This week I continue to look at the Disney Fairies Franchise and especially the films that were made.
With Lasseter in charge, he set about fixing the story of the first Tinker Bell film and setting up a chronology for the entire series. Tink's fellow fairies would be more ethnically diverse and have empowering skills and each sequel would focus on a particular season.
A significant change made by Lasseter was casting Mae Whitman as the voice of Tinker Bell instead of Brittany Murphy. Officially, a Disney representative stated, “When John Lasseter came on board, the schedule changed, and the new schedule didn't work for her.”
Actress Mae Whitman, who has a long list of live action film credits as well as voice over work remembered, “My agent got me an audition and we knew it had something to do with fairies in general, but that was really the most information that they would give us. I read for the role and then I got the call. It was like a double dose of excitement, being cast in the first place, and then for something as iconic as giving a voice to Tinker Bell.
“It was really fun. They liked my sense of humor. They let me come up with little jokes and fun ways to read certain lines. It's a very collaborative effort. Tinker Bell has really become a part of me. We've sort merged into one.
“There are so many wonderful things about Tinker Bell and all of her friends. I think a few of the things I really love about her are that she has an attitude but she's very smart and funny and she really has a heart of gold. It's inspiring to see such a strong female lead character who has her little flaws and things that she needs to overcome, but is growing and learning.
“In the series, there are different lessons that are really important and special and she's got great supportive friends. I think there's a positive special message in all of her movies, like finding yourself and loving yourself for who you are.”
A Disney animator stated, “We had a big story change shortly after Lasseter came on board. They still wanted it to get on time related to all the other company-wide department, publishing, etc. There's a bunch of us here who were just cranking to get the movie up and running again.”
Despite all the efforts, the first film did not come out in 2007. It was delayed over a year.
DVD cover art for Tinker Bell.
Tinker Bell (October 28, 2008)
The film earlier had an initial release in theaters in Argentina on September 11, 2008, and an exclusive theatrical release at the El Capitan Theater in Hollywood for two weeks beginning September 19, 2008.
Tinker Bell is born from the first laugh of a baby, and is brought by the winds to Pixie Hollow. She learns that her talent is to be one of the tinkers, the fairies who make and fix things. Two other tinker fairies teach her their craft, and tell her about the fairies who visit the Mainland to bring each season.
While working, she meets a water fairy named Silvermist; a garden fairy named Rosetta; a light fairy named Iridessa and an animal fairy named Fawn. After meeting them, she notices a mean, fast-flying fairy named Vidia who immediately dislikes Tink because of her unusually strong talent.
Vidia challenges her to prove she is worthy to go to the Mainland, and Tink creates several inventions out of Lost Things that she found on the beach but learns that only nature-talent fairies can visit the Mainland.
Desperate to help change the seasons in the Mainland, Tink tries her hand at nature skills—making dewdrops with Silvermist, lighting fireflies with Iridessa, and trying with Fawn to teach baby birds to fly but she fails miserably at all of these tasks. All agree that Tinker Bell's natural talent is tinkering.
As a hurtful prank, Vidia tells Tink that capturing the sprinting thistles would prove she could be a garden fairy and worthy to go to the Mainland. In an attempt to capture the thistles Vidia let loose, Tink destroys the preparations for spring and runs away.
Tinker Bell redeems herself by using Lost Things to invent machines that quicken the process of doing tedious tasks, such as decorating flowers, painting bugs, planting seeds, etc. These inventions allow the other fairies to get back on schedule, thus saving the arrival of spring.
Vidia is punished for prompting Tink to cause the chaos, and Queen Clarion allows Tink to join the nature-talent fairies when they bring spring to the Mainland. Tinker Bell is given the task of delivering a music box that she found and put back together to its original owner who is a young Wendy Darling.
The song that plays on the ballerina music box that Tinker Bell delivers to young Wendy is actually the song You Can Fly from the Disney animated feature Peter Pan (1953).
The DVD sold 668,000 copies in its first day of DVD release, about 22% more than expected. The film was CGI-animated by Prana Studios in India and was the first time Tinker Bell ever spoke.
As a marketing tie-in with Southwest Airlines, a Boeing 737 was decorated and named “Tinker Bell One”. Flight attendants wore fairy wings and awarded prizes to passengers in a Tinker Bell trivia competition.
