Disney Just Abandoned Its Most Underrated Sci-Fi Franchise
There won’t be another return to Witch Mountain.
Disney has been a family movie juggernaut for nearly a century, so its archives contain countless movies that exist as vague memories. Bedknobs and Broomsticks and The Island at the Top of the World may not have merch lines and Disney rides, but they’re a treasured part of childhood to the select few who went to the theater or owned the VHS tape at a formative time in their lives.
One of these cult classics has long been a target of a possible reboot, but after a lengthy history that includes four sequels, the project may be abandoned for now.
During a panel at Fan Expo Canada, Bryce Dallas Howard told Collider that the pilot she starred in based on the classic 1975 movie Escape to Witch Mountain was not picked up for a full series. “It's not happening, which is disappointing,” she said. “It was a really great groove, and we really all enjoyed shooting it here in Toronto. Some things make it, and some things don't, and that's the unfortunate truth of this industry.”
Disney+ ordered the pilot nearly two years ago, and described the series as a modern take on the franchise that follows “two teens that develop strange abilities and discover their sleepy suburb may not be as idyllic as it seems.”
The History of Witch Mountain
Ike Eisenmann and future Real Housewife Kim Richards as Tony and Tina in Escape to Witch Mountain.
The Witch Mountain franchise began with Escape to Witch Mountain, based on a 1968 novel by Alexander Key. It followed Tony and Tina Malone, two orphans who learn that they’re extraterrestrial beings who must get to Witch Mountain, home to unexplainable phenomena, before they’re caught by menacing adults who want to use their strange abilities for their own nefarious purposes.
The movie was followed by 1978’s Return From Witch Mountain, which brought back the original cast and director for a direct sequel following Tony and Tina as they return to civilization only to get caught up in a chase with nefarious adults yet again.
1982’s Beyond Witch Mountain was then meant to be a pilot for a TV series, much like the one Bryce Dallas Howard was set to star in. It recast nearly everyone, and is an odd duck canonically, as while the movie is set between Escape and Return, the plot directly contradicts the events of the latter, apparently retconning the entire movie. Unlike the prior theatrical releases, Beyond Witch Mountain aired on CBS as part of an anthology series simply called Walt Disney.
Beyond Witch Mountain recast Tony and Tina and veered away from canon.
The franchise was then put on ice until 1995, when ABC aired Escape to Witch Mountain, a complete remake starring Erik Von Detten and Elisabeth Moss as Danny and Anna, renamed versions of the Tony and Tina characters. There were some changes to the story, like Anna and Danny not knowing they’re siblings until they meet at an orphanage, Parent Trap-style, but most of the plot is similar.
Finally, in 2009, the franchise was given another chance with Race to Witch Mountain, starring Dwayne Johnson as a getaway-driver-turned-taxi-driver who gets swept up in an adventure when yet again renamed twins Seth and Sara enlist him in a quest to get back to their homeworld. While the movie opened as a box office number one, its fortunes soon faded. It wasn’t the second wind the series needed to get off the ground, and no sequels were made.
With this failed pilot now one more mark against the franchise, it looks like Witch Mountain may be buried for good. But maybe that’s for the best, as the obscurity of the movies is part of what makes them great. They’re hidden gems for whoever stumbles upon them on TV, in the depths of Disney+, or a home media bargain bin. Maybe the magic should remain there.
