Disney: The Life and Times of a Main Character
How Disney's past helps to explain its current malaise
For a man who made children’s stories, Walt Disney was a remarkably enigmatic character. Some remember him as a hero, others as an imperialist, patriot or propagandist, antisemite or a leader for Jewish equality, an autocratic ruler or shy artist. Disney recognized his own ambiguity, saying of himself: “I’m not Walt Disney. I do a lot of things Walt Disney would not do. Walt Disney does not smoke. I smoke. Walt Disney does not drink. I drink.”1 At the very least, one might think that no one could deny his merits as an artist, but that’s not the case either: CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien both hated his movies and complained about his lack of mythological accuracy.2
No one can deny that he built an unrivaled film empire, however. From his first full-length feature in 1937, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, to Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 3, released last year, Walt’s empire not only defined film but shaped the childhood of millions. To say that he was a legend in his own time undersells his status: he won 26 Academy Awards and created, according to the American Film Institute, some of the greatest films ever made, and did so with plots aimed at children. Today, many (myself included) find it hard to believe that “Disney” was ever the last name of an unknown man from Chicago.
However, if Disney’s personal story was somewhat symbolic, his company’s was even more so. Disney became a metaphor for the 20th-century United States as its films encompassed a colorful, aesthetic beauty that represented the hope and optimism the US held coming out of two world wars and the Great Depression. Less subtly, Disney supported the US government by making anti-Nazi propaganda in WWII and frequently incorporated strong gender roles and racial stereotypes mixed with values of hope, courage, and kindness, all of which were seen as uncontroversial during the period. In short, Disney and Uncle Sam had a lot in common, and both were okay with that.
Today, however, reactions to Disney range from boredom among those who’ve lost count of the sequels to the stories they loved to blind rage among fans who feel their beloved characters are being overwritten with formulaic filler. Years of Marvel films have left the company’s live-action line-up feeling stale. Its animated cartoons have eschewed hand-drawn art in favor of more automated approaches since Winnie the Pooh in 2011,3 compounding the sense of art-by-algorithm.
When and why did such an artistic, innovative company lose its way? How can the company not see that it’s recycling plot ideas? And why does it seem content to languish at the box office? While concise, satisfying answers to these questions remain elusive, we can find clues in the history of the company itself.
1937-1950: The Golden Era
Walt Disney, the man, was born in Chicago in 1901, but he grew up on a farm in Missouri, which perhaps led to the lifelong fascination with animals that permeates his work. He seems to have always been interested in art and never bothered with any other career choices that did not include drawing.
After fits and starts creating a couple of short films, Disney had his first true success with Steamboat Willie in 1928, which was the first animated picture to use synchronized sound, putting the Disney company on the map.4 Though Disney was only in his late twenties at the time, Steamboat Willie not only showcased his abilities as an artist but introduced his signature mascot, Mickey Mouse. Interestingly, Mickey came about due to a legal dispute. The year before, Disney had developed “Oswald the Lucky Rabbit” but had sold the rights to Universal. Mickey was born to repurpose his work and maintain his romantic attachment to Oswald’s silhouette.5
This success gave him the notoriety and the capital needed to grow and expand the company with his older brother, Roy. The period from 1930 through World War II and into the 1950s was a golden era for Disney. The company continually released hit animated films that delighted critics and audiences alike. Snow White, released in 1937, is consistently ranked one of the greatest films of all time. Fantasia, three years later, brought Mickey to the big screen in a tour de force performance of visuals and classical music, along with Pinochio, Dumbo, and Bambi. The 1950s saw further classics, including Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, and Lady and the Tramp.
Historian Steven Watts pinpoints Disney’s artistic style during this period as “sentimental realism” that came from Disney’s balance between the Victorianism of the 19th century and the Modernism of the 20th century. From Modernism, Disney got his love of folklore, the use of animals as subjects, and his fascination with dream sequences. But, he did not stray so far from Victorianism as to forego the tales of morality embedded in his films, nor his use of conventional plot points (e.g., the frequent use of romances). 6
All this came together beautifully in works still watched and remembered by audiences of all ages. Disney received soaring reviews for his work, and the company became a household name. But that is not to say all was well…
1950-1965: Disney Branches Out
Ironically, the golden era lacked gold for Disney; the company struggled financially. Though hard to believe given their place in popular memory, neither Bambi nor Fantasia were box office successes, forcing the company to live hand-to-mouth during the 40’s. While Dumbo rescued the company slightly, labor disputes continued to create problems, and the company looked for all sorts of creative ways to boost profits, including re-releasing films and cutting production costs.
