The latest title to get an early digital home release is Pixar’s latest flick, Onward. Disney says it will be available to download today, but, in our current reality, it’s also one of the first tentpole movies to get a streaming release a month or so after arriving in theaters. You can stream Onward on Disney+ starting April 3rd.

#PixarOnward is coming to the US tonight on digital download and will be streaming on #DisneyPlus on April 3rd. pic.twitter.com/8IJFNTXOL8

— Walt Disney Studios (@DisneyStudios) March 20, 2020

The fantasy movie hasn’t reached the heights of most other Pixar films at the box office, having pulled in $103 million worldwide to date. But there are clear reasons why Onward has underperformed. Many movie theaters are closing shop for now and, of course, people everywhere are being urged to stay home.

Like other studios, Disney’s in a bit of a bind with its release strategy. Since Onward is already out in the world but fewer folks are actually able to see it right now, bringing it to Disney+ while people are holed up with their loved ones will give them something new to watch. Those who want to see Onward but haven’t been able to will also have another reason to sign up for Disney+ if they haven’t already. At the very least, it might lure kids away from endless Frozen 2 repeats.

Catmull, a computer scientist and former president of Pixar and Disney Animation Studios, and Hanrahan, a founding employee at Pixar, have both been recognized for fundamentally influencing the field of computer graphics. Thanks to them, what were once blocky shapes made from polygons have been transformed into curved surfaces displaying mind-blowing detail. Pixar’s Toy Story, released in 1995, was Hollywood’s first fully computer-animated film and is the inspiration for the dozens of animated movies that have since followed — none of which would have been possible without the work of Catmull and Hanrahan, who will share the $1 million prize.

Their work influences not only animated movies, but Hollywood special effects, virtual reality and video games — in fact, much of the entertainment we enjoy these days can be attributed to the Pixar pioneers.

“Because 3D computer graphic imagery is now so pervasive, we often forget what the field was like just a short time ago when a video game like Pong, which consisted of a white dot bouncing between two vertical white lines, was the leading-edge technology,” said Jeff Dean, senior vice president at Google AI. “The technology keeps moving forward, yet what Hanrahan and Catmull developed decades ago remains standard practice in the field today — that’s quite impressive. It’s important to recognize scientific contributions in CGI technology and educate the public about a discipline that will impact many areas in the coming years—virtual and augmented reality, data visualization, education, medical imaging, and more.”

Of course, since Disney’s announcement in 2017 that it would launch its own streaming service, Disney+ was immediately billed as a Netflix rival — which is understandable considering how dominant Netflix has been in that business over the past few years. But Paull sees it differently. “I don’t really think about it in that way,” he said about Disney+ being a Netflix rival. “If we create and we bring quality programming, there’s room for a multitude of players in this space, just like in the traditional [TV] ecosystem there was room for a whole bunch of different networks.” Instead, Paull added, “when we’re thinking about this product, this experience and the programming, we’re thinking about the end consumer.”

One of the biggest challenges in launching Disney+, Paull said, has been figuring out “the complexity of a global service.” On November 12th, Disney+ will be available in the US, Canada and the Netherlands, followed by Australia and New Zealand on November 19th. That will be the start of Disney’s rollout plans for its streaming service, which the company expects to be live in “most major global markets” within the first two years of its launch. “There’s a lot of complexity under the hood,” he said, pointing to how difficult it can be to build a product “that can scale, that can support a broad array of [devices]” and that can “take on massive concurrent streaming with a breadth of programming.”

In Europe, for example, Paull said Disney has to understand local laws that Disney+ needs to comply with, like the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation. GDPR may be the reason Disney+ hasn’t shared any details yet on when it will arrive in the UK, which has the potential to be a major market for the company. Paull said the Disney+ team has also been learning a lot from ESPN+, the standalone sports streaming service it launched in 2018, as well as the majority acquisition of BAMTech in 2017. (BAMTech is the startup behind the video-streaming tech powering services including Hulu, Hulu with Live TV, ESPN+ and, now, Disney+

“As an organization, we’ve learned a lot from that experience [ESPN+],” said Paull, “in terms of bringing product to market, marketing that product, acquiring subscribers, keeping them engaged and we will learn from all of those lessons.” With BAMTech, on the other hand, he said Disney was able to have a “strong and deep base knowledge of building, marketing and operating direct-to-consumer services,” which has laid the foundation for Disney+. We’re taking all of the experience we’ve had over the years, whether it’s the streaming experience, getting people to sign up or the learnings about creating an elegant [service].”

Paull said that, ultimately, the key is to offer people a streaming service that makes it easy for them to watch the shows and movies they love most. The Disney+ experience, he said, should be seamless whether you’re watching on your iPhone, Android phone, Apple TV or Xbox One. “We want to make sure that the product doesn’t get in the way of the content,” Paull said. “We want to delight consumers with the product. But, really, in the end the product is the content.”

Images: Angela Papuga/Getty Images (Disney+ stage at D23 Expo)