Is it wrong to feel like Disney's shine has worn off?

I don't know if anyone will actually respond to this, but still—

Like anybody of my generation, Disney was a big part of my childhood. I enjoyed many of their movies and TV shows in the past and still enjoy them to this day. But in recent days, my over active brain has taken all the things that i thought made Disney's animated stories great and turned them into something that bothers me to no end.

And the worst part of it all is, i can actually see the validness of these thoughts.

Here's the thing:

Disney movies frequently use the idea that if you have wish, there's a chance that it will come true if you have faith that it will. That seemed like a touching message back in the day, but now, whenever i think about that, i keep thinking about someone saying that such a belief is childish and naive. As you can imagine, that really undercuts the warm feelings i once had for those movies.

Disney movies also imply that Love and Friendship are very powerful things that weather anything when strong enough. But whenever i think about someone pointing our such things, i imagine them doing so in the most corniest way possible, and that just bothers me.

Disney has also implied that kind acts will always be rewarded, no matter who they're given to, even animals. However, whenever i imagine a scenario with that idea in mind, i'm reminded of the rare occasions when Disney showed that kind acts aren't rewarded. It bothers me

Disney has also made a habit of making it so that the female lead in a movie or show is only there to be the love interest and/or support the male lead. Granted, after Snow White, they did try to give the female leads more personality and actually have them do something to help the plot. But when it comes down to it, many (if not all) of the Disney female leads usually end up getting married and possibly have children by the film's end. Is that bad thing, no, of course not, but it does almost give the impression that if a woman is apart of the story, then chances are she'll end up hooked up with the male lead and "live happily ever after". I never really put much thought into this in the past and i don't know why i'm putting thought into it now, but this Disney formula does seem to be offensive and objectifying towards women. And as an imaginative man who is aspiring to be a writer, i'm worried that i might have been secret doing this for some time, and that's just wrong

Disney has implied that it's always a good idea to help others in need. But when i think about such a scenario, i usually think it going south because of two possible reasons: 1.) Because if the person you're trying help doesn't want your help, then you're just meddling. 2.) Helping others might only serve to make more problems in the long run.

Finally, Disney has always implied that it's important to be yourself and not let other peoples' perceptions of you dictate who you are. But once again, when i imagine such a scenario, i think about the rare moments when Disney made such a belief seem foolish and naive and that other peoples' opinion of you is important. Similarly, if it's important to be yourself, then why allow yourself to be changed by other people?

Some of this might have been influenced by me watching online reviews so much, but still this was alot to think about. Is there just something wrong with me?

Nope, you're just starting to think critically. Congratulations.

Well, as with many mediums of entertainment, Disney is meant to embody certain ideas. Above all(in an idealistic manner of speaking), Disney tries to bring about happy ideas even if they aren't the most accurate. Life is full of a multitude of experiences and conclusions. As much as I like Disney as well, I would consider it a bit narrow minded to follow Disney as an example of how life should go. It's not completely invalid, just a single way to think about the world, and life should be about accumulating many of those experiences. Disney isn't the end all be all of animation, nor is it the paragon of ideals. It has its flaws like any other studio, and it's evolving like any other studio. What it stands for will change, but hopefully upon foundations which made it great.

Maybe there aren't direct rewards to doing good things, but we do them anyway because we know there are benefits to others. And there are times when we let our friends go, and others where we genuinely try to patch up relationships.

To quote Lindsay Ellis(Nostalgia Chick), Disney films evoke passion in people that other films don't, regardless of whether they're liked or not.

edited 6th Feb '13 6:31:46 PM by blueflame724

Once upon a time, Walt Disney Pictures was the premiere animation studio. Occasionally, another studio such as Warner Brothers or MGM might field a film or two, but Disney always seemed to have a lock on the venue. It got to the point where there's a Trope for it: [1].

However, under Michael Eisner's direction, Disney go too comfortable on their laurels, which allowed Pixar and Blue Sky and Dreamworks to start stealing their thunder. Suddenly, the animated film industry wasn't the loaded-dice game for Disney anymore. So there, you're right: Disney's star began to dim.

However, healthy competition is what makes an industry strong. Once Michael Iger took the Disney reins, the film department shaped up. The Princess And The Frog and Tangled and Wreck-It Ralph are Walt Disney Pictures announcing to all Hollywood, "Get off my throne, imposters. The King has returned."

