Disney confirm movies through to 2012!

[E Pluribus Unum]

At a New York press conference yesterday, Walt Disney announced a pretty packed slate of animations that it plans to release by the end of 2012. Some of these we already knew about and some are straight to DVD, but there are some interesting surprises in there too. A selection from the list is as follows (all release dates are US, unless otherwise stated):

WALL•E (June 27, 2008 in US; July 18 in UK)
The story of a very cute robot left to clean up Earth on his lonesome. Sigourney Weaver was announced as the voice of the computer on the ship that Wall-E eventually heads to.

BOLT (November 26th, 2008)
Bolt (voiced by John Travolta) is the canine star of a TV show in which he plays a pooch with super powers. When he's accidentally shipped to New York, he has to make his way back home to Hollywood. Problem is he thinks his TV powers are real and his only aids in his journey are unwanted housecat Mittens and TV-obsessed hamster Rhino. Miley Cyrus also lends her voice. This film was originally being directed by Chris Sanders (Lilo and Stitch), but he's since been replaced by Chris Williams and Byron Howard following creative differences.

UP (May 29, 2009 in US; July 17, 2009 in UK)
Pixar's big film for 2009, directed by Pete Docter (Monsters Inc) and Bob Peterson, concerns a 78-year-old man who abandons his quiet life and embarks on a series of adventures with an 8-year-old Wilderness Explorer that take them to exotic and bizarre locales. The footage shown on this one made the collective hard-hearted journalists at the press conference go a bit misty-eyed.

TOY STORY 3 (June 18, 2010)
“At the end of Toy Story 2, Woody and Buzz had accepted the concept that they were toys, things that would some day become expendable to their owner,” director Lee Unkrich told us at the presentation. “And that’s all well and good. Until that some day becomes that day – when Andy finally goes to college. That’s what we’re exploring here.” Little Miss Sunshine's Michael Arndt scripts and we're told that Barbie's long-term beau Ken will be a new character.

CARS 2 (Summer 2012)
Lightning McQueen and Mater return in a sequel to the hit movie, to be directed by Ratatouille producer Brad Lewis. No details on plot, but John Lasseter says "I asked the cast this time to make sure all their passports were up to date. because this time we’re going international.” No word either on which other characters might return. Cars wouldn't have been the Pixar project most people would expect to get a sequel, since it was the least well reviewed of the studio's work. We'd never suggest that Pixar would be driven by profits over good story, because we genuinely consider them much better than that, but Cars was one of the studio's most profitable movies based on the enormous merchandise sales, so we can imagine Disney was keen for a sequel.

KING OF THE ELVES (Christmas 2012)
Philip K. D!ck's only fantasy story is the basis of this tale of a man in the Mississippi Delta who tries to help a group of elves – whom production art showed as covered in leaves that help them hide from humanity – and winds up being named their king. He becomes embroiled in an attempt to escape a fearsome troll and finds big meaning for his life through the lives of these little people. Aaron Blaise and Robert Walker direct. No word on whether this is traditional animation or CG, but it's not a Pixar project. Crypticly, Lasseter said "I’m really excited because I think this movie could change everything.”

A full list of confirmations, and the source used, is available here