Plotlines that Disney shot down?

[Chad Bonin]

(I'm mirroring this on the Entertainment forum, as it was spurred by live-action plots).

Ignoring "Plots we wanted to do but didn't have enough time", and focusing on "plots we were going to do but Disney shot them down"... are there many well-known examples of stuff that was planned but was changed?

As a PR fan, you end up learning a lot of the behind the scenes. Saban, back when they were in control, ended up cutting plots, but these were more due to acting changes. An Ancient Rangers arc in Power Rangers Lost Galaxy (using the Dairanger suits) was bailed on when Kendrix' actress got leiukemia and had to leave the show (aptly, Saban KILLED her on the show). Likewise, any and all Jason/Trini/Zack plots from MMPR Season 2 had to be bailed on/adapted once the trio... well, stopped showing up for filming.

Anyways, there was a recent interview with Jeffrey Parazzo (no idea how to spell that), also known as Trent the White Drago Ranger, that brought up two interesting notes from Power Rangers DinoThunder.

In this interview, he states that Disney shot down two plots integral to his character. When he first appeared, you could tell they were leading up to a Trent/Kira relationship... yet as the series went on, they seemed to just be friends and, well, coworkers in a way. Likewise, in the japanese series, the White Ranger (Abarekiller) stayed against the Rangers for the majority of the series, only turning loosely good near the end. In DinoThunder, Trent was the "Evil White Ranger" for a good while, but became good soon and had to deal with the "Evil White Dino Clone", a character that seemingly died at one point and randomly reappeared. Naturally the clone was to keep using footage of the White Ranger fighting the others, while giving the good one a chance to film more New Zealand footage of him fighting evil, instead of with it.

So, in the series, there's two obvious incidents of Disney playing things down: a relationship (which boys might find "icky") between Trent and Kira was axed, and a character staying evil for an extended period of time (possibly because it would scare children) was shortened.

I'm sure there's GOTTA be some Gargoyles plots that Disney axed. It just seems very likely.

(And as of note, more Rangers died under Saban than Disney.)

[DTaina]

Well, there was going to be an episode where the Weird Sisters had Macbeth, the Manhattan clan, and several others acting out Shakespeare's Macbeth. Greg wanted to make it a two-parter, but he couldn't, and he felt that he couldn't do it justice in one episode, so it was axed. Yeah, it sounds a little weird, but I have faith in Greg. I'm sure he could've pulled it off.

There was also going to be an episode of Coldstone in the Himalayas (he had sent himself into exile). Greg also tried to write a comic book about it, but the comics were cancelled before he could. However, they did get one scene of Coldstone in the Himalayas in the episode "Possession."

They were also going to make a movie and restart the timeline completely so the audience would be up-to-date. But the details are fuzzy right now. I know that Macbeth was going to own Castle Wyvern, that there would be no mention of the eggs, and that, basically, everything would be different. I'm going to have to look it up on Ask Greg.

And let's not forget the doomed third season that became the nightmare that is The Goliath Chronicles. Thailog was going to be the main antagonist (he was going to be VERY important) There was also going to be a double date episode where Elisa tried to convince herself that her romance with Goliath was a mistake and on Halloween, she dated either Jason or Morgan (Greg hasn't decided) and Goliath dated Delilah just to humor Elisa.

There's also all the doomed spin-offs: Pendragon, Gargoyles 2198, Time Dancer, Bad Guys, Dark Ages...

All the axed stories... all that wasted potential... It's so sad.

[Dogbert]

(And as of note, more Rangers died under Saban than Disney.)I think that's a little unfair. Saban had PR for 10 years, but Disney is only 1/4 of the way through their third year. Saban didn't have any deaths until Space; observe the viewing globe:

1. Zordon (in Space)
2. Mike (LG - came back 13 episodes later)
3. Magna Defender (LG - best death ever)
4. Kendrix (LG - came back 14 episodes later)
5. Alex (TF - came back later)

All other deaths I can recall were either bad-guys, bad-guys turned good, or never filmed (Alpha V and others during the invasion of Countdown to Destruction). They didn't even kill off Rita and Zedd because they were too human.

That said, I do agree with you, Knux Five. I don't know why Disney (and others) keeps things so toned down. When I was young I certainally knew that destroy and kill meant the same thing.

[Conan-san]

Disney Heratiage killed any plans for Kingdom Hearts : TAS.

I think that's my lot.

[Antiyonder]

There was suppose to be an episode of Darkwing Duck called Opposites Attack which would have been the intro episode for Negaduck (The one from the Negaverse). Would have been nice.