Disney's wrongheaded decision to cancel "Tiana," Western animation under stress, positive news about Japanese girls' love series, and beyond
This newsletter issue will focus on my new article about animated depictions of monarchy, impact of "Tiana" news, pending release of Japanese girls-love series, and other queer content
Hello everyone! This newsletter will focus on LGBTQ+ content, yuri series, anime, and Western animation, all of which often mix together. It was taking too long to put together something of the length of my last newsletter on February 12, so my plan is to release different newsletter issues on related topics. There has been a mix of news about the topics I mentioned in the first sentence recently since that newsletter, good and bad, and I plan to cover it here.
Most recently I published an article examining animated depictions of monarchy, centering on Rose of Versailles, and bringing in some other series like The Magical Revolution of the Reincarnated Princess and the Genius Young Lady, Disenchantment, I’m in Love with the Villainess, Astro Note, Steven Universe, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, Elena of Avalor, Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure, Soaring Sky! Pretty Cure, Adventure Time, and Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts. Erica Friedman described it as an “excellent read” and I had a good conversation with her on Bluesky about this post, Rose of Versailles, and other topics. On with the rest of this newsletter!
Let’s start with the terrible news which came out on March 3rd. It was announced that Disney was not proceeding with an animated series, entitled Tiana, which would have been directed by Joyce Sherri (who was lead writer), and have Jennifer Lee and Stella Meghie as executive producers. It would have featured Anika Noni Rose reprising her role as Tiana, who originally appeared in the somewhat controversial (due to historical denialism of Jim Crow) 2009 film The Princess and the Frog. The series had been announced in December 2020 and was seeming to move along since then, with Sherri even joining the series as a writer in October 2023, according to reporting at the time. In this newsletter I have previously mentioned Tiana, mentioning it as a series that Disney had in development and noting the delay of the series. Apart from my passing mentions, in the past, I also previously cited Tiana as an example of Disney's focus on diversity, even saying that executives want to "bring in, promote, and produce non-White stories." I'm not sure that statement is accurate anymore, to be perfectly honest. Hopefully the new contract between WDAS and production workers can be helpful to ensuring stronger stories going forward, given that that production workers are getting “health and pension benefits…[and] higher minimum wage rates.” That is a positive.
While the full story of the cancellation of this series, which was originally slated to come out in 2022 (then delayed to 2023 and 2024), is not known, The Hollywood Reporter (THR), a trade publication, noted sources saying that “production costs” were the reason for the series cancellation. This is the same reason cited for the cancellation of The Acolyte, despite admission that the series garnered a huge audience. Cancelling the latter was a slap in the face of LGBTQ+ people. Cancellation of Tiana follows Disney scaling back their diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, removing the transgender identity and storyline of Kai (voiced by a trans woman named Chanel Stewart) in Win or Lose, refusing to air a Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur episode about one character (Brooklyn) facing discrimination due to the fact she is a trans girl, toning down the interactions between Riley and Val in Inside Out 2 so that Riley is “less gay” (this didn’t really work lol), and shelving Molly Ostertag’s series, Neon Galaxy. Ostertag even speculated that Neon Galaxy was shelved because two cast members were openly trans. Whether that is true or not, is not known, but it is possible.
Prior to this, Disney cancelled Nimona after shutting down Blue Sky Studios. While that film was revived, and ended up on Netflix, where it premiered in 2023, The Owl House was cancelled and had an abbreviated finale because it did not fit the Disney “brand” according to series creator Dana Terrace. Furthermore, Moana was supposed to be an animated series before it was repurposed into an animated film, which came out in late November 2024. It is unknown why this can’t be done for Tiana, or what form the reported “separate shortform special” will take. In any case, having Walt Disney Animation Studios (WDAS) abandoning “making original longform content for streaming,” according to THR, which follows Pixar making a similar announcement last year, is devastating. It seems that they the studio is moving toward a focus on films and shortform series instead, with the article taking the tone that longform content is bad.
It should be remembered that WDAS is not the same as Disney Television Animation (DTA), but this bad decision is still a bad sign. All television series which had been in production by WDAS were shelved. What’s to say that DTA doesn’t make the same decision? This news also means that Iwájú, which WDAS helped produce, will not be continuing either, nor will Zootopia+, or Baymax!. If DTA makes the same declaration it could imperil upcoming series like The Doomies, Dragon Striker, The Sunnyridge 3, and Cookies & Milk, or even the upcoming season of The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder. WDAS making this declaration flies in the face of well-received long-form DTA productions like Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, Kim Possible, Phineas and Ferb (coming back for a new season this year), Elena of Avalor, Milo Murphy's Law, Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure, Amphibia, or The Owl House, to name a few.
A related issue is not Warner Bros. shutting down three studios, but the reported departure of Kathleen Kennedy as president of Lucasfilm. It was later reported that she had been “working on a succession plan for a couple years,” eyeing various candidates, including, possibly, Dave Filoni, who is said to know the Star Wars “universe inside out,” while Kennedy was described as the most successful female producer/executive “in Hollywood history.” She told Deadline that she is not retiring and will never retire from movies, but said she is looking for someone to replace her, after she was asked by George Lucas to take over Lucasfilm 13 years ago, and talked about “sustaining” the Star Wars brand. She even implied that Andor could be continued. If Filoni does get chosen, it is worth noting that he has been criticized in the past, by some, for downplaying queer representation.
