The beloved Dreamworks animated franchise is coming back to the big screen as Universal now sets Kung Fu Panda 4 for release on March 8, 2024. With the film in early production, no plot details of the fourth installment in the Kung Fu Panda franchise were given, but with a confirmed release date, fans can now officially anticipate the return of their favorite characters on the big screen.
No directors of the upcoming animated feature have been announced yet, but more announcements are likely to come as production for the Kung Fu Panda 4 begins to gear up. Jack Black, who plays Po in all the films and spin-off shows, will likely return for the role in the fourth installment as everyone's favorite panda. Due to the film's early stages of production, it remains unclear if any previous voice actors, such as Angelina Jolie and Dustin Hoffman, will be returning.
The first Kung Fu Panda released in theaters in the summer of 2008 to positive responses from critics and audiences with the film earning an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Feature Film. Due to the critical and financial success of Kung Fu Panda, it eventually became one of Dreamworks' most lucrative franchises alongside Shrek, Madagascar, and How to Train Your Dragon.
A still from ‘Kung Fu Panda 3’ | Photo Credit: Netflix
The beloved animated franchise Kung Fu Panda will return to the big screen with a fourth film, which is set to release on March 8, 2024.
The studio has not revealed a director for the project. Actor Jack Black is expected to return as the voice of Po, the giant panda who becomes a master of kung fu.
The new movie will follow the further adventures of wide-eyed Po in ancient China, whose love of kung fu is matched only by an insatiable appetite.
Produced by DreamWorks Animation, the franchise started with the 2008 movie Kung Fu, also featuring the voices of Dustin Hoffman as Master Shifu, Angelina Jolie as Tigress, Seth Rogen as Mantis, Jackie Chan as Monkey, and Lucy Liu as Viper.
It was followed up by Kung Fu Panda 2 [2011] and Kung Fu Panda 3 [2016].
Everybody’s gonna be kung fu fighting — a fourth film in the “Kung Fu Panda” series will release in 2024, Universal Pictures announced Friday.
The film, which is slated for a March 8, 2024 release, will be the first film in the “Kung Fu Panda” franchise since 2016, when the DreamWorks Animation series concluded a planned trilogy. The films focus on Po [Jack Black], an excitable panda bear living in a fantasy version of ancient China. In the first film in the franchise, released in theaters in 2008, Po is chosen to become the “Dragon Warrior,” a prophesied kung fu master. Over the course of the film and its two sequels Po trains under the wise Master Shifu [Dustin Hoffman] and overcomes his doubts to grow into a capable hero, defeating several dangerous foes and eventually reuniting with his long-lost birth parents.
The first “Kung Fu Panda” film was DreamWorks’ highest-grossing original animated film, earning $631 million at the global box office. The films in total grossed $1.8 billion, and spawned a franchise that includes several animated TV specials and three series, including “The Dragon Knight,” which premiered its first season on Netflix last month. Beyond their financial success, the three “Kung Fu Panda” all received generally positive reviews from film critics. In a review for Variety in 2016, film critic Justin Chang called the third film a “delightful trilogy capper,” writing that it brought the trilogy’s “long-running themes of perseverance and self-knowledge to satisfying fruition.”
Beyond the release date, no information about the fourth film in the franchise has been announced. Aside from Black, other cast members from the original trilogy included Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, Seth Rogen, Jackie Chan, Lucy Liu, David Cross and James Hong. Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger wrote the screenplays for all three films in the original trilogy, while Melissa Cobb served as the lead producer. John Stevenson and Mark Osborne directed the first film, while Jennifer Yuh Nelson helmed the two sequels, the latter of which she co-directed with Alessandro Carloni.