Ralph Breaks the Internet

Ralph Breaks the Internet is an upcoming American 3D computer-animated comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Pictures. The sequel to the 2012 film Wreck-It Ralph and the 57th Disney animated feature film, it is directed by Rich Moore and Phil Johnston and written by Johnston and Pamela Ribon, and features John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jack McBrayer, and Jane Lynch reprising their roles from the first film, with Alan Tudyk returning to voice a new character, alongside new additions to the cast such as Taraji P. Henson, Gal Gadot, Bill Hader and Alfred Molina.

The film is scheduled to be released in the United States on November 21, 2018.

Premise
Six years after the events of the first film, the steering wheel controller on the Sugar Rush game console breaks, forcing Mr. Litwak to unplug the machine. Wreck-It Ralph and Vanellope von Schweetz evacuate all of the Sugar Rush residents to other games before it is shut down, placing the racers in the care of Fix-It Felix Jr. and Sergeant Tamora Jean Calhoun. Ralph and Vanellope then use the arcade's new connection to the Internet to go looking for a replacement steering wheel. While they find a source for a replacement wheel, they need money, leading them to join a free-to-play violent racing game, Slaughter Race, where they meet Shank, one of the game's drivers. Vanellope is taken in by what Slaughter Race has to offer over Sugar Rush, and Shank becomes a big sister figure for Vanellope, making Ralph concerned that Vanellope no longer looks up to him nor will return to her game. Along the way, the two encounter new customs, worlds, and characters, such as trendy algorithms and the Disney Princess lineup with The Muppets, Star Wars, Disney Animation, Marvel Comics and Pixar characters.

Voice cast

 * John C. Reilly as Wreck-It Ralph, a gigantic but soft-hearted man who is the villain of the arcade game Fix-It Felix Jr.
 * Sarah Silverman as Vanellope von Schweetz, a racer/glitch in Sugar Rush who turned out to be its lost princess-turned-president.
 * Jack McBrayer as Fix-It Felix Jr., a repairman who is the hero of Fix-It Felix Jr., as well as the husband of Sergeant Calhoun.
 * Jane Lynch as Sergeant Tamora Jean Calhoun, the lead character of Hero's Duty and Fix-It Felix Jr.'s wife.
 * Ed O'Neill as Mr. Litwak, owner of Litwak's Family Fun Center & Arcade.
 * Taraji P. Henson as Yesss, an algorithm that determines the trending videos on BuzzTube. Her character is modeled after Cruella de Vil, as both characters are seen as fashionable.
 * Flula Borg as Maybe, Yesss' assistant.
 * Alan Tudyk as KnowsMore, a search engine. Tudyk previously voiced King Candy in Wreck-It Ralph.
 * Gal Gadot as Shank, a racer in Slaughter Race.
 * Bill Hader as Spamley, a spammer on the Internet.
 * Alfred Molina as Double Dan, the creature of the Dark Web.
 * Hamish Blake as Pyro, a character in Slaughter Race.
 * Ali Wong as Felony, a character in Slaughter Race.
 * GloZell Green as Little Debbie, a character in Slaughter Race.
 * Timothy Simons as Butcher Boy, a character in Slaughter Race.
 * James Corden
 * Ana Ortiz
 * Susan Lucci

All of the Disney Princesses appear, including: Jennifer Hale as Cinderella, Kate Higgins as Aurora, Jodi Benson as Ariel, Paige O'Hara as Belle, Linda Larkin as Jasmine, Irene Bedard as Pocahontas, Ming-Na Wen as Mulan, Anika Noni Rose as Tiana, Mandy Moore as Rapunzel, Kelly Macdonald as Merida, Kristen Bell as Anna, Idina Menzel as Elsa and Auliʻi Cravalho as Moana, all of whom reprise their roles from previous films and other media, while screenwriter Pamela Ribon will voice Snow White. Additionally, Brian Curless voices himself, an auctioneer, while the film's directors Rich Moore and Phil Johnston voice auction bidders. Colleen Ballinger, Dani Fernandez, and Tiffany Herrera voice cameo as themselves.

Popular culture cameos and references
Similar to the first film, which included a number of cameos and references to video games, Ralph Breaks the Internet has additional features to Internet culture and to various Disney properties, including their own films, Pixar films, the Star Wars franchise, Marvel Comics, and The Muppets. Mickey Mouse, Grumpy, Dumbo, Eeyore, Tinker Bell, Buzz Lightyear, Baymax, C-3PO, R2-D2, Yoda, First Order Stormtroopers, and Iron Man will appear in the film as well, along with video game characters like Sonic the Hedgehog.

The filmmakers announced that Kylo Ren's "Spoiled Child" joke was cut from the film.

Development
In October 2012, director Rich Moore said that he and Disney had ideas about a sequel that would bring the characters up to date and explore online gaming and console gaming. Moore stated that many of the crew and voice cast were open to the sequel, believing that they have "barely scratched the surface" of the video game world they envisioned. He also stated that he planned to include Mario and Tron in the sequel. In 2014, the first film's composer Henry Jackman said that a story for the sequel was being written. In July 2015, John C. Reilly said he had signed on to reprise his role of Ralph in a projected sequel.

