4 key things we learned at CinemaCon about 2024’s biggest movies

polygon.com:

Few weeks of any year are bigger or more important for the business of movies than CinemaCon. The annual gathering gives studios, theater owners, and exhibition-minded tech companies a chance to show off the most exciting developments in the movie business. But while the innovations that debut at CinemaCon may have important implications for the theaters where viewers get their film fix, the biggest news out of the convention almost always comes from the stage presentations, where studios show off their biggest gambles.

2024’s CinemaCon was no different, but with more than a hundred titles either shown or mentioned during the event, it can be hard for a regular movie fan to keep up with all the news — especially since most of the trailers and clips previewed at the con aren’t released to the public. So to help you keep track of all the most promising things from the convention, Polygon has put together a list of what we learned from being on the ground at CinemaCon 2024.

The demise of animated movies has been greatly exaggerated, as the CinemaCon 2024 lineup shows. Nearly every studio got in on the animated action. Disney and Pixar have massive sequels coming up, including Moana 2, Inside Out 2, and a Lion King prequel. Paramount has the first Transformers animated movie in almost 40 years. And Universal is releasing a new Despicable Me movie and a stunning-looking adaptation of the kids’ book The Wild Robot. Perhaps the most surprising addition to this crop is the Warner Bros. entry: Lord of the Rings: War of the Rohirrim, which wasn’t previewed at CinemaCon, but was pitched to exhibitors as “anime” during the studio’s stage show.

With all these movies set for release in the next eight months, 2024 is easily the biggest year for animation since 2019, a year that included The Lion King, Toy Story 4, Frozen 2, How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, The Secret Life of Pets 2, and The Lego Movie 2. It’s hard to imagine any year living up to all those huge