A Hippie in the House of Mouse (Jim Henson at Disney, 1980)

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fasquardon

Geekhis Khan said:
A little of all three, really. Gold is being very pragmatic here. Were it entirely up to him, he would assemble his own team of WKs and possibly take back the studio for Roy. But he knows that Roy's (and by extension his) actions are under intense scrutiny by the Walt side, who remain very suspicious, calumet pipe aside. The Basses are in the picture simply because of the failed Arvida buy, which I assumed would be Watson's choice for acquisition in this timeline for the same reasons it was in our timeline. They also showed through their OTL actions a willingness to play White Knight for Disney. RR and Bass impressed Gold in our timeline too, even if Gold despised the Arvida buy. He sees them as an obvious compromise candidate for White Knight since Watson and the board were clearly willing to partner with the Basses already vs-a-vis Arvida.

The Marriotts remained neutral in OTL (in OTL and TTL they considered acquiring Disney in 1982, hence the "hotels" meeting), but here Bass convinces them to join the Round Table.

One thing to keep in mind going forward is that there are really only a handful of players capable of making a real run on Disney stock in any real percentage, be that as a raider or a WK. Recall how Jim had to risk his very financial solvency and take on nearly crippling debt just to grab 8.3% back when stock prices were around $50/share. Other mid-level players like Henson, who may have tens of millions in assets, are highly limited in what they can accomplish individually. Those 0.001%-ers who can grab serious percentages of the company without assuming crippling debt are few, and many of them are folks like Ivan Boesky and Saul Steinberg who are in it for the money and could care less about sentimental nonsense like making sure Mickey Mouse and Cinderella stay in Walt's family.

As such, a good WK candidate will a) need shit-loads of assets, ideally liquid, to make massive purchases without bankrupting themselves combined with b) enough love for Disney to try to save it rather than just join KA and bite off a piece, and/or c) a legitimate business interest in keeping Disney together and solvent.

That, alas, is a shockingly small list in 1984 when greed was good and "activist investor" was an oxymoron.
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Gotcha.

And I was forgetting that interest rates were alot higher at this point... Taking on debt to buy a big slice of Disney (or using liquid funds to buy Disney slices confident in the knowledge that if they need to borrow money for their own business operations, doing so will be cheap and secure) isn't the easy proposition it would be today.

fasquardon
 
marathag

marathag

Banned
fasquardon said:
And I was forgetting that interest rates were alot higher at this point... Taking on debt to buy a big slice of Disney (or using liquid funds to buy Disney slices confident in the knowledge that if they need to borrow money for their own business operations, doing so will be cheap and secure) isn't the easy proposition it would be today.
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At the time, got a mortgage for a house, and by a variety of different programs and deals thru the bank, got a near unheard of 30Y rate of 8.25%
Most others got 14%

Did like getting 7% Interest of my Checking account, though, and being able to write off Credit Card Interest in the Taxes in April
 

wietze

marathag said:
At the time, got a mortgage for a house, and by a variety of different programs and deals thru the bank, got a near unheard of 30Y rate of 8.25%
Most others got 14%

Did like getting 7% Interest of my Checking account, though, and being able to write off Credit Card Interest in the Taxes in April
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at some moments it was even higher, mortgages at 18% or so and savings account interest being 10%+
 

Geekhis Khan

fasquardon said:
Gotcha.

And I was forgetting that interest rates were alot higher at this point... Taking on debt to buy a big slice of Disney (or using liquid funds to buy Disney slices confident in the knowledge that if they need to borrow money for their own business operations, doing so will be cheap and secure) isn't the easy proposition it would be today.

fasquardon
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My goal is verisimilitude, but I make no claims to be an MBA here, so feel free to let me know if I'm missing anything.

Nivek said:
I'm the only one thinking this whole holmes arc derailed the TL? have become a drag to read about.
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nick_crenshaw82 said:
I agree but it's probably a necessary evil. Maybe something glorious will come from it.
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And here I thought you'd really appreciate everything going wrong, @Nivek :)

I can understand the frustration if you're here for the pop culture red meat, and I am trying to keep things balanced (Your Mileage May Vary on any given subsection). I did just post an update full of Counterfactual red meat: Muppets on Broadway, alternate Follow That Bird, Disney and Henson doing Terry Gilliam's Brazil. Even Pluto bursting from a fake Cake on Donald's birthday. Also, Tuesday is all pop culture with no mention of Holmes at all.

cmakk1012 said:
I quite enjoy the drama and sense of dread. It keeps it from being yet another “everything goes perfect” scenario you see in most pop culture TLs.
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Rosenheim said:
I definitely agree.
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Thanks. Hopefully you two (and those like you) won't get annoyed that I'm interrupting the "drama" with more pop culture red meat in the upcoming post.

I really do try to keep these things balanced. Not everyone wants the same thing out of a TL. Some of you are just here for the Muppets, some for Disney, some forthe '80s nostalgia, and some for something else, I assume. I'm sure some of you are digging the Corporate Finance sections.

