Disney News: 'Three Men And A Baby' Reboot, A Superhero Pet Squirrel, More 'Ice Age', Animated 'Night At The Museum,' And Much More

In case you spent all day yesterday on the Moon, in a cave, with your fingers in your ears, Disney hosted a massive Investor Day presentation where they laid out plans for all sorts of future films and TV shows. It was kind of like Comic-Con, but all Disney, all the time, and with a lot more talk about stock options. We here at /Film covered the biggest of the big news yesterday, but there were still plenty of odds and ends left to round-up.

So gather round, children, and allow me to tell you the tale of the future Disney has in store for all of us. As a wise man once said, we are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives.

This isn't one project, it's three. Disney will be making three films inspired by the true stories of Chris Paul, a basketball player for the Phoenix Suns; Giannis Antetokounmpo, a basketball player for the Milwaukee Bucks; and Keanon Lowe, the "Oregon football star who became a hero off the field when he disarmed a student who brought a gun to Parkrose High School." Here's the part where I tell you I really don't follow sports, at all, so I've never heard of any of these gentlemen before. But I'm sure there are plenty of people who are interested in seeing these titles whenever they arrive on Disney+.

The Cheaper by the Dozen series is getting a reimagining from Blackish producer Kenya Barris. The film "centers on a blended family of 12, navigating a hectic home life and their family business," and Gabrielle Union is set to star. The original Cheaper by the Dozen starred Clifton Webb and opened in 1950. It was remade with Steven Martin in 2003. This latest version arrives in 2022 on Disney+.

Quick, without looking it up – how many Ice Age movies are there? If you guessed 10,000, you are correct. And here is another one – The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild. The film features "prankster possum brothers Crash and Eddie, and swashbuckling weasel Buck." Buck is voiced by Simon Pegg. But I'm sure you already knew that, reader, because Ice Age is an important series that we all know and love and cherish. Look for this thing in 2022 on Disney+. At this point, I'm pretty sure the Ice Age franchise has lasted longer than the actual Ice Age (please don't look this up to correct me). 

Jungle Cruise, the first Disney movie from Orphan and The Shallows director Jaume Collet-Serra, was supposed to open in October of 2019. Then it got moved to July 24, 2020 – only to be pushed again due to the coronavirus pandemic. It's now set to open on July 21, 2021. This isn't news, we knew this already, but Disney still felt the need to remind us. Or perhaps they wanted to drive home the fact that the film is sticking with its theatrical plan and not headed to Disney+. The movie, based on the theme park attraction, stars Dwayne Johnson, Emily Blunt, Édgar Ramírez, Jack Whitehall, Jesse Plemons, and Paul Giamatti.

Speaking of live-action remakes, we already knew that a live-action Little Mermaid was on the way. And we already knew who was starring in it. But Disney went ahead and made it official: Halle Bailey is Ariel, Daveed Diggs is Sebastian, Javier Bardem is King Triton, Jacob Tremblay is Flounder, Melissa McCarthy is Ursula, Jonah Hauer-King is Prince Eric, and Awkwafina is Scuttle. There you have it. Rob Marshall is directing, and the film will feature music from the original movie, and new music by Alen Menken and Lin-Manuel Miranda. Production on the film was delayed due to the pandemic, but during the presentation yesterday,  CEO Bob Chapek said all postponed films had started shooting again.

We got our first look, of sorts, at Robert Zemeckis' live-action Pinocchio. It's been rumored for a while now that the film would reunite Zemeckis and Tom Hanks, and sure enough, it looks like it is. Hanks is playing Gepetto. And the film is headed to Disney+. I'm sure someone, somewhere, is excited about this, but based on the last few years of Zemeckis' career, I'm not.

One of Disney's all-time classics is coming to #DisneyPlus with the new live-action retelling of Pinocchio, starring Tom Hanks and directed by Robert Zemeckis. ✨ pic.twitter.com/44bHbFRhMe

— Walt Disney Studios (@DisneyStudios) December 11, 2020

The long-gestating Enchanted sequel, Disenchanted, is still happening! Disney swears! And they're bringing it Disney+! And Amy Adams is back! There's still no release date, though. So you'll just have to keep waiting. In the original film (which, oddly enough, currently isn't on Disney+), "In the fairy-tale land of Andalasia, pretty young Giselle frolics with her woodland pals, and falls in love with the handsome Prince Edward, but when Giselle arrives at the castle to marry her Prince Charming, his evil stepmother sends the princess-to-be to a place where there are `no happy ever afters': New York City. Cynical divorce lawyer Robert comes to her rescue, but can Giselle find her way back to her true love?"

Finally, here's Iwájú. Disney Animation teamed with Pan-African entertainment company Kugali to create an "all-new, science fiction series coming to Disney+ in 2022." Per Deadline, the series will have "deep themes of class, innocence and challenging the status quo," and Walt Disney Animation Studios' chief creative officer Jennifer Lee added that the series will also "bring African stories created by African artist to the world, highlighting the diversity of cultures, histories and voices across the continent."