John Lasseter is listed as executive producer in the ending credits. He is well known for wearing Hawaiian print shirts and when his name appears, there are fairies using a Hawaiian shirt as a sail.
According to the June 21, 2007 issue of Variety, “Tinker Bell has seen close to two dozen versions of the script and a dozen different directors and cost one executive her job.”
Tinker Bell and The Lost Treasure (October 2009)
The nature-talent fairies are bringing Autumn to the Mainland. Tinker Bell works on a new invention to help her friend Terence who is in charge of distributing pixie dust to the fairies.
Tink is summoned to meet with Queen Clarion, Fairy Mary and the Minister of Autumn who show her a mystical moonstone that every eight years during a blue harvest moon becomes rejuvenated with blue-colored pixie dust to revive the Pixie Dust Tree. They want Tink to create a ceremonial scepter to hold the moonstone.
Tink asks Terence to be her assistant but quickly becomes irritated at his eager efforts. Her anger results in both the completed scepter and moonstone accidentally smashing. Tink learns a legend of a magic mirror that still has one wish left in it and sets out to find it in order to repair the moonstone.
After some misadventures, some help from a friendly firefly and other insects lead her to the right location but when she finally finds the mirror she wastes her last wish when her temper flares up again.
Terence shows up to rescue her. Tink fixes the scepter by using pieces of the broken mirror and the original scepter. The mirror's gem refracts the blue moon's light into the individual moonstone pieces, creating an enormous amount of blue pixie dust. Tinker Bell and Terence join everyone in a procession to take the blue pixie dust to the Pixie Dust Tree.
In its first two months of release, the DVD sales of the film brought in a revenue of $50 million for 3.25 million units sold.
The film was originally slated for just a direct-to-DVD release in the United States, but received a one-week theatrical run in Los Angeles, California in order to qualify for the 2010 Oscars.
The film premiered at the UN on October 25 2009. Kiyotaka Akasaka, Under Secretary General for Communications and Public Information, named Tinker Bell the “honorary Ambassador of Green” to help promote environmental awareness among young children.
Because the film takes place in the cooler months of autumn, Tinker Bell's costume has been altered accordingly. So, instead of her iconic green dress, she wears an outfit with long sleeves, a shawl, leggings and boots. Director Klay Hall stated, “In the earlier films, she wears her iconic little green dress. However, it being fall and there being crispness in the air, in addition to this being an adventure movie, her dress just wouldn't work”
Tinker Bell and Terence repair the scepter in Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure.
Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue (September 2010)
When Tinker Bell and her friends attend a summer fairy camp on the Mainland, the curious pixie goes to visit a nearby human house. The owner, Dr. Griffiths, and his daughter Lizzy leave out a hand-made fairy house that fascinates Tink despite the warnings of Vidia who has followed her.
An annoyed Vidia jams the door shut, trapping Tink inside resulting in Lizzy finding her and attempting to show the fairy to her father who is just too busy repairing leaks in the house.
Lizzy reveals her interest in fairies to Tink who is so flattered she teaches the young girl about fairies that Lizzy writes down. When it is time to say “goodbye”, Lizzy runs down to show her father her notes but he is still too busy fixing leaks in the ceiling to prevent the rain from coming in.
Tink spends the night fixing the links and releasing a butterfly that Dr. Griffiths intended to show to a London museum committee.
Vidia has gathered Rosetta, Iridessa, Fawn, Silvermist, Clank and Bobble to rescue Tinker Bell. Since they have an inability to fly in the rain, the group build a boat to sail to the house. Despite smooth sailing at first, the boat encounters a waterfall and crashes and Vidia confesses that it was her fault that Tink was captured.
Dr. Griffiths blames Lizzy for the missing butterfly and sends her to her room, where Tink teaches her how to fly. Hearing the noise, her father goes upstairs and demands the truth. He refuses to believe her until Tink appears and scolds him.
The fairy rescue party arrives and Vidia bumps Tink out of the way so she is captured by Dr. Griffith instead. He immediately decides to get in his car and show the committee in London his discovery.
Lizzy, Tink and the other fairies give chase, with Tink tampering with the car engine causing it to stop. Dr. Griffiths finally listens and apologizes and they teach him how to fly. Soon, after, Lizzy and her father have a picnic in the field with the fairies.
In the United States, the film had an outdoor premiere on August 28, 2010 as part of the Outdoor Cinema Food Fest at La Cienega Park in Beverly Hills, California. Between September 3 and 19, 2010, the film was shown at the El Capitan Theatre in order to make it eligible for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature category.