All I can really say is that Disney's goal is to make feel-good escapist entertainment that aims for the feelings and not the intellect. After all, Disney made them for a broad audience, not necessarily the critics. The Illusion Of Life book actually had a quote from Walt Disney about this;

->"We seem to know when to "tap the heart". Others have hit the intellect. We can hit them in an emotional way. Those who appeal to the intellect only appeal to a very limited group. The real thing behind this is; we are in the motion picture business, only we are drawing them instead of photographing them." —>—Walt Disney, quoted from pg. 119 of The Illusion Of Life

Here is what a pal of mine who I discuss this stuff with had to say about the matter;

"I'd say Disneys biggest problem is their lack of substance and identifiable content and not being adaptable to pleasing newer generations who perfer more satiric, thought-provoking, and vulgar material. Disney is still trapped in the mindset of producing films the same way when Walt was alive almost fifty years ago; their entire philosophy and style of operation still revolves around trying to please a man whose tastes are, for lack of a better term, outdated and irrelevant to todays culture. Its not necessarily the companies fault that they used him as a crutch for all their creative solutions, its just the only thing they think is plausible for their company. Disney adhered to the philosophy that the mothers were the main demographic to please because they were the ones who decided what movies to see and ultimately controlled the family audiences. That mindset was combined with his belief that if you were to market to the intellectual crowd in films youd be marketing to such a narrow audience that you wouldn't make your money back. So much of what can identified as Disney's "escapist cliches" were largely out of fear that if he did something else he wouldn't recoup the cost. I think that Walt's attempts at what he considered highbrow films like Fantasia, Pinocchio, and Bambi, all three of which flopped at the box office in their debut runs, largely reinforce why he stuck to the same formulas. Yet despite Walt's belief that narrowing your audience to the intellectual was damaging to your box-office potential, Walts career and entire legacy is still built on the idea of satisfying a very narrow select group of people, but instead of it being the high-brow artistic circles who look for content thats engaging, Walt perfers to narrow his audience to the people who are sketpical about what movies are right for the family. Also much of the escapist themes that resonate within his work are largely a product of Depression Era films, were a weary solution needing public would turn to any film that was optimistic and imaginative enough to help lift their spirits. Its just that now that the times and content in films have changed, Disney hasnt jumped off that bandwagon."

Popular consensus seems to be that Disney films lost their way for a while, but have since regained it. I agree.

And don't forget that Disney is much more than just films. They're also the ones that in part brought us Kingdom Hearts, with both its glory and its issues, as well as their television (again, some of which has issues, and some of which is quite excellent), and their various other multimedia brands.

Guys, those are all very nice responses, but they don't seem to be answering his question.

Well, his question is, "is there something wrong with me?" right? And the answer is— no, I don't think so. There certainly may be some more thinking to do, but I don't think anyone's necessarily wrong with someone to question what is or has been happening with Disney.

Nope, there's nothing wrong with you. You're just thinking critically. A bit cynically in a few spots, but critically. Just as there are times and places where the values presented in the average Disney film wouldn't be applicable or advisable, there are times and places where they most certainly would be applicable or advisable. I must admit, I myself have gotten a bit bored with the "follow your heart," and "be yourself" messages.

One of my favorite animated films is, actually, A Boy Named Charlie Brown, which is interesting in it's approach to the idea of failure. In, I feel I'm pretty safe in assuming, EVERY other film where a character put themselves out on a limb and took a wild chance, said chance would pay off because the message of the film would be something like "only those that dare, win" and some such. In A Boy Named Charlie Brown, the hero does put himself out on a limb and take a chance, in the face of much ridicule and opposition, and, if you know anything about Peanuts and Charlie Brown, you can imagine how it goes for him. This is the singular film that posits that failure and disappointment, while they feel awful, aren't the end of the world (an excellent, useful message, because most of us, I think, are going to fail a lot more often than we succeed). I've never seen another film that did anything like it, certainly not any animated films. While I love the Disney canon, I can't see that as an idea they'd build a film around. And that, in my opinion, is a real shame.

Bored with "follow you heart"? Noooo! Say it isn't so! But if you're True to Your Heart, that's when the heavens will part!