Perhaps too much the artist, Walt Disney famously said, “We don’t make movies to make money; we make money to make movies.” Disney began branching out from animated films into live-action movies to create the money needed to make more films. Treasure Island, released in 1950, marked Disney’s start in this genre, but it would be followed by others, including the unspeakably tragic Old Yeller and the saccharine classic Pollyanna later in 1960.
Walt Disney also became interested in theme parks around this time. As the legend goes, he was walking with his children at Griffith Park, the zoo in Los Angeles, and had the idea for a park that would appeal to children and adults alike (suggesting, at least to me, that he was pretty bored on this visit). This ultimately led him to open Disney Land in California in 1955 and, later, in 1971, Disney World in Florida. Disney Land was an immediate success, doubling the company’s revenue in its first year of existence.
1965-1982: Shambles
Alas, before he could see the completion of Disney World, Walt died of complications related to lung cancer in 1965. In 1967, the last two films that Walt himself had been working on were released. The Happiest Millionaire, a live-action remake few remember, and Jungle Book, which immediately joined the Disney pantheon and became Disney’s most successful film for decades. But, after these, Walt’s vision was lost, as the company essentially gave up animation for the next several decades, cutting its animation department staff by nearly 80%.7
After Walt’s death, Roy took over leadership until he died in 1971. Roy had long worked with his brother and seems to have genuinely supported him and his vision. But, as is so often the case, he could not build a new vision, only to work on the old. Though the company would have a hit in Rescuers in 1977, it floundered for this period, again struggling financially as it tried to avoid multiple takeover attempts.
1982-2004: The comeback
After Roy’s death, the company had a series of leadership changes, finally deciding on Michael Eisner, a Paramount executive, in 1984. Though only 42, Eisner was determined to right the Disney ship, even going so far as to host The Wonderful World of Disney, making him a celebrity and a CEO. With Who Framed Roger Rabbit in 1988 and The Little Mermaid in 1989, he quickly saw Disney return to producing box office success, ingratiating him with shareholders and film-goers.
However, the Disney he inherited was very different from the golden era. In 1982, the company had gone into significant debt to create EPCOT (including several international parks built over this period), and theme parks now accounted for nearly 70% of the company’s revenue.8 While still a respected company, it was heavily in debt and trying to fight off takeover attempts while dealing with labor struggles, making it large, weak, and unwieldy.
Moral criticism of the company also grew during this period. Sociologists Best and Lowney note that the 1980s saw the rise of moral criticism from the Christian right. At the same time, progressives upped criticisms they had begun earlier, both around Disney’s labor practices and its very traditional messages. Theme parks opened a new arena for criticism, as academics, in particular, saw them as an artificially constructed reality and, therefore, fodder for all kinds of social criticisms.
However, Best and Lowney point out that these criticisms are better seen as reflecting strength, not weakness, in Disney’s reputation. Rather than being problems specific to Disney, the criticisms leveled here were really criticisms of society generally of which critiques saw Disney as an example. Disney’s strong reputation as a platform to illustrate arguments about capitalism, identity, and the country’s moral decline. Nonetheless, one can imagine that the company didn’t appreciate them all the same.9
Nonetheless, Eisner persevered and led Disney into its “Renaissance” in the 1990s, where it saw many successes, including Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), The Lion King (1994), Pocahontas (1995), and The Hunchabck of Notredame (1996). Meanwhile, its live-action departments produced Pretty Woman (1990), Sister Act (1992), Conair (1997), and Armageddon (1998), creating an incredible line-up throughout the 1990s. To top it all off, Disney bought ABC, giving it a presence in primetime television. These successes won Eisner many accolades, rightfully, and returned the company to its hallowed place in the public eye.
2005-Present: Chaos returns
In 2005, Bob Iger was promoted to take over from the departing Eisner. Though a controversial figure today, he initially sought to keep up Eisner’s momentum and succeeded for a time. Iger continued the merger streak, buying Pixar in 2006, Marvel Entertainment in 2009, and Lucasfilms in 2012. Cinematically, the company had tremendous success not only with all the Marvel films but also with the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, as well as Toy Story and Frozen, among others.
