Pop Culture WI: Disney's Superheroes

As you may or may not know, in the '90s, Greg Weisman, creator of Gargoyles, one of the finest animated series' to come out of the United States, planned to make it the centerpiece of a collection of super-hero-esque shows; essentially giving Disney it's own version of the Marvel and DC universes.

Obviously, this didn't happen; but what if it had?

That would be awsome!

Though I doubt it can beat Hunchback of Notra dame.

Hey could they all be musicals? Becouse that's just awesome.

Interesting.
I think that in 40s Captain Marvel and the Marvel family were PERFECT for Disney!

That would be interesting, mainly because while Disney is a big corporation it could provide a haven for comic book writers and artists who have fallen out with the big two. If Disney is willing to let the people working for it do some avant garde work (perhaps they could create a comic imprint with a different name, so they could print darker, grimmer stories without 'tarnishing' the Disney name), and the artists are willing to compromise with Disney execs a little to make their work more sellable, this could put some exciting and original superheroes in print with a very powerful advertising force behind them.

krinsbez said:

As you may or may not know, in the '90s, Greg Weisman, creator of Gargoyles, one of the finest animated series' to come out of the United States, planned to make it the centerpiece of a collection of super-hero-esque shows; essentially giving Disney it's own version of the Marvel and DC universes.

Obviously, this didn't happen; but what if it had?

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Hmmmm, maybe The Rocketeer gets spun off into a TV show?

Two things would greatly help make Disney want to get in the Superhero game. One, prevent the great comic book crash of the 1990s - even today comics haven't really recovered. Two, prevent the glut of awful comic book movies in the mid ninties.

That said, the late 90s gace birth to much of the early independant comic book industry. If Disney can brand itself as a high quality third rail in comics, you could see people from IDW to Dark Horse flock to thier banner.

As I mentioned earlier, Marvel and Disney were in talks about a theme park deal in the late 90's -early 2000's. In addition Disney comics were published for decades. If anyone could break into the comic market, it would be Disney.

Well, Disney did have two animated series that could be linked to superheroes: Darkwing Duck and Kim Possible

I don't think they'd start to focus on comics in this situation. They would simply make a lot of shows in the same vein as Gargoyles, and hopefully in the same continuity. No doubt they'd publish a few comics, but they'll be the half-assed variety that one could expect from comics based on TV shows.
But despite that, it would be awesome. It would also warm up companies to the idea of making movies in a shared continuity, but I wouldn't guarantee that we'd have an earlier Avengers or a JLA film.

krinsbez, do you know for a fact that the intention was to make a shared universe of superhero shows? I suppose in that case, we'd see Xanatos in all the shows, and one of the shows will be based on the Pack.

Brady Kj said:

krinsbez, do you know for a fact that the intention was to make a shared universe of superhero shows? I suppose in that case, we'd see Xanatos in all the shows, and one of the shows will be based on the Pack.

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Greg's been pretty open about how he had a whole bunch of spin-offs planned, and IIRC, he has said that the point of the "Avalon World Tour" was to introduce a bunch of new characters who could act as superheroes, although ATM I can't find the specific qoute.

Could they not have made "Gargoyles" darker?

A little more sinister, like Cinderella's step-mother sinister.

That ladies snatch could have made the human torch catch the chills.

I don't believe that making Gargoyles any darker would help, nor do I believe that a reference to anyone's snatch is constructive.