Inside Out 2, Mufasa, and all the other CinemaCon footage Disney won't let plebes like us see

Welcome, friends, to the Pop Culture Pity Party, where we all get together to talk about all the fun that the *checks notes* collective cinema owners of America are having over at CinemaCon this week, getting treated to special new movie trailers that none of the rest of us get to see—even though they already get to eat all the popcorn they could ever want, for free!

Anyway, it’s not like we’re bitter, despite the fact that Disney’s presentation at CinemaCon today went way beyond just trailers, including showing off 35 minutes of Pixar’s upcoming Inside Out 2. (The short version, per THR: Riley goes to hockey camp, and newcomer Anxiety, voiced by Maya Hawke, maneuvers around the other emotions to get her to blow up her sense of self to fit in with cool older girls.) Or nine minutes of Deadpool & Wolverine, complete with a pegging joke! Oh, why couldn’t we be at the Disney press conference where Deadpool makes a pegging joke?

Meanwhile, on the list of movies that we’d kind of forgot were happening—but which we are, nevertheless, deeply envious that we didn’t get to see—the entertainment giant also showed off a teaser for Barry Jenkins’ Mufasa, the prequel to the 2019 Lion King movie. It also brought out the Moonlight Oscar winner to personally explain why people should give a damn about a prequel to a CGI remake of an animated classic, with Jenkins apparently making a pretty good pitch: “It’s an expansive adventure,” Jenkins promised after showing off a teaser for the film, which is slated for a December 20, 2024 release date. “Audiences can expect so many things in this film — an epic story and a comedy with plenty of familiar faces,” he added. “There are some absolutely hilarious moments and some with extreme gravitas.” He also said there are all new songs, and that he’s “handcuffed” from saying who made them, so, thanks Barry Jenkins: You made us feel vaguely bad for not getting to see a teaser for Mufasa, a movie we only vaguely remembered was happening before this exact moment.

Oh, and in case that wasn’t enough, audiences at CinemaCon (a.k.a. “those smug bastards”) also got to see footage from Captain America: Brave New World, with Harrison Ford taking over the role of now-President Thaddeus Ross; a couple of scenes from Alien: Romulus; and like 13 minutes of Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes. The only one they actually put the trailer online for, meanwhile, was Daisy Ridley’s Young Woman And The Sea, so there you go, folks, enjoy your scraps. (The trailer does look good; we’re just mad.)