disney puts together a really nice tribute that does Boyce justice!