And yes, everyone, this isn't just a random tangent, it really is going somewhere. The long-run effects on the TL will be noteworthy.
 

Nivek

Geekhis Khan said:
And here I thought you'd really appreciate everything going wrong, @Nivek :)

I can understand the frustration if you're here for the pop culture red meat, and I am trying to keep things balanced (Your Mileage May Vary on any given subsection). I did just post an update full of Counterfactual red meat: Muppets on Broadway, alternate Follow That Bird, Disney and Henson doing Terry Gilliam's Brazil. Even Pluto bursting from a fake Cake on Donald's birthday. Also, Tuesday is all pop culture with no mention of Holmes at all.
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I appreciated is just the arc is dragging on, you could have solved with 2 or 3 well done and meaty updates, but again i thank it, very informative as mentioned..unironically i would like to see a board of henson, holmes, the disneys and other minor and all them having work up all the difference, that woudl be funny, after all disney is a business, i treat it like one. That is why for me is such a drag, i don't panic a shit.
 

fasquardon

Geekhis Khan said:
I really do try to keep these things balanced. Not everyone wants the same thing out of a TL. Some of you are just here for the Muppets, some for Disney, some forthe '80s nostalgia, and some for something else, I assume. I'm sure some of you are digging the Corporate Finance sections.
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So far the balance is perfect for me. Alternate pop culture means very little to me without some of the context it's being made in.

And alt-corporate evolution makes little sense if you don't look at how the company's main products are in the timeline...

Geekhis Khan said:
My goal is verisimilitude, but I make no claims to be an MBA here, so feel free to let me know if I'm missing anything.
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I am not either. Economics interested me much more.

fasquardon
 
nick_crenshaw82

nick_crenshaw82

Geekhis Khan said:
I can understand the frustration if you're here for the pop culture red meat, and I am trying to keep things balanced (Your Mileage May Vary on any given subsection). I did just post an update full of Counterfactual red meat: Muppets on Broadway, alternate Follow That Bird, Disney and Henson doing Terry Gilliam's Brazil. Even Pluto bursting from a fake Cake on Donald's birthday. Also, Tuesday is all pop culture with no mention of Holmes at all.
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I've got never against this sort of stuff, or the length of it but you could have broken it up a little like today. It would nice learning some the off screen/behind the scene reactions of the other employees mixed with live going on like today's update.
 
Ogrebear

Ogrebear

Good that Henson is keeping busy- I hope the stress does not effect his health.

The Bureau does sound more 'Orwell' than Brazil to me. Got that 'faceless' feel to it. That Disney are involved (even at arms length) is amazing.

Splash, Ghostbusters, et all are not going to help convince anyone not to buy Disney stock- place is clearly making money- get a chunk now and see if it pays off during the buyout!
 

Geekhis Khan

wokOX.jpg
 

Plateosaurus

nick_crenshaw82 said:
With the existence of Halyx we definitely need Disney to acquire LucasFilms and Star Wars just so Halyx is better remembered.
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Woah man, what part of alternate timeline don't you understand? Nivek's right.

Although I did picture Universal buying Lucasfilms, if only because the fanfare goes well with Lucas' logo.
 

Nivek

Plateosaurus said:
Woah man, what part of alternate timeline don't you understand? Nivek's right.

Although I did picture Universal buying Lucasfilms, if only because the fanfare goes well with Lucas' logo.
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I think disney fanbase is now legit scary, for example, disney is set to remove all their movies from cable and discontinued all his dvd in latin america and europe, meaning if you want to watch a movie, you need Disney+ as a must...
 
nick_crenshaw82

nick_crenshaw82

Nivek said:
WHY? just because happpened OTL?maybe that is something, i don't consider disney a sacred crow.
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Plateosaurus said:
Woah man, what part of alternate timeline don't you understand? Nivek's right.

Although I did picture Universal buying Lucasfilms, if only because the fanfare goes well with Lucas' logo.
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Did I say something wrong. There's already a close friendship between George Lucas, Jim Henson and Ron Miller (they were called the 'three mouseketeers') both Lisa Henson and Frank Oz have worked with Lucas. Combine that with the work that both Jim and Brian Henson have with both the parks and Disney's walk around suits could be a big help with the costuming and set construction. Plus there were a lot of Star Wars references with the band, so the idea of making them canon in Star Wars could mean that they are better remembered. I don't know, just a random thought.
 

fasquardon

tornadobusdriver said:
Defuntland helped produce a full documentary on them. it's an odd story but also touching at points.
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That is pretty wild.

nick_crenshaw82 said:
With the existence of Halyx we definitely need Disney to acquire LucasFilms and Star Wars just so Halyx is better remembered.
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It sounds like Halyx needed the record company that was going to do their album to hold together or for Disney to decide to do the Halyx album on their own. I am not sure how LucasFilms could have helped the band last longer and be better remembered...

fasquardon
 
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