The Fox and the Hound (2009)
If there was one thing nobody expected from Disney, it was a package film long after the wartime era. "The Fox and the Hound" were originally developed as two seperate films, both dating back to the Renaissance Era. In 1994 after "Melody Time", Howard Ashman brought in a collection of books from Roald Dahl, and after drawing out of a hat, chose "Fantastic Mr Fox". At the same time, a script starring a wannabe superhero was in production, directed by Don Bluth. However, both films were stuck in a production quagmire and was going nowhere. Taking inspiration from the Wartime Era, Bob Iger proposed to merge both projects into a package film, mixing both traditional animation and CGI together. "The Fox and the Hound" was completed and finally released in 2009 after 15 years in development hell.
The film's two segments are "Fantastic Mr Fox" and "The Super Hound", with Jim Carrey (who had previously voiced Captain Hook) serving as a framing device by introducing the two segments.
The first segment was "Fantastic Mr Fox" done with traditional animation. Based of the Roald Dahl book, Mr Fox lives in his underground burrow where he steals chickens from Boggis, Bunce and Bean's farm every night. The trio ambushes him one night but only manages to shoot off his tail, Mr Fox and his family dig deep underground to avoid the farmers, who wait for Mr Fox to pop his head out and catch him. Mr Fox and his family begisn to strave, and need immediate access to food. Mr Fox burrows to the farm and steals poultry, but runs into the Badger, Weasel, Mole and Rabbit families on their way back. To compensate for their starvation, Mr Fox hosts a grand dinner party and starts an underground tunnel city, where the farmers would never be able to catch them. Now the animals would never go hungry again.
The second segment was "The Super Hound" done with CGI. An original tale by Don Bluth, the story tells the tale of Copper, a hound dog who works as an actor. Believing he's a superhero, a cliffhanger episode causes Copper to believe that the world is in grave danger. Copper rushes off the "save the day", but gets knocked onto a plane headed to New York City. There, Copper discovers that his superpowers are not real and meets up with a stray cat named Mittens. Mittens agrees to guide Copper back to Hollywood, and in their journey, Copper learns that there is more to life than being a superhero or an actor. When he gets back to Hollywood, Copper is tasked with saving the studio which has caught on fire, proving himself to be an actual hero.
"The Fox and the Hound" premiered on November 25th 2009 and released nationwide on December 11th. Expectedly, reception was mixed and the response to the two segments were polarised. While audiences praised the "Fantastic Mr Fox" segment, "The Super Hound" segment was criticised for its weak plot and its overall presentation. "Fantastic Mr Fox" was no doubt the crown jewel of the entire film, but that wasn't without its own controversies. Wes Anderson's own adaptation of "Fantastic Mr Fox" had released a few weeks prior, and both parties accused each other of plagarism and even resulted in a lawsuit. Fortunately, the lawsuit went nowhere and the case was closed, with animation historians ruling the controversy as just a mere coincidence.
"The Fox and the Hound" would not be the last package film however, that honor would go to the studio's next film...
