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Summary
- Warwick Davis, star of Willow, has criticized Disney for removing the show from Disney+, leaving fans unable to watch it and asking what he should tell them.
- The removal of Willow highlights the need for physical media in the entertainment industry, as streaming services prioritize cost-cutting measures and remove shows from their libraries.
- While it remains uncertain if there will ever be a Willow season 2, a physical media release would allow fans to continue accessing beloved shows like it, even after they are taken down online.
Warwick Davis, star of the original Willow movie and its 2022 sequel show, has called out Disney for its “embarrassing” decision to remove the show from Disney+. Picking up more than 20 years after the events of the original 1988 movie, the show premiered on November 2022 to favorable reviews and strong viewership numbers. Nonetheless, after only six months on the streaming platform, the show was removed from the Disney+ library in May 2023 amid a controversial content purge pitched as part of larger corporate cost-cutting measures.
Over five months after the show was taken down, Davis took to Twitter to express his ongoing frustration with the decision, labeling Disney’s move as an embarrassment. Check out his post below:
Saying that he meets fans of Willow on a daily basis, for whom the sequel show was originally made, the veteran actor asked what he should tell fans who ask why they can no longer view the series.
While the Disney+ Willow show did not seem to penetrate the cultural zeitgeist in the same manner as the original and iconic 1998 movie, the show was still warmly received and there were once hopes for a potential Willow season 2. Despite initial reports in March 2023 that the series had been cancelled, showrunner Jonathan Kasdan later disputed this claim and instead suggested the show was on hiatus. Yet regardless of Kasdan’s claims, the show was unceremoniously pulled from streaming two months later along with over 40 other titles purged from both Disney+ and Hulu.
Yet with Willow now firmly locked away in the infamous Disney vault, there currently remains no other online means for fans of the franchise to watch the episodes, despite it being less than a year since they first premiered. In the absence of Disney either electing to reverse their decision, or license the show to another network or streaming provider, it would seem that Willow is now all but lost to viewers keen to return to the world of Davis’ beloved Nelwyn sorcerer.
It is precisely these kinds of actions on behalf of streaming services that highlight the importance of physical media within the entertainment industry. With streaming services quickly coming to realize that supporting eternal content libraries is impractical and unsustainable, physical releases such as DVDs and Blu-rays still remain an important distribution method, despite Disney’s recent moves to end physical media releases in countries like Australia. While it is unclear if fans will ever get to see Willow season 2, a physical media release could ensure audiences are still able to access beloved shows like it, even after they’ve been taken down online.
Source: Warwick Davis/Twitter
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