Canceled by Disney Plus: Does Willow Deserve This?

While the original film from 1988 has never been my favorite fantasy story (The Lord of the Rings will always hold that spot), I was still excited when the sequel series, simply titled Willow just like the original film, was announced. The trailer got me excited, and I eagerly awaited its debut.

We appear to be living in a new Golden Age of fantasy. Game of Thrones and its spin-off, House of the Dragon, are huge on HBOMax, Amazon Prime offers Wheel of Time and Rings of Power — the latter is controversial, but seems to be thriving during the current The Lord of the Rings resurgence — and Netflix has The Witcher, though certain casting decisions have people upset. Animation fans have The Dragon Prince on Netflix as well. Upcoming reboots of Avatar on Netflix and both Percy Jackson and Eragon on Disney+ are set to provide even more options in the next couple of years as well.

In the meantime, Disney attempted to get in on the mix of nostalgia and fantasy popularity by bringing back Willow. While it may seem odd at first, as the film was never popular the way a certain other George Lucas property from the 70s and 80s was, it does make sense. Willow is fantasy and fantasy is popular; it is a pre-existing property that does carry some recognition, even if it never really took off, and the other streaming services all offer at least one big fantasy series that is in progress. They want to compete? Why not throw Willow out there? It’s not a bad plan at all, and it really could have worked well.

Unfortunately, it didn’t, as it was announced on March 15th, 2023, that there would be no second season — it was canceled. There will be no real ending for fans. So what happened?

Realistically, it was probably the way Disney executed the plan and tried to set Willow apart from the other shows. The diversity? Great, love seeing more people represented in fantasy. I loved the queer relationship, and aside from The Dragon Prince I can’t think of any other fantasy shows with queer characters at the moment (I have not seen House of the Dragon and have done only the bare minimum research on it to find out when it aired). I love that Disney included that. I love that I haven’t seen anyone complain about that online. But the tone, dialogue, music… Those are things that I have seen complaints about. Unfortunately, that’s all I saw anyone online talk about with Willow if anyone ever talked about it.

I saw next to no recognition of Willow online between November and January when episodes were coming out. Maybe there were people talking about it elsewhere, but I was still seeing Rings of Power and House of the Dragon comparisons almost everywhere I turned with Willow seemingly missing in action despite being the only one of the three still putting episodes out. House of the Dragon ran from the end of August into mid-October, with Rings of Power starting in September and also finishing in mid-October. Disney waited until November 30th to release Willow and it still got drowned out by the other two. And, as previously mentioned, when I did see it recognized it wasn’t overly positive.

Yes, people did seem to enjoy the slow burn and agree that it got better as it went on, but there were still huge complaints. People were not happy about the change in tone from the original movie, the clunky dialogue that sounded like what adults think teenagers and young adults sound like, and particularly the jarring rock(?) music that played at the end over the credits. A quick Google search of “Willow series reviews” throws up a 2.7, with far more 1-star reviews than any other rating. That said, Rotten Tomatoes gives it an 83% from critics. Get more specific by selecting Top Critics specifically, and that jumps up to 91%. The audience score, however, is 66%. Notable too, however, is the fact that those scores are also based on far fewer reviews/scores as compared with Rings of Power and House of the Dragon.

Unfortunately, this series just didn’t catch, and I suspect it was the attempt to compete that threw it off. House of the Dragon and Rings of Power were both long awaited, and I barely saw any advertising for Willow before it aired; I saw the trailer and knew about it because my dad told me. The other two shows probably drowned it out, and for those who found it and chose to watch it, it was likely just a bit too different from its attempts to stand out. Throw in the too-complicated-to-explain behind-the-scenes CEO things that have been going on with Disney the last few years, and this honestly isn’t all that surprising.

This cancellation is sad. The show had so much potential that I was genuinely invested in the story. It wasn’t anything amazing, but seeing more of that universe was enjoyable and fun. Just a few small changes with music and dialogue, and maybe airing it with a bit more separation from Rings of Power and House of the Dragon, or if it had come when there was less behind-the-scenes corporate drama, then maybe things could have been different. It really felt like the show was starting to find itself in the last couple of episodes, but now we’ll never know. In other circumstances, I would fully recommend this show as I did find it genuinely enjoyable, after getting past some of the odd choices, but as it was canceled and the finale sets up the second season we will never get, I find it hard to do so.

If unresolved plots don’t upset you too much, then by all means, please check Willow out. Maybe somewhere down the line it will get rebooted again. With Percy Jackson and Eragon both getting second chances, I am willing to hold out hope for another attempt at telling this story, even if it is different from the series, in this world someday.