The first trailer for Pixar’s Onward, scheduled for theatrical release March 6, 2020, gave us the setting and the characters. This new second trailer, though, reveals more of the plot.
In the first trailer, we met the Lightfoot brothers, Ian (voiced by Tom Holland, who plays Spider-Man in the MCU, and voices both Jip in Doolittle, currently in post-production, and Walter Beckett in Spies in Disguise) and Barley (voiced by Chris Pratt, who plays both Star-Lord in the MCU and Owen Grady in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom).
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In this new taste of the film, we learn that it’s Ian’s birthday, and that Mrs. Lightfoot has a present from her late husband which she fetches down from the attic, explaining their father had wanted both boys to have it once they were over sixteen.
Barley recognizes the gift as a wizard’s staff. Barley concludes that Dad must have been a wizard, although Mom (voiced by Julia Louis-Dreyfus) insists he was an accountant. (The two are not incompatible: Disney already proved in their Oscar-nominated short, Donald in Mathmagicland, that numbers have a magic of their own.)
Barley uses the staff to attempt to bring back Dad, who died when Ian was too young to remember him. Unfortunately he can’t hold the staff steady, and the spell is not entirely successful – the late Mr. Lightfoot is summoned back all right, but only from the waist downward. The brothers have twenty-four hours to complete the spell and bring their father back for a spectral visit.
Written and directed by Dan Scanlon, the director of Monsters University, Onward promises to be a fascinating family film, a film about family, suitable for the whole family to watch.
As the trailer shows, Ian and Barley will learn a wizard’s staff is not a toy. It remains to be seen if the Lightfoot brothers will be successful in their quest, or if they will even survive it.
Let us know if you’re looking forward to Pixar’s Onward in the comments section below. It’s due in theaters March 6, 2020.
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Susan Macdonald is the author of the children’s book “R is for Renaissance Faire”, as well as 26 short stories, mostly fantasy in “Alternative Truths”, “Swords and Sorceress #30”, Swords &Sorceries Vols. 1, 2, & 5, “Cat Tails” “Under Western Stars”, and “Knee-High Drummond and the Durango Kid”. Her articles have appeared on SCIFI.radio’s web site, in The Inquisitr, and in The Millington Star. She enjoys Renaissance Faires (see book above), science fiction conventions, Highland Games, and Native American pow-wows.
