Disney is without a doubt, one of the most successful names in the entertainment industry. For nearly a century, they released some of the most influential animated films of all time. Their empire only got bigger after purchasing Titanic Studio assets such as Marvel, Pixar, and Star Wars.  Recently, they have taken another massive step forward in completely dominating the realm of film and television.

The release of Disney+ took place on November 12th. This is a video streaming service similar to Netflix, but entirely full of content from Disney and its subsidiary companies. A subscription to the site costs $6.99 per month, or alternatively $69.99 per year, a fairly low price compared to other sites. Every account will allow streaming to up to four devices simultaneously and up to seven different profiles. 

Hills student John Scozzafava believes that “this is a smart move for Disney as a company” and that “it will lead to increased fandom”.

The highly anticipated content consists of original movies and shows. Original movies include the Christmas fantasy/comedy Noelle starring Anna Kendrick and Bill Hader and a live-action reimagining of Lady And The Tramp with Justin Theroux and Tessa Thompson. Original shows include the sitcom, High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. 

Pixar Animation Studios has its fair share of films available to stream, including Finding Nemo, Inside Out, Toy Story, Monsters Inc, The Incredibles, Up, and WALL-E. Many of their earlier animated shorts will be streaming as well as original shorts, titled “Sparkshorts”. A Toy Story 4 spinoff short series, Forky Asks A Question, will also air. Finally, a Monsters Inc based original series, Monsters At Work, is set to premiere early next year.

The content library for Marvel Studios is sizable as well. Films include Iron Man, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of The Galaxy, as well as hits from earlier this year such as Avengers : Endgame and Captain Marvel. Many of Marvel’s cartoon shows from the 90s like Spider-Man and X-Men will be available to watch too. Some of Disney+’s most anticipated original content are the Marvel shows. WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Hawkeye, and Moon Knight have undetermined release dates around 2021.

Star Wars content is also garnering conversation. With the site’s launch comes The Mandalorian, a high budget spinoff that has been described as a “sci-fi western adventure”. Episodes will be released every friday, the first two of which have already aired and are quite the adventure. Episodes I through VII of the main saga are currently available as well as Rogue One, an anthology film. A series focusing on Obi-Wan Kenobi of the prequels is in development and Ewan McGregor is set to reprise his role.

Of course, a large bit of the spotlight is focused on Disney’s own animated films. Classics such as Cinderella, The Lion King, Aladdin, and Beauty and the Beast are open to stream for the first time ever. Additionally, recent computer animated hits such as Zootopia, Frozen, Moana, and Big Hero 6 are accessible too.

Disney is still in the middle of a few arrangements with Netflix, so movies like Avengers : Infinity War, Star Wars : The Last Jedi, Incredibles 2, and Black Panther will not arrive on Disney+ until their contracts are expired. Additionally, more drama between Disney and Sony will likely mean no MCU Spider-Man content on Disney+, though nothing has been confirmed yet. Regardless of contracts, not everything will premiere on the launch day. Disney will frequently be adding new content to avoid being obsolete.

Launch day attracted so many sign-ups that the platform crashed, leaving many users unable to access the app. Issues in editing profiles as well as loading the Pixar and Star Wars subpages arose too. 

Hills sophomore, Dream Maywether, mentions that the crash is “due to eagerness from the public and that this can only mean Disney+ is a bigger deal than initially thought”.  

On the contrary, Freshman, Bridget Fullam, sees it as a “negative” for the company. She then goes onto say “It probably means Disney wasn’t ready, and they should’ve waited to launch [Disney+] until the tech was figured out”. 

Disney+ marks a historic day for the massive company, finally throwing themselves into the streaming wars and truly diving into at-home entertainment. Netflix and its massive attempts at fame this year with Martin Scorsese’s The Irishman and Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story are put to the test with this new release. Disney+ is not just a turning point for Disney, but entertainment consumption as a whole.