The fact is that none of the series he has created, have featured queer representation in the main cast. That includes Ahsoka, Star Wars Resistance, Star Wars: The Bad Batch, Tales of the Jedi, Tales of the Empire, and Star Wars Rebels. In fact, I vaguely recall a queer character either in Tales of the Jedi or Tales of the Empire, but I know that Star Wars Resistance has a gay couple (Orka and Felix). This could bode badly for Star Wars animated series, which tend to be aimed at kids and families, rather than young adults, which impacts their tone and topics covered, without a doubt. On the positive side, Filoni has never committed anything that would land him prison like anime producer Kouichirou Itou, who was sentenced to four years for “committing nonconsensual sexual intercourse with three minor girls, and knowingly exchanging money with a 15-year-old girl he met on social media for obscene acts.” Itou is known for directing films like Your Name, Weathering With You, and Suzume.
Through all of this, there is good news, especially when it comes to yuri anime. For instance, there’s news that a new Is The Order a Rabbit anime was greenlit, and the development of two anime, which are based on manga. The first of those is a new yuri dark fantasy anime entitled I Want to Love You Till Your Dying Day. The second is a music slice-of-life yuri series, entitled The Guy She Was Interested In Wasn't a Guy at All. For disclosure, I bought the first English language volume of that series. Another anime in development I’d like to highlight is the second season of Skip and Loafer. The first season featured a trans character named Nao, the aunt of protagonist Mitsumi Iwakura.
There’s also news about the impending premiere of the Witch Watch (which will be airing on Netflix), the premiere of yuri horror anime This Monster Wants to Eat Me anime adaptation in October, the premiere of the comedy drama yuri Young Ladies Don’t Play Fighting Games sometime this year, and release of The Colors Within film on digital platforms on April 1 (and on Blu-ray on May 27). That film is directed by Naoko Yamada, who is also known for directing K-On!, Tomako Market, and seasons 1 and 2 of Sound! Euphonium, and films such as Liz and the Blue Bird (2018) and A Silent Voice (2016). On the other hand, it was disappointing to hear about the Sailor Moon anime movie trilogy “re-release” on Blu-ray (i.e. it wasn’t much of a re-release at all!), the impending end of part of the Ascendance of a Bookworm manga, and ending of the Komi Can’t Communicate manga, to note a few stories out there.
This is a preview for series which is beginning to air on April 6.
Beyond that, and scattered episode reviews, there were some retrospective looks at Revolutionary Girl Utena, classic shojo manga in a gallery, season 1 of Sound! Euphonium (it recently was released as a Blu-ray), along with a review of She and Her Cat: Everything Flows. I was also intrigued by an article in Anime Herald on the potential of “Afro-anime” (as the article calls it) with investments by Viola Davis, a report on the next generation of anime fans which notes barriers to entry (i.e. downside to accessibility, with purist fans being disappointed when you haven’t watched certain shows) and the mainstreaming of anime as compared to the past, and other articles on the continuing appeal of music anime, Ranma 1/2 fanfiction of the 1990s, and the interlinking of the business and politics of magic in Magilumiere Magical Girls Inc [also known as Magilumiere Co. Ltd.] (present in the manga and anime adaptation).
There are some other stories I’d like to cover here before ending this newsletter. For one, there was the positive news that ND Stevenson has a new book entitled Scarlet Morning, which is said to follow “two orphans and a crew of pirates on a world-saving journey,” a book said to be 15 years in the making, that is set to come out in September. Otherwise, Anime Feminist had articles on translating doujinshi to English, the influence of takarazuka revue and girl princes on modern yuri, and how the manga Love Me for Who I Am falls short for non-binary people, and depicts the difficult realities of the latter, while depicting transphobia, through treatment of non-binary protagonist Mogumo.
There was also notes that a live-action series based on a boys love webtoon entitled Secret Relationships can be watched on streaming site iQIYI, and yuri network news from Okazu. The latter notes that the manga Roll Over and Die: I Will Fight for an Ordinary Life with My Love and Cursed Sword is reportedly getting an anime adaptation, while Yen Press had licensed new yuri titles, like Common Sense Monster, and the Lycoris Recoil Official Comic Anthology: Reload, followed by Azuki licensing including Flower Princess of Sylph and LILIES, and notes released of other yuri light novels, games, and visual novels. It’s also noted that trailer for a “gritty Thai GL prison drama,” entitled CLAIREBELL The Series, can be watched on YouTube.
Otherwise, there was reporting about a series set after the now-classic Legend of Korra, which is, itself, a spinoff/continuation of Avatar: The Last Airbender (ATLA). The series, entitled Avatar: Seven Havens, will take place many years after Korra and it seems to be positioning Korra as the one “responsible for a tragic cataclysm.” While some are claiming it is in trouble and rushed already, that seems hasty to claim, when so little is even known about the series! It’s that type of reporting which makes people distrust outlets like CBR, which can occasionally have good articles, but is, more often than not, a content-mill. Some have called for a series on Kyoshi, a bisexual character who was mentioned (and shown) in ATLA and had her own comic series, entitled The Rise of Kyoshi. I don’t disagree, but why do we need to put down a series which hasn’t even come out yet? Again, that doesn’t really seem fair.
My hope is that Avatar: Seven Havens has queer characters in the main cast. After all, with series creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, who also created Korra and ATLA, returning, along with Korra storyboarder Ethan Spaulding and Sehaj Sethi as executive producers, that is a good thing. Sethi is an Indian-American woman screenwriter known for work on many live-action series, with this as her first animated production. It will be 26 episodes long.
There were many other articles I could focus on here, whether fanart by Witch Hat Atelier manga creator Kamome Shirahama of characters in The Owl House style, the major flaw in season 5 of Harley Quinn, the battle for nature in Princess Mononoke as noted in one Anime Feminist review, or the disability metaphor in the series In The Name of the Mermaid Princess, and many other articles. However, I feel that with the above paragraphs, in this newsletter issue, I have drawn in many articles about animation, anime, queer content, and the like, and this issue is coming to a close. With that, see you all in a month. I plan to release issues on this topic monthly.
- Burkely