This is the only movie in the series with no scenes set in Pixie Hollow. Also, this is the only movie in the series to not feature Queen Clarion.
Pixie Hollow Games (November 2011)
Rosetta is busy helping to set up flowers for the big night when she meets a new garden fairy named Chloe, who has been training for the Pixie Hollow Games and is excited to be competing. The garden fairies have never won, but Chloe is confident that she and Rosetta can win.
The storm fairies, Rumble and Glimmer, are the favorites to win the competition due to their winning streak and having winner's rings for almost every finger. The events include leapfrogging (actually riding a frog), dragonfly water skiing, twig-spheres and mouse polo.
In the final challenge, Rosetta's poor performance puts them in last place. Other teams drop out leaving only the garden and storm fairies.
Rosetta and Chloe take the mudslide mountain shortcut and successfully make it over thanks to Tinker Bell. However, in the last leg of the race, Rumble uses Glimmer's lightning ability to zap one of the wheels causing the girls' cart to crash.
Rosetta and Chloe push their cart over the finish line and finish together. While Rumble celebrates his victory, Queen Clarion announces that the garden fairies are the winners because Glimmer abandoned Rumble just before the finish line for cheating.
This was a 23 minute Disney Channel special shown November 2010. It was later featured as an exclusive bonus disc accompanying the Blu-Ray release of The Pirate Fairy in 2014, which included ten extra mini-shorts of around one to two minutes.
There were 46 “Pixie Previews” one to two minute shorts produced that were sometimes preceded by the narration: It is time for another Pixie Preview when we sneak a peak at Tinker Bell and her friends from Pixie Hollow.”
Storyboard art from Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure shows Tinker Bell and her friend the firefly interacting with two trolls.
The Secret of the Wings ( October 2012)
As the fairies make preparations for the oncoming winter, Tinker Bell helps her friend Fawn take the animals to the Winter Woods to get them ready for hibernation. Fawn warns Tink that fairies from the warmer seasons are forbidden from crossing the border to the woods as the cold can damage their wings. The naturally curious Tink, of course, wanders into the forbidden area and her wings start to sparkle. Fawn pulls her back.
Tink learns that information about the phenomena can be found by the Keeper who lives in the Winter Woods so she tries to hide in a shipment of snowflake baskets to further investigate. When she finally finds the library of the Keeper she sees another fairy named Periwinkle who has wings like Tinker Bell's. It is revealed that they were born from the same laugh, making them sisters.
The two spend the day together, with Peri showing Tinker Bell around the Winter Woods and introducing her to her friends. The Keeper advises them that it is too dangerous for them to be together and the sisters pretend to say goodbye at the border but promise to meet again.
The next day, Tinker Bell arrives at the border with an ice-powered snow maker. With the machine keeping her cool, Peri crosses over and Tink introduces her to her friends and shows her the warm side of Pixie Hollow. However, Peri's wings start to wilt and they rush her back to her own area. Queen Clarion informs them that it was she who instated the law because of an unfortunate incident between two fairies from the different seasons who fell in love and disaster happened.
The snow maker is thrown into the stream but gets lodged in some rocks and starts producing a massive ice blizzard that endangers the Pixie Dust Tree. Tink learns that frost keeps the warm air inside like a blanket so the winter fairies frost as much of the warm seasons and the Pixie Dust tree as possible.
When the freeze finally abates, the Pixie Dust Tree is safe and the fairies celebrate. However, one of Tink's wings is broken from the cold and cannot be repaired. However, when Tink and Peri's wings touch, Tink's wing heals. They learn that the warm fairies can cross over and visit if they have their wings frosted.
The original title promoted for the film was Tinker Bell and the Mysterious Winter Woods.
Pixie Hollow Bake Off (October 2013)
This six minute short first aired on television.
Tink challenges the best baking fairy Gelata to see who can bake the best cake for the queen's party. The baking fairies always make exactly the same cake for Queen Clarion's Arrival Day party, for the last 399 years.
Tinker Bell has an idea for a different kind of cake, which Gelata takes as a challenge and that results in the bake off. Tink and her friends compete against the baking fairies. In the end, Tink's cake looks very appealing, but she finds out looks aren't everything.
