It seems that Pixar is revving up the launch of the sequel to Cars (Cars 2, of course) with the leakage of some ground-breaking (ish) news. As Pixar boss John Lasseter knows only too well, Cars made a fortune from merchandising rather than from the movie itself, and in an effort to squeeze yet more revenue out of the franchise, there is, according to Movieline, to be their first ever direct-to-video with a spin-off to Cars, the just as imaginatively named Planes.
The direct-to-video business, or the DTV as we like to call it, is an extremely lucrative avenue that Pixar had intended to go down with the sequels to Toy Story before Lasseter realised that people would flock to the big screen in their millions to find out if Bo-Peep ever did manage to tie down the uncontrollable Woody. Indeed, the spin-off news is hardly surprising for a company that once stood proud against the tide of sequels: the release of Toy Story 3 and Cars 2 during 2010-11 is to be followed by a sequel to the much-loved Monsters, Inc. in 2012, and let's be honest, who can blame them?
It was merely a matter of time before one of the many brains behind Cars came up with another method of transport to bring to life, one that will surely earn them a few more billion dollars in merchandise. One has the feeling that the new Planes idea is more of a panicky after-thought because they realised that Cars 2 may not entice those who already owned their Lightning McQueen toy to buy another. With regards to a franchise that depends on merchandise, perhaps the effort will go into the design of the new planes rather than the spin-off itself, but you would be a fool to bet against Lasseter and Co. pulling off another successful movie. After all, has anything from Pixar ever not been?
Source: Screenrush
