21 Oct – Due to the recent issue regarding the controversial scene in "Abominable", the animated movie will no longer be releasing in certain ASEAN cinemas, including Malaysia. The movie was originally slotted for release in the country on 7 November 2019. However, over the weekend, anger erupted among Southeast Asians when it was revealed that one of the scenes in the movie showed a world map that featured the Nine-Dash Line, often used by China to indicate its claims on the South China Sea. The aforementioned marginal sea that's part of the Pacific Ocean has long been the subject of a territorial dispute between the People's Republic of China (PRC), the Republic of China (ROC/Taiwan), Malaysia, Vietnam, Brunei and the Philippines.
When the issue sparked, the Film Censorship Board of Malaysia (LPF) asked local distributor United International Pictures (UIP) to cut the offending scene in order to receive approval to be screened in local cinemas. However, UIP has decided to pull it off its release schedule altogether. Cinema Online has reached out to UIP for a comment regarding its decision to cancel the movie's release but at the time of writing, the distributor has yet to comment.