'Frozen 2' Footage Digs Into Anna And Elsa's Past And Teases Mysterious Music [D23]
Do you want to build a sequel? Six years after Frozen iced box office records, Frozen 2 is ready to take us back to Arendelle, and beyond. Will the same audiences that flocked to the first film be willing to line up again for this sequel? Probably! The first trailers were vague to the extreme, but we got to see some new footage at D23. Read our Frozen 2 footage reaction below.
Frozen 2 will explore why Anna was born the way she was, giving her incredible ice powers. The sequel will also expand on Anna and Elsa's parents, including where they were going when their ship was wrecked in the middle of a storm at sea. It's their past that takes our main characters on a new adventure in an enchanted forest far away from Arendelle.
Evan Rachel Wood will be voicing Anna and Elsa's mother, Queen Iduna, who was teased with footage at The D23 Expo panel. Queen Iduna sings a song to a young Anna and Elsa for them to fall asleep. Anna and Elsa's father will be back for a scene with their mother, presumably a flashback of some kind.
Meanwhile Sterling K. Brown will voice Lieutenant Matthias, a new character in the present day story. Another clip showed Lieutenant Matias telling Anna that her grandfather never let him take the good for granted, giving Anna advice to follow for the rest of the movie.
Frozen 2 directors Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee also revealed that the film would begin with a prologue scene, but they didn't bring the clip to reveal. However, that prologue will help set up the footage that they did show during the panel, which including a quick clip of a voice calling out to Elsa during a tense moment.
The voice calling out to Elsa appears to be a big part of kicking off the story, as illustrated in the longer clip that was played to the D23 crowd. In another clip, Anna (Kristen Bell) hears the voice while in the middle of a game of charades with Olaf (Josh Gad), Elsa (Idina Menzel) and Sven. During the game, we get a Disney gag where Olaf breifly turns into Mickey Mouse.
But suddenly, Elsa says she's tired and wants to go to bed. Anna thinks she's acting a little odd and is very concerned about her sister, which keeps her from noticing the fact that Kristoff (Jonathan Groff) is trying to propose to her, seemingly going to bed without acknowledging the proposal.
In Elsa's bedroom, Anna tries to find out what's wrong. Elsa says she doesn't want to mess up the good life that Anna has. To help calm Elsa down, Anna lays down in the bed and begins to sing the song that their mother used to sing when they were kids, and the two sisters fall asleep.
Suddenly, Elsa is awoken by music somewhere in the distance. She tries to ignore it, but the music persists. She goes searching for the source of the music, and she begins her first song of the movie, singing about how she wishes the music would go away, but it simply can't be ignored. She seems to know that following this voice would require her risking a lot, and she's already had an adventure of her own. A sampling of lyrics says:
"What do you want? Because you are keeping me awake. Are you here to distract me, so I'll make a mistake?"
She follows the music out into the forest, and she begins creating images with her snow and ice powers as she questions where these sounds are leading her. Elsa ends up on the edge of an ice cliff as hundreds of crystalline, diamond-shaped snowflake-like objects appear around her, and that's where the scene ended.
Buck and Lee said this is only Elsa's first song in the film, and there are even better songs on the soundtrack, but they weren't ready to give anything else away yet. We'll have to wait for more when Frozen 2 arrives on November 22, 2019.
