Wish, the 62nd movie launched by Walt Disney Animation Studios, is a foul film. The movie is supposed to have a good time the studio’s a centesimal anniversary, however as a substitute, its incoherent story and reliance on millennial cliches for reasonable jokes come off prefer it was fed into an AI generator and spat out onto the massive display. And the music, all the time a staple in Disney movies, has some actually pretty components which are sadly weighed down by horrible lyrics.
Overall, Wish is a scorching mess, however for Kingdom Hearts followers, its core premise may have vital implications for Square Enix’s Disney and Final Fantasy crossover—that’s, if Tetsuya Nomura and associates resolve to include it into future Kingdom Hearts video games.
What is Wish about?
Wish is ready within the kingdom of Rosas, the place King Magnifico, a sorcerer with the facility to grant needs given to him by the widespread folks, hoards needs as magical orbs and refuses to grant ones he doesn’t imagine will likely be good for the dominion. When a citizen turns 18, they provide Magnifico their want for “safekeeping” in his examine till the day he decides to grant it. While he may imagine himself righteous, as protagonist Asha factors out, Magnifico has created a system by which he controls the destiny of everybody in Rosas, rendering the townsfolk hopeless as they wait for his or her needs to be granted. As the movie progresses, the king’s true nature as an egomaniacal bastard turns into obvious and Asha leads a riot towards his tyranny.
But what does this should do with Kingdom Hearts? As Asha learns extra concerning the needs in Magnifico’s clutches, it turns into clear that a few of these needs should do with occasions that lead into numerous Disney films. One Rosas civilian needs to fly, wears a inexperienced tunic, and is called Peter like Peter Pan. Valentino, Asha’s pet goat who features the power to talk due to magical shenanigans, needs for a spot the place all mammals dwell equally, referencing the idyllic imaginative and prescient of 2016’s Zootopia. Asha herself turns into a Fairy Godmother and dons a cloak much like the character from Cinderella.
There are different references, like Asha’s group of associates all dressing and performing equally to the seven dwarves from Snow White. And when Magnifico is defeated, he’s trapped in a mirror principally changing into the Magic Mirror from the identical film. There’s even a split-second body by which his face is printed to appear to be the masks that inhabits the mirror within the 1937 movie.
What does Wish imply for Kingdom Hearts’ Disney universe?
All of this (and the 90 minutes of different Disney film references) is a part of the aim of Wish—to have a good time Disney’s historical past—however there’s a bigger implication right here: Rosas is the middle of a related Disney universe. According to co-directors Chris Buck and Fawn Veerasunthorn, in addition to co-writer Jennifer Lee, Wish isn’t hardwired as a multiverse launch pad, however it does indicate characters like Peter Pan, locations like Zootopia, and songs like “When You Wish Upon A Star” are the desires of the residents of Rosas. Prior to this, films like Frozen featured characters from Tangled in a crowd shot, which Disney has largely acknowledged as cute nods. But Wish makes a whole plot level out of Disney’s most beloved characters and worlds having an inception inside its kingdom.
This raises questions as to how that world would operate in a possible Kingdom Hearts’ crossover. Will Kingdom Hearts play with the summary concepts Wish hints at? In Square Enix’s RPG collection, protagonist Sora and his associates Donald and Goofy journey to numerous Disney worlds on a spaceship. But earlier than these worlds had been separated, they originated from Scala advert Caelum, which featured closely in Kingdom Hearts Union χ and within the last part of Kingdom Hearts III.
Incorporating Wish and Rosas into Kingdom Hearts’ world would require a substantial amount of retconning, as Square Enix has already been constructing out its personal related lore for 20 years. But it’s unclear if it is going to even should reckon with it anytime quickly given Kingdom Hearts IV has been in improvement concurrently alongside the film. But even so, Disney started work on Wish in 2018, a yr earlier than Kingdom Hearts III launched. While we don’t know what Disney worlds will seem within the subsequent sport, we are able to fairly assume Disney and Square have been speaking about Kingdom Hearts IV whereas Wish was in manufacturing.
Kingdom Hearts has launched loads of prequels and midquels in between its numbered entries that assist recontextualize story beats or fill in gaps, however Scala advert Caelum’s place as the foundation of Kingdom Hearts’ Disney crossover is fairly well-established. So it would simply be simpler for Square Enix to disregard Rosas and Wish’s Disney cinematic universe solely. However, the collection is not any stranger to tweaking characters, worlds, and relationships to suit its personal narrative. On high of weaving the existence of the shadow-like enemy Heartless into Disney film plots, Kingdom Hearts has continued to fold new films into its storytelling.
The first sport made the Seven Princesses of Heart (Alice, Snow White, Jasmine, Belle, Cinderella, and Aurora) throughout Disney’s animated movies right into a unified, magical drive that affected your entire recognized Kingdom Hearts universe, together with key KH character Kairi. Kingdom Hearts III made positive so as to add newcomers Rapunzel, Anna, and Elsa as a part of the New Seven Hearts meant to take up the mantle. So Rosas may realistically be molded to suit the wants of a brand new story arc—maybe it might be the origin level of the brand new worlds Sora will discover in Kingdom Hearts IV, additional explaining the increasing lore with out stepping on the toes of the story the collection advised earlier than.
Wish makes an attempt what Kingdom Hearts pulled off over 20 years in the past
Kingdom Hearts’s interconnected Disney universe was a reasonably novel thought again in 2002 when the primary sport was launched. But these days, crossovers are so widespread they’re having diminishing returns. Take a take a look at current Marvel Cinematic Universe field workplace numbers and also you’ll see persons are much less infatuated with the idea of every little thing they watch and play weaving into each other. A shared Disney universe is a core theme in newer video games like Disney Dreamlight Valley and Disney Mirrorverse, however Kingdom Hearts is among the few examples the place these worlds really feel cleverly woven into one another, reasonably than thrown collectively in a disconnected pocket dimension. Now that Wish is at the least toying with the concept of Rosas because the supply of characters and concepts seen in earlier Disney movies, Kingdom Hearts is in an attention-grabbing place. It has to both reckon with one of many films it could characteristic consuming its lunch—albeit with its fingers as a substitute of a superbly good fork and knife and simply usually making a large number of the desk—or discover a option to wiggle out of the bind it’s put the collection in.
I do surprise if, given Wish’s middling reception and field workplace efficiency, Square Enix may decide to not contact the film or its characters in any respect, as it will complicate issues in methods which are in all probability not definitely worth the bother. But Kingdom Hearts has put some mid-ass Disney films in its video games in a technique or one other, so who is aware of? Yes, I’m you, Chicken Little. In the meantime, let’s hope no matter Disney is cooking for 2024 doesn’t learn prefer it was written by ChatGPT.
