Toy Fair 2014: Disney’s Launch Event Recap

The last presentation tied with the exciting announcements for Disney/Star Wars new animated property, “Star Wars: Rebels”. Like with “Guardians”, the audience was again privy to an exciting pile of never-seen behind-the-scenes and unfinished footage as well as cast and production interviews. Featuring much of the creative pedigree of “Clone Wars” before it, “Rebels” is looking to be another epic addition to this franchise, and it appears that Disney is staying right on-target with its tone and feel. Yet another rag-tag bunch of space-faring folk will band together in what looks to be a setting that takes place in the coveted time period between Episodes 3-4. For those who don’t spend too much time obsessing over the details, this is rightbefore the classic first film, “Star Wars: A New Hope”. Logic (and the title of the show) dictate that we’ll get to watch the Rebel Alliance in its infancy, as led by the Freddie Prinze Jr-voiced unlikely leader and former Jedi, Kanan, the so-called “Cowboy Jedi”. A strong emphasis was placed on Kanan’s need to maintain his secrecy as a Jedi, with a whole “don’t show off the light saber” riff that is frankly straight-up awesome. He leads the motley crew of the starship Ghost, and the whole presentation built upon intense buzz for the franchise and made me want to fight Darth Vader. More than anything, it allowed for a collective sigh of relief at seeing a completely original Star Wars property being well-handled amidst this delicate and wonderful new partnership.

Said buzz was in no way muddied upon the arrival of lead voice actor, Freddie Prinze, Jr. As adorable as Jorge Vega was, Freddie Prinzewas that much more enthusiastic. He’s wildly excited to be a part of this franchise and property. It felt as though the host couldn’t stop him from bubbling over about how cool it was to be an element of the Star Wars universe, and his enthusiasm extended into his getting to check out the LEGO-representation of the lead starship, Ghost. Which incidentally looked amazing. Enough can’t be said about Freddie’s excitement, he was truly the representation of the little kid in all of us.

Freddie’s toy enthusiasm was apparent as he played with LEGOs, but the awesome Star Wars toys did not end there. All the products in the Star Wars section were beautiful. Not all of them seemed as specifically tied to the property of “Rebels” as others, but they were all a pleasure to behold. Sure: the double-handled light saber of the lead villain, The Inquistor.? Cool and well-built. Ok, the miniature Star Wars battle packs? Yep, they’re awesome. The new classic action figures on display? Super slick (especially the Wookie). But what knocked it out of the park, leaving room for new adjectives that don’t (yet) exist? The giant X-wing and Millennium Falcon. Breathtaking. I needed to sit down. I don’t know if they’re in “Rebels”, but they were simply beautiful.

It should also be mentioned, tucked into one last corner of the after-party-tiny-tiny-quiche-showroom was a console running Disney Infinity, and it looks as fun as ever. Disney was particularly promoting some newer additions to the family of action figures that can be transformed into video games. The focus was on Phineas and Ferb and characters from Frozen, and it all looked as fun as the proverbial Dickens. If Dickens had video games.

And there I was exiting my thrilling adventure when the good people at the Disney Company politely asked for my badge back. And what did I receive in return? A bag of goodies, that’s what! The SWAG report is as follows: A fully packaged Disney Infinity “Phineas and Ferb” figure set which was actually Phineas and Agent P(cool!); a miniature LEGO Spiderman Airplane (the only Spiderman thing I wanted!); a sweet little LEGO Droid (Droids 4-eva!!); and a lovely diescast Plane from “Planes”(it’s lovely). Oh! And sort-of-weirdly, an 8×10 ad from “Guardians” featuring a long-view mugshot of all the characters as toys, packaged in an over-sized mailer. That one was incongruous, but the rest were quite rad. All total, pretty solid SWAG.

And that’s that. On the second day of Toy Fair 2014, Disney Consumer Products presented an array of products tied to new experiences and properties that were largely excellent. Toys that resonated with their array of exciting properties were in full effect, a physical demonstration of a company invigorated by its many savvy partnerships, all tied up in a thrilling box of fun. With a couple small bumps on the road to epic awesomeness, Disney made me even more excited to play with toys (and watch the movies and shows that they are tied to) than I normally am. And if you’ve seen my shelf of “collectables” and DVDs, that in itself is an accomplishment.