Disney isn't the most subtle studio; its films are often about putting forth an ideal or theme in spite of the various realistic flaws. There isn't anything wrong with viewing Disney's ideals as a bit outdated and lacking in the complexity. But certainly I find they're admirable concepts when viewed with some rational lens. No, literally wishing upon a star or literally just "wanting something" won't get you what you want, but hopefully that drive of wanting something will encourage people to pursue their dreams through various opportunities or means.

And they can certainly know when to have fun with themselves or twist things around, as with Enchanted, which while keeping true to certain themes, also turned a number of ideas on their head, while proving highly entertaining to boot.

That was one of the things that I liked about Princess and the Frog. Right near the beginning it was flat-out stated that wising upon a star won't get you much. You actually have to work toward your dream, so the movie focuses on a character that took working for your goal a little too much to heart.

Of course not, at least you don't think that Pixar did more harm than good to animation in general like I'm starting to think

You misspelled Dreamworks.

Other than that, everyone else said pretty much everything I was going to.

While the movie quality (preferably animated) is improving (Despite Pixar's lackluster performances as of late), the TV animation quality leaves something to be desired - more shows like Randy Cunningham Ninth Grade Ninja and Gravity Falls level of quality would be nice - that and more risk-taking like Motor City and Tron Uprising, in terms of action fare (that and keeping it funded and around for more than one season, to be specific in that regard!).

Other than that, Disney still has a lot of work to do showing us that they are prepared to entertain the 21st Century viewer (even though Pixar has succeeded in the last decade, yet this is a new one, so IMHO, my point still stands...).

edited 7th Feb '13 1:02:47 PM by TheShopSoldier

No, he spelled Pixar quite well. Im SICK of people saying "PIXAR RULES, DREAMWORKS DROOLS". I know you are entitled to your opinion but Pixar should NOT BE ABOVE CRITICISM.

Chill, it's all tongue in cheek. Both Dreamworks and Pixar get flak for ending the popularity of Hand-Drawn Animation(especially Disney animation), which is a shame since the people at Pixar want to bring back hand drawn animation, and it seems Dreamworks wants to incorporate hand drawn elements in some of their films as well.

I like that variant, "All good CG animation is Pixar, all other CG animation is Dreamworks."

x3 Love them or hate them, the trends Dreamworks made (over use of all star casts, pop culture references, dance party endings, etc) caused everyone and their mom to try and cash in on their success (similar to the princess craze in the 90's). Then add in that one of their reps (I think it was Katzenberg) actually went on record saying handdrawn animation was dead, leading to Disney abandoning it and trying to rip off Dreamworks in the worst way imaginable and you result in all of the worst trends of the past decade of animated cinema that we are only now just getting over and the absolute fear of doing handdrawn animation in fear that it won't be financially successful.

Granted, thats not to say that Dreamworks made no good films at that time, or that they aren't trying to do better now (although the production of the Croods makes me weary of just what the hell they're thinking when teaming up directors), I would just point out that Dreamworks did more "harm" to animation than Pixar ever has, if you even want to call it "harm" and not "a trend that has come and gone."

Oh I see. That's a WAY more reasonable and well though argument. Sorry for blowing up at you.

No biggy. I just didn't feel like pulling out the full argument for this topic until asked.

Hon, Disney's shine has worn off 15 years ago, then it was regained just this decade.

The message of The Princess And The Frog is actually the CORRECT way to tell you "your dreams can come true": you need to also work for them yourself. I can't imagine even 5% of all my friends in real life who simply wished for something and then got that exact thing verbatim later in their life!

edited 7th Feb '13 2:28:54 PM by kyun

There are, of course, valid criticisms that can be leveled at Pixar, but what annoys me is folks who essentially pick at them because they've been successful (more successful so far, taken on a film-by-film basis, than any other movie studio ever has been—they've never lost money). There are those who pick at Disney for the same reason. Our OP is not one of those, to be sure, but I'd wager thaT you know you've heard them.

Disney's main flaw in the 90's was, I think, that they felt they'd found a wildly successful formula and then proceeded to milk it dry. They didn't anticipate anyone challenging them in the animation market (or, if so, that such a challenge would mean anything to their bottom line), or that people might get a mite bored with their formula.

But then, Disney animation does seem to ebb and flow. Right now, they seem to be getting the flow going again. Here's hoping Frozen and The King of Elves are good. I still want to see them do that Baba Yaga film they were talking about back in the '90's.