As I mentioned in an earlier post, I subscribed to the new Disney+ streaming service so Jennifer and I could watch the filmed version of the Broadway musical Hamilton. Then, with 29 days of our one-month subscription left to go, we started watching The Mandalorian, a Star Wars-based TV series. We’re three episodes into it and are enjoying it quite a bit, but we also came across another series on Disney+ about the making of The Mandalorian that we’re enjoying just as much.
Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian is an eight-episode documentary series in which each episode explores a different aspect of The Mandalorian through interviews, behind the scenes footage, and roundtable discussions hosted by Jon Favreau, the series’ executive producer. (Those roundtables are reminiscent of Dinner for Five, Favreau’s wonderful series on IFC in the early 2000’s in which he hosted four different show-business luminaries each week for conversations over dinner about their experiences in the movie business.) There are in-depth looks at the directors, cast, score, movie-making technologies used, and more.
Evidently, docuseries like this are becoming something of a Disney staple. Jennifer and I watched Frozen II last week and discovered there’s a making-of series for that movie, too. Into the Unknown: Making Frozen 2 is a fascinating — at times nail-biting — look behind the scenes at Disney Animation Studios over the final year of the movie’s creation. We’re four episodes in.
Jennifer and I years ago watched Disney’s documentary about the making of the first Frozen movie, and we loved it. (That one isn’t available on Disney+ but can be purchased from Amazon.) But that was 43 minutes long, which is the length of just one of Into the Unknown’s six episodes, so we’re getting a much more in-depth look at the making of the sequel. (At one point, as the creative team struggles with a particularly fraught issue, one of directors looks up at the camera, shakes her head and says “this isn’t a good day to have cameras in here.”)
At this point we still have no plans to extend our Disney+ subscription beyond one month, but we’re certainly getting our $6.99’s worth in the meantime.