Streaming, however, introduced new problems, as did Covid. In 2017, Disney launched Disney+ to keep up with the audience’s desire to stream films and avoid licensing its works to other services. Though it has achieved over 150 million subscribers,10 as of the end of 2023, it was not yet profitable.11
Beyond its problems in streaming, the company has not seen a billion-dollar movie since 2019, when it released Spider-Man: No Way Home.12 And, unlike the social criticisms fifty years earlier, many of the criticisms against Disney today come from its weakness, not its strength. Though arguments about “wokeism” to some extent do fit Best and Lowney’s model of using Disney’s prominence as a means of making a wider social critique, criticisms of its overreliance on franchises, especially Marvel, speak to the company directly, even if the same is also true of the industry as a whole. Movies like Indiana Jones: Dial of Destiny, which cost nearly $300 million to produce but barely broke even, give weight to these criticisms, making them feel less academic and more tangible.13
Where does that leave us?
Today’s criticisms of Disney come from different sources, such as South Park the Critical Drinker, but in many regards, they follow the ebb and flow of Disney’s creativity over the years. Though this may seem like a particularly abysmal spell for the company, it’s not clear that the movies it’s churning out are worse than those of the early 1970s or if that won’t again rise to have another creative burst in the future.
So, is there anything new about Disney’s predicament? While the problems it faces today are familiar, some things are novel relative to its past.
First, with each movie it creates, the challenge of overcoming its catalog grows. This is often remarked upon in media circles and academia, where the problem is called the “burden of knowledge.” For Disney to make a fantastic child’s movie, it has to do “better” than all of its previous classics - an increasingly onerous challenge. Perhaps this can explain, to some extent, the overt desire for more diverse casts and progressive messages; after all, if you aren’t into that sort of thing, Disney already has 80 years of movies for you.
Second, the theme park business is now so strong that Disney has given up the pretense, at least internally, of being anything other than a theme park company. Today, “theatrical releases” fall under the “Content Sales/Licensing and Other” line item of Disney’s revenue, which, in its entirety, made up 11% of revenue in 2023. In other words, the artistic films that were Walt’s passion account for less than 10% of his creation’s current income. “Linear Networks,” meaning television channels (e.g., ESPN), account for 35%, and the theme parks division accounts for 33%, with streaming services (e.g., Disney+) making up the balance. Put differently, today, Disney is a television and theme park company, not a film company.14
When the revenue was nearer 50/50, the company had much more incentive to invest in new films and characters. Now, with an extensive, well-known back catalog and a set of very successful parks, Disney is making films to support the parks rather than Disney’s original vision, which was the other way around. With Jungle Cruise, the tail truly wagged the dog as Disney made a movie based on an existing theme park ride, a clear acknowledgment of its reversal of fortunes.
Consequently, the company has a (somewhat perverse) incentive to “rub the panderstone,” as South Park memorably put it, and churn out new characters and casts to ensure that every child has a favorite character to see at the park, dragging mom and dad along for the ride, literally. Though it’s easy to be frustrated about this, consider the life and times of other media companies: Cable television’s only raison d’etre seems to be increasing partisanship; after an extraordinary run, Netflix has now succumbed to reality TV and “comedy” specials (though notably did report strong results this past quarter); After sinking over a billion dollars into a failed adaptation of Lord of the Rings, Amazon Prime is going the way of its online store by stocking anything and everything it can. By contrast, Disney is growing and profitable, and the biggest complaint of arguably its primary business, theme parks, is that they are too expensive and crowded, i.e., too popular.15
This is not to say that Disney has adopted the best long-term strategy. The revenue of its parks is heavily tied to its brand, and making poor films will undoubtedly hurt over time. However, Disney has not been equally productive every decade, and it must be acknowledged that, in the context of Disney’s wider history, it hasn’t been that long since moviegoers were excited about Marvel films. Comments like those by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, the new Star Wars director, who stated that she enjoys “making men uncomfortable” in her films, are hard to justify.16 But, the desire to focus on theme parks isn’t. Nor is it unfathomable that they perceive their marginal audience - the audience with nothing to like in their back catalog - as very niche.