On March 24, 2016, Moore stated that a sequel was still being planned. Moore specifically stated that a sequel would include an appearance from Mario, citing a "good relationship with Nintendo". On June 30, 2016, Walt Disney Animation Studios announced that the sequel would be released on March 9, 2018, with Reilly, Moore and writer Phil Johnston attached, and that it would focus on "Ralph leaving the arcade and wrecking the Internet".

The sequel's title was officially announced in March 2017 as Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2, with Moore returning as director joined by the first film's co-writer, Phil Johnston, in his directing debut in an animated film and Clark Spencer also returning as producer. In July 2018, Disney removed Wreck-it Ralph 2 from the film's title.

Writing
The design of the scenes within the Internet was based on tours made of One Wilshire in Los Angeles, as it is one of the world's largest telecommunications centers, serving most traffic around the Pacific Ocean. The filmmakers did not approach any of the companies (outside of Disney) that are represented in the Internet, and strived to include net branding from all across the world. They also had to explore various Internet memes, making sure to avoid those that lacked long-term presence on the Internet. While the first addresses many positive elements of the Internet, the filmmakers did not want to shy away from covering some of the more unpleasant aspects about it, in part fueled by the success of tackling racism indirectly within Zootopia. Such elements include Ralph reading through comment sections on videos to find users leaving disparaging messages about him, and having the pair travel to the dark web with its activities of questionable legal and ethical status. They wanted to follow the same approach as they had with Judy Hopps in Zootopia, where she experienced, learned, and overcame the racism aspects, and have Ralph similarly learn and become a better person without having to actually solve the issue of hostility on the Internet.

The scene where Vanellope is introduced to the Disney Princess came from screenwriter Pamela Ribon. In 2014, Ribon was still working on Moana when Disney began internally pitching ideas for the sequel to Wreck-It Ralph, Ribon recognized that like the title character of Moana, Vanellope fit the definition of a Disney Princess. When work formally began on the sequel after the completion of Zootopia, Ribon pitched the idea of Disney poking fun at itself by having Vanellope meet the other Disney Princesses in the green room of OhMyDisney.com, the Disney fan-driven website. Further inspiration came from a Buzzfeed online quiz that asked which Disney Princess the user was; Moore thought it would be interesting if Ralph had encountered that quiz and ended up in an argument with Vanellope over the result. Ribon's initial script for the scene, playing off the various tropes of the Princesses such as several being kidnapped or enslaved, remains mostly intact through production. Animators had to work out various techniques to take the different styles of animation into a single approach, and figure out the proportions of the characters to themselves using official figurines.

Casting
Reilly, Jane Lynch, Jack McBrayer, and Sarah Silverman are set to reprise their roles. In December 2016, Alan Tudyk confirmed his return in the sequel as a different character, named KnowsMore. In August 2018, actress Gal Gadot joined the film. The team was able to secure all the Disney Princesses' original voice actresses, save for Adriana Caselotti for Snow White, Ilene Woods for Cinderella, and Mary Costa for Aurora, as the former two passed away in 1997 and 2010 respectively while the latter retired in 2000; Jennifer Hale and Kate Higgins, the current voice actresses for Cinderella and Aurora were hired for the film while Pamela Ribon, the film's co-screenwriter, performed Snow White's voice for temporary tracks, but the team considered it a good substitute, allowing Ribon to voice her in the final film.

Animation
The movie contains over 150 unique sets and 5,726 assets. It also included the highest number of characters in any Disney Animation movie, with 434 individual characters with 6,752 variants.

Following the initial trailer for the film, which included the first shots of the Disney Princesses, some viewers noticed that Tiana, the lead character from the 2009 film The Princess and the Frog and of African-American heritage, had appeared to have a lighter skin tone, a narrower nose, and European features in Ralph Breaks the Internet than in the 2009 film. This lead to some backlashes on social media as these drew her appearance away from that expected of African-Americans. As a result, Tiana's voice actress Anika Noni Rose and the advocacy group Color of Change contacted Disney to redesign Tiana for Ralph Breaks the Internet to make her look closer to her 2009 appearance, which was reintroduced in the second trailer. The same treatment was made given to Pocahontas, the title character of the 1995 film, who had been pointed out by many viewers that she was given a much lighter skin tone.

Music
On September 19, 2018, Imagine Dragons released the lead single from the soundtrack titled "Zero", which will play during the end credits of the movie.

Release
On June 30, 2016, Walt Disney Animation Studios initially announced that the sequel, titled Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2, would be released on March 9, 2018. However, in April 2017, A Wrinkle in Time took over its date, and the film was pushed back to November 21, 2018. In July 2018, Disney shortened the film's title to Ralph Breaks the Internet. The film will be released in 3D, 2D and IMAX 3D.

The film will be released in the United Kingdom on November 30, as shown on its international trailer.

Marketing
A new poster for the film was released on February 26, 2018. Two days later, a teaser trailer for the film was released on February 28, 2018, and it quickly became viral, getting more than 4.5 million views in 24 hours. A second trailer was released on June 4, 2018 with the Daft Punk song "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger". A sneak peek of the film was released on August 10, 2018 that included the will.i.am song "Geekin'". Its final trailer was released on September 20, 2018 with the song "Never Gonna Give You Up" playing.