Good, if somewhat surprising, news for anyone who grew up watching Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the groundbreaking mix of live-action and animation that shaped imaginations and made cartoons cool with mainstream audiences when it was released back in 1988 \u2014 there\u2019s now the very real possibility that a sequel could finally reach theaters\u2026 and it\u2019s because Disney has surrendered the rights to the property.<\/p>\n
The update comes from none other than Gary K. Wolf, who originally created the characters and concept of Toontown and the human\/toon crossover world in his 1981 novel, Who Censored Roger Rabbit<\/a>. \u201cI now have back the rights to all my characters, all my books. I can, basically, do my own Roger Rabbit projects,\u201d he told fansite ImNotBad.com<\/a>. \u201c35 years after you have sold the rights to a book or [song], you could petition the Library of Congress and get those rights back. [An attorney] said to me, \u2018You could get your rights back from Disney.\u2019\u00a0 I said, \u2018There\u2019s no way that\u2019s possible.\u2019\u201d And yet \u2014 it was.<\/p>\n In fact, according to Wolf, it proved to be surprising easy. \u201cI expected that this would be a contentious process. Who knows what was going to happen? But, it was not. It was very civil, very courteous, very straightforward,\u201d he said. \u201cDisney was always top-notch for me. They treated me very well. They always accommodated me in whatever I wanted to do.\u201d<\/p>\n This doesn\u2019t mean that Wolf now owns Who Framed Roger Rabbit the movie \u2014 that\u2019s still Disney\u2019s property. What he does own is the right to make new movies, or shows, or anything, based on the characters, and on his novels\u2026 and, it seems, that\u2019s something that\u2019s already in the works.<\/p>\n \u201cThe [project] that is most prominent \u2026 is a live-action Jessica Rabbit movie based on the book Jessica Rabbit: XERIOUS Business<\/a>. That was the first project that we took a look at and the first we started developing. It\u2019s probably the one that\u2019s furthest along right now.\u201d<\/p>\n Published in 2022, XERIOUS Business is a soft reboot of Jessica Rabbit as a character, reimagining her as a regular human called Jessica Krupnick who longs for a life of excitement, not knowing what she\u2019s about to get herself into. As a way to relaunch Roger Rabbit on the big screen, it\u2019s akin to rebooting Batman with Batman Begins \u2014 but the real question is, who could play a real life Jessica? Actresses, start polishing your resumes now.<\/p>\n