In that sense, while the company and the world have changed significantly since Disney’s formation over 100 years ago, it has stayed true to its DNA. Like its founder, it remains ambiguous - a theme park company known for movies, a children’s company focused on action films, and a creative company that markets its back catalog. In its struggles to remain innovative, appeal to a wide audience in a meaningful way, and balance changes in its economic make-up, the symbolism with the US itself still feels apropos. Disney has not navigated these challenges consistently well and nearly fell along the way. However, it remains in business and in a relatively profitable position going into its next century.
"The Politics of Walt Disney: Truth and Myth." Fascinating Politics. April 23, 2022. https://fascinatingpolitics.com/2022/04/.
Jacobs, Monique. “Why J.R.R. Tolkien Felt ‘a Heartfelt Loathing’ towards Walt Disney and His Movies.” Winter Is Coming, February 20, 2022. https://winteriscoming.net/2021/02/20/jrr-tolkien-felt-loathing-towards-walt-disney-and-movies-lord-of-the-rings-hobbit/.
McGowan, Andrew. "Disney’s Last 2D Animated Movie Isn’t ‘The Princess and the Frog’ — It’s This." Collider. August 5, 2023. https://collider.com/disney-last-2d-animated-movie-winnie-the-pooh/.
"Ub Iwerks, Walt Disney." MoMA. Accessed April 20, 2024. https://www.moma.org/collection/works/302797.
"Oswald the Lucky Rabbit." Disney Fandom. Accessed April 20, 2024. https://disney.fandom.com/wiki/Oswald_the_Lucky_Rabbit.
Watts, Steven. "Walt Disney: Art and Politics in the American Century." The Journal of American History 82, no. 1 (1995): 84-110.
Sito, Tom. "Disney's The Fox and the Hound: The Coming of the Next Generation." Animation World Network. November 1, 1998. https://www.awn.com/animationworld/disneys-fox-and-hound-coming-next-generation.
Hayes, Thomas. "Fanfare as Disney Opens Park." New York Times, October 2, 1982. https://www.nytimes.com/1982/10/02/business/fanfare-as-disney-opens-park.html.
Best, Joel, and Kathleen S. Lowney. "The Disadvantage of a Good Reputation: Disney as a Target for Social Problems Claims." The Sociological Quarterly 50, no. 3 (2009): 431-449.
"Number of Disney Plus Subscribers Worldwide from 1st Quarter 2020 to 1st Quarter 2024." Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1095372/disney-plus-number-of-subscribers-us/.
Watercutter, Angela. "Disney Swears It Can Make Streaming Profitable and Promises a Combined Disney+, Hulu Service." Wired. November 8, 2023. https://www.wired.com/story/disney-plus-streaming-profitability-hulu/.
"Disney’s Box Office Problems Ramp up Pressure on CEO Bob Iger and Studio Chief Alan Bergman." CNBC. November 17, 2023. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/17/disney-box-office-flops-put-pressure-on-iger-bergman.html. Technically, the second Avatar movie grossed over a billion, but as Disney bought that with its Fox catalog in 2019, I don’t count that here.
"10 Reasons Indiana Jones & The Dial Of Destiny Bombed At The Box Office: Breaking Down Disney's $295m Flop." ScreenRant. July 4, 2023. https://screenrant.com/indiana-jones-dial-destiny-box-office-bomb-reason/#:~:text=Disney's%20%24295%20million%20box%20office,years%20after%20its%20last%20installment.
I’m unclear how much of the 11% is theatrical releases, but it doesn’t matter for my argument. "How Disney Makes Money." Investopedia. April 15, 2024. https://www.investopedia.com/how-disney-makes-money-4799164. Also, see the 10K, here: https://www.sec.gov/ix?doc=/Archives/edgar/data/1744489/000174448923000216/dis-20230930.htm
Thompson, Ben. "Disney’s Taylor Swift Era." Stratechery. August 15, 2023. https://stratechery.com/2023/disneys-taylor-swift-era/. This is an amazing article, definitely worth the read.
Tassi, Paul. "Star Wars Director’s ‘Make Men Uncomfortable’ Quote Is Eight Years Out Of Context." Forbes. January 6, 2024. https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2024/01/06/star-wars-directors-make-men-uncomfortable-quote-is-eight-years-out-of-context/?sh=498760db779b.