The Pirate Fairy (February 2014)
Inquisitive Zarina experiments with the magic behind pixie dust and creates variants including one that goes wildly out of control in Pixie Hollow. She is forbidden to continue her experiments so she runs away.
One year later, Pixie Hollow celebrates the Four Seasons Festival and Tink and her friends see Zarina flying around the audience putting them to sleep with her pink pixie dust. Zarina has stolen all of the blue pixie dust used to create yellow dust that allows the fairies to fly.
Following her, they see that she has become the captain of a pirate crew with a young cabin boy named James Hook. Seeing them try to retrieve the blue pixie dust, Zarina throws multi-colored pixie dust on Tink and her friends resulting in them switching their talents. They struggle with this switch as they try to track down Zarina.
In the process they meet a baby crocodile. When the fairies finally sneak on to the pirate ship they discover Hook talking with the other pirates about how Zarina became captain by promising to make the ship fly so they could increase their plunder. When the ship arrives at Skull Rock, the fairies find another Pixie Dust Tree that Zarina has grown with her pink pixie dust.
The fairies get captured. Hook double-crosses Zarina and traps her in a lantern and he becomes the new captain. The baby crocodile who has taken a liking to the fairies arrives and frees them.
The fairies defeat the pirates with Hook vowing revenge as the baby crocodile attacks him. Zarina returns the blue pixie dust to Tink and her friends and is offered a chance to return to Pixie Hollow. Zarina restores all their original fairy talents and the festival celebration continues.
Originally titled Tinker Bell and The River of Doom and Quest for the Queen.
This is the first Tinker Bell film to feature characters from the original Peter Pan franchise including Smee, Captain Hook and Tick-Tock the crocodile.
Tinker Bell and the Legend of the NeverBeast (March 2015)
Fawn finds a massive, unusual creature lying in a cave beneath the earth building some structures around Pixie Hollow. She names the beast “Gruff”. She describes Gruff as a cross between Didelphis marsupialis and Bison occidentalis which are respectively a South American opossum and an extinct North American bison.
An ambitious scout fairy named Nyx investigates the situation, researching in the library and finding that Gruff is a creature that awakens about once every millennium, when he will transform into a terrifying beast that could destroy Pixie Hollow with a storm.
Fawn reveals Gruff to her friends and explains that he is actually friendly. Queen Clarion urges both Fawn and Nyx to work together and “do the right thing” regarding the protection of Pixie Hollow. As such, Fawn sets out with Tinker Bell to relocate and keep Gruff from the Scouts, while Nyx is determined to capture him.
Gruff transforms into the monster depicted in the fairy lore, growing wings and horns and is captured by the Scouts. Tink and Fawn free him but he is weak. He still saves Nyx from lightning strikes. Gruff also absorbs every lightning strike saving Pixie Hollow.
He helps the fairies rebuild Pixie Hollow but the time comes for him to hibernate again. The fairies sadly guide him to his cave and try to make his sleep as comfortable as possible.
The film introduces a new type of fairy called the “Scout Fairy” whose talent is to protect Pixie Hollow from any danger or threat.
In addition to these Tinker Bell films, Disney also had plans for a seventh and an eighth film. Both films were cancelled in October 2013, during the production on the seventh film, reportedly due to declining DVD sales and disappointing merchandise sales. Apparently, there is no information on the proposed titles or storylines for these two films.
“I think the success of Tinker Bell might have opened Disney's eyes to an under-served market, which are pre-tween girls,” stated Wade Holden, a financial analyst. “Then came Tangled, Brave and Frozen. Disney saw there was a craving for this sort of content.”
“What we've heard from our audiences is that they love the fairies because they have power and talents,” says Peggy Holmes, director of Secret of the Wings and Pirate Fairy. “The fairies are superheroes to them.”
Overseas, especially in Europe and Latin America, the Tinker Bell films play in theaters. “Wouldn't you know it, people showed up,” says Dave Hollis, Disney's Executive Vice President of Distribution. “So what started as a small handful of theaters grew.”
The Disney Fairies franchise juggernaut pretty much flew under the radar for the most part but was incorporated across many divisions, including Disney Consumer Products, Disney Publishing, Disney Interactive Studios, Disney on Ice, Disney Parks and Resorts, and Disney Online, among others, and drove some impressive sales numbers.
It was a great monetary driver across multiple lines of businesses. However, it is definitely no longer the force it once was, which led me to debate whether the franchise is dead.
