Kingdom Heartsis one of the biggest game franchises ever released by Sony since it first hit the PlayStation 2 in 2002. However, it could also have been a massive TV series too if a planned animated series based on theDisneyand Square Enix collaboration had gone ahead. Now almost two decades later, director Seth Kearsley has revealed some details about the lost project, which include a VHS tape that seems to contain an early version of the proposed pilot of the show.
Kingdom Hearts is a crossover project that pitched many much-loved Disney characters into a dark and twisted world where they meet Sora, a boy whose world is rocked by the arrival of a sinister force that steals away his friends and destroys his home. The game then sees Sora joining forces with Donald Duck and Goofy to travel through worlds to defeat the evil and restore his world. The game spawned a number of spin-offs, and it potentially included a TV series that was put into development almost immediately.
In the posts, Kearsley shared a number of images showing the script for the potential extension of the game franchise, including dialogue between the main characters in the pilot episode that would have been called “Agrabah” after the setting of Disney’s Aladdin. While a shared cast list included many of thevideo gamevoice actors returning to voice their characters on TV, with the absence of Haley Joel Osment, who played Sora in the game. Check out the posts below:
Related:Is Disney+ Really Planning a Kingdom Hearts TV Show?
AKingdom HeartsSeries Could Now Be Coming to Disney+
While the original idea of a Kingdom Hearts series never made it off the ground, the advent of Disney+ seems to have reignited the possibility of the franchise making a move from game to TV. Back in 2020, it was rumored that a new series had been put into development with the regular Disney talent such as Jim Cummings, Bill Farmer and Tony Anselmo reprising their regular roles.
However, since then, the series seems to have been stalled with no further announcements being made, even when a fourth installment of the video game series was announced around the original game’s 20th anniversary. With the games having pretty solid storylines, it seems like most of the work has already been laid down, and a series should really be a no-brainer.
One of the biggest challenges facing Kingdom Hearts twenty years ago was where it could have found a home, with the kind of continued storytelling that is now becoming normal being a complete no-no for many networks. Whether Kingdom Hearts will ever make it to screens as a series still remains to be seen, but fans would certainly love to see Sora’s adventures play out as a TV series, especially with a number of other game franchises currently being produced,such as Sonic The Hedgehog, Super Mario Bros, Twisted Metal and Metal Gear Solid among others.
