Hulu Added ‘Big Hero 6,’ Mystifyingly Still Disney’s Only Animated Marvel Movie

Today’s a big day for Marvel completists! Hulu snagged the streaming rights to the entire Disney/Marvel animated feature catalogue, bringing the adventure to your TV or tablet of choice! Starting today, November 10, you can stream all the animated epics like Big Hero 6 and… uh… oh, wait. Big Hero 6. Just Big Hero 6. There’s only one animated Disney/Marvel feature film and it was released four years ago.

What gives?

When Disney acquired Marvel way back in 2009, everyone assumed that Marvel cartoons had to be on the way. After all, that’s Disney’s whole thing. Disney literally invented the animated motion picture with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs back in 1937! We knew Disney would keep the Marvel Cinematic Universe going strong, but it seemed like a no-brainer for the Disney animation wing to run wild with the thousands of superheroes they just bought in bulk. The idea of Pixar, the studio behind The Incredibles, potentially giving us the Fantastic Four movie ever single Marvelite has been waiting decades for–! The excitement was real.

And then nothing happened. Nothing happened for 5 years. And when it did happen, the major motion picture didn’t star the Avengers or any B-list Marvel heroes. It didn’t even star any C-list Marvel heroes. Instead, Disney Animation Studios went with Big Hero 6, a team that debuted in a very much forgotten limited series from 1998, and another in 2008. And that’s basically it. With literally a dozen appearances to their name in as many years, Big Hero 6 got a big break. And it worked!

None of this is a slight to Big Hero 6! The fact that the animators could redesign all the characters from the ground up into whatever they wanted with zero worry of even remotely conflicting with the #branding of the live-action cinematic universe had to be a major selling point. Big Hero 6 shares a few character names with the comics and that’s it, and that’s great. It won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, so trust that they made the right call.

But what happened? After waiting so long to knock out a movie based on a Marvel property and then winning an Oscar for the first one, why hasn’t Disney Animation returned to superheroes? Much was made about Disney buying Marvel as a way to balance their girl-friendly, mega-popular princess franchise and gain ground with boys. One would think that major animated features on the scale of Frozen or Moana starring Marvel heroes would be a no-brainer.

This is even more confounding when you realize that superheroes have almost zero presence in theatrically released animated movies. Marvel has Big Hero 6, produced by Disney, and now Sony’s picking up Disney’s slack by dropping Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse later this year. Marvel’s primary rival DC Comics has fared slightly better. There’s 1993’s Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, 2017’s The Lego Batman Movie, and this year’s Teen Titans Go! To The Movies. So… three! They’ve released three. Marvel’s released one.

These competitors really separate when you take home video releases into account, though; DC has a hugely successful and widely beloved line of animated movies, one that includes upwards of 30 feature-length films. Marvel was in the middle of giving this home video business model a go back when Disney bought them in 2009. The line, distributed by Lions Gate Entertainment, released 8 films between 2006 and 2011 (you can stream a few on Netflix right now) and then disappeared. Maybe that line kept Disney out of the Marvel animated movie business at first, but what’s keeping Disney away now–especially after the success of Big Hero 6?

Nowadays Marvel makes a direct-to-video animated feature every year or two, the most recent being Disney XD’s Marvel Rising: Secret Warriors. The lack of all-ages animated major motion pictures still feels like a missed opportunity. The MCU movies are by no means as grim and gritty as the DC live-action movies, but they’re still not exactly kid friendly. They’re fun and funny, but they also feature things like the lovable teenage POV character crying and crumbling into dust in front of his emotionally-shattered mentor. I think the little kid loudly sobbing behind me after Avengers: Infinity War would maybe have rather seen something more like Big Hero 6 and waited a few years before watching his heroes grapple with emotional shock and trauma.

But that little kid didn’t have a choice! There are no Marvel movies that are truly fun for the whole family, from the first minute to the last. And I don’t think brand confusion is really a thing, either. If you introduce an animated Captain America who doesn’t look or sound like Chris Evans, kids will get it. But Big Hero 6 proved these potential animated movies don’t have to star the A-listers! They could star Squirrel Girl, the new teenage Wasp, Marvel’s Hercules or Black Knight, Tigra, She-Hulk, Lockjaw and the Inhumans, the teen Hulk Amadeus Cho–I could keep going! And if Disney doesn’t want to risk a full-on animated feature, what about putting animated shorts starring any of the above ahead of their major fairy tale films? I mean seriously, why isn’t Shuri an official Disney princess yet?!

I don’t know, I’m sure there’s red-tape or budget concerns that started and stopped the Marvel/Disney animated movie line with one film. I get that there’s a limited number of animated features Disney can slot in in a given year, and I’m sure they want to pursue all sorts of ideas beyond ones involving superheroes (they already turn out 3 live-action ones a year). But I do know that Big Hero 6 happened 4 years ago, and now Sony’s making Marvel cartoons instead of Disney. Come on, Disney! Fill the void and give us the Shuri and Squirrel Girl animated romp that kids need!

Where to stream Big Hero 6