Mind the gap: Every movie missing from Disney Plus

Since Disney announced its own streaming service with Disney Plus, the media giant's bean counters have been blowing the dust off every single distribution deal it has across the globe, seeing where it can herd back stray movies and TV shows and when. Looking at the U.S. launch lineup, Disney’s done a solid job so far when it comes to getting all your favourites back in one place.

Now that the service has launched in Australia, we've been checking out what's made the trip Down Under and what we get in Australia that isn't available in the U.S.

We’ve looked at the four major production companies under the Disney Plus umbrella (Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar and Walt Disney Animation) and ran a roll call to see who is absent on the first day of school.

Since updating our list for what's missing from Disney Plus in the U.S., it has become clear that Australians get access to most of the major movies the U.S. doesn't; every Disney-owned MCU movie is here, the remaining Star Wars too. Even Tarzan is available in Australia. The only titles still missing are the obvious ones (Sony's Spider-Man movies and The Incredible Hulk) and the curiously MIA Toy Story 4, which still can't be streamed on-demand in Australia.

Here are the major missing titles from Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar and Disney’s animated classics and whether they are available in Australia.

There a few entries here where the reason for their absence is obvious. Firstly, there are the Marvel characters that Disney doesn’t own, like Spider-Man and The Hulk. But wait, both characters have appeared prominently in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). That’s true but their residence in the MCU has been a temporary arrangement.

Firstly, there’s the big green guy. While The Hulk is allowed to appear in other characters'  movies like Thor: Ragnarok and big crossovers, such as Avengers: Endgame, Univeral still owns the rights to The Hulk’s solo movies. So Ed Norton’s Bruce Banner won’t be appearing on Disney Plus anytime soon. Even though that movie had cameos from both Thunderbolt Ross (William Hurt) and Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.).

Next up is Spider-Man. Poor Petey Parker has been caught in a web of high-profile distribution spats over the last few years to the point where it was confirmed he wouldn’t be returning to the MCU (at least until the toddlers up top learned how to share again). Still, the simple fact is this: while Tom Holland’s Spider-Man is rented out to Marvel like some low-grade thug for big blockbusters like Avengers: Infinity War, the rights to his solo movies are still owned by Sony.

So when you dive into Disney Plus you will notice that there aren’t any listings or planned release dates for The Incredible Hulk, Spider-Man: Homecoming or Spider-Man: Far From Home.

Next up are the more recent releases. Thor: Ragnarok, Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, Ant-Man and the Wasp, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Solo: A Star Wars Story, Coco, Incredibles 2, and Ralph Breaks the Internet all released between 2017 and 2018; a time when Disney’s streaming fate was still being decided. These movies are still within whatever content distribution deals were made at the time of their home release which is also why these movies specifically have a release date on Disney Plus because Disney is, obviously, savvy to the exact dates those deals end. It’s also why you will notice that movies released in 2019, such as Avengers: Endgame and Captain Marvel are available day one. When plans for Disney Plus started picking up steam, Disney began withholding its properties from distributors, or in the case of local streaming services Stan, offered an incredibly limited window of exclusivity.

That leaves us with two oddball outliers: Toy Story 4 and 1999’s animated Tarzan. The latter seems to be a case of bad timing, as Tarzan is scheduled to release on Disney Plus in June 2020. Somebody’s hand must have slipped when signing the contract because, in our first check, it was the only Walt Disney Animation classic not available to stream day one.

Then there’s Toy Story 4. Who knows what the story is there. It’s not even listed on Disney Plus, despite being a 2019 release and Disney pushing a completely original spin-off of that very flick with Forky Asks A Question.

Again, this is based off what the U.S. has access to. The Disney Plus FAQ page assures that the “majority” of content will be available at each region’s launch but there might be a few titles missing here and there. We’ll report back next week to see what’s available and what’s missing on Disney Plus Australia when it launches 19 November.