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You know, here’s something I just thought of. If Astro Boy becomes one of the first huge anime shows to air in the United States, will that mean that another robot boy from Japan will receive an even warmer welcome than OTL? Mega Man being an even bigger smash hit would be interesting to see...assuming it still exists, of course.
Mega Man still exists. Most video game franchises from before the first generation of 3D consoles will survive.
 
Was making Beauty and the Beast something Walt said he actually planned?
Yes. He's quoted as saying that the only film he would want to return to animation for would be an adaptation of Beauty and the Beast. Once he got into Disneyland and theme parks, the guy just didn't care about moviemaking anymore. He still approved all the ideas and looked them over, but the last movie he was really passionate about was Fantasia, what I consider to be his OTL magnum opus. It was the furthest he could go in the medium. His later films lacked the same pizazz and ambition, and when World War II rolled around and the US Army occupied his studio (yes, I mean that literally, the Army was there for eight months after Pearl Harbor), the only way he could make money was through government contracts for cartoons. That's where stuff like Der Fuerher's Face and Education For Death come from. They weren't choices of Walt's--it was the only way to keep the studio afloat.

The first film he was passionate about after Fantasia was the animated/live-action adaptation of the book Victory Through Air Power, showing how the Allies could and would win the war with their air forces. Then there was a dry period, he was somewhat interested in Cinderella, but he didn't really get back into his pre-WWII, pre-studio strike self until he conceived the idea for Disneyland (then named "Mickey Mouse Park" and to be built across the street from the studio) in 1953.

And there's your crash course on Disney history.
 

PNWKing

Banned
Here's the compromise. Hershey buys Fox, Coca-Cola buys Columbia (like in OTL), and Trump starts his own studio.
 
@HeX

Just to be clear, this is a legit quote right?
That's not a direct quote from the man himself, it's a paraphrasing of a quote from the book Disney's Art of Animation: From Mickey Mouse to Beauty and the Beast. For the life of me I can't find the exact quote, but it said basically what I said. Walt also tried to adapt BatB in the 1930s and 1950s as well, which lends some credence.

It's important to remember that Walt was not the man we usually characterize him as. All he was looking for was escape from the real world into a realm he'd created himself (Walt hardly had any friends outside of people at his studio for most of his adult life). He tried it with drawings, which turned into cartoons, then feature-length animated films, then his studio in Burbank, then Disneyland. The original concept for E.P.C.O.T. was born from this desire to create his own world to escape to.
 
So Hershey buys Fox, Turner buys Columbia.
I think Turner could/should still buy MGM assuming he doesn't get CBS ITTL and Coca-Cola still gets Columbia. Maybe Pepsi could still get involved in the movie industry by buying someone else like Trimark/Lionsgate.
 
BTW, was Orion pictures still founded? I think that place was founded by former UA employee's after a failed attempt to make the studio independent from Transamerica, so does the studio still exist or did its founders remain in UA, maybe by successful separation from Transamerica or a compromise was held by both parties?
 
BTW, was Orion pictures still founded? I think that place was founded by former UA employee's after a failed attempt to make the studio independent from Transamerica, so does the studio still exist or did its founders remain in UA, maybe by successful separation from Transamerica or a compromise was held by both parties?
Orion was still founded. Most of Hollywood politics will remain the same until Fox dies after Heaven's Gate comes out in 1980.
 
Hmm...

I wonder. Since either Twentieth Century Fox dies outright like United Artists did OTL, or else it's picked up for cheap by someone who's a rather small player at the moment (not Murdoch; still a little too early for him), what will happen to a certain, currently sixteen year-old Joss Whedon? While his first big break was directing several pivotal eipsodes of Rosanne, he had finished the first draft for the script of Buffy the Vampire Slayer by 1985.

In OTL, he shopped the script around to the major studios and didn't get any bites, so he put it in his filing cabinet and forgot about it until in 1990, Fox commissioned a horror script from him "with a totally fresh angle," and the rest is history. HeX, is there any reason Mr. Whedon might try his luck with one of the indie/B movie studios? It worked for his idols Wes Craven and John Carpenter, maybe he can make it work, too.
 
The Freedom Club Strikes Again
Note: This idea was provided by reader @Unknown!

--------------------------------

American Airlines Flight 444
November 15, 1979


Arthur Plotnik gazed out the window to his right. The canopy of fluffy clouds hung below, mimicking the treetops of a lush rainforest, and the tranquil endless blue sky sped by. Plotnik smiled and returned to his work, an editorial on some four-star restaurant in Chicago. The forty-two-year-old's career in the journalism industry didn't pay very well, but it was his passion, and enough to keep him and his two preteen daughters happy. The fat alimony check he got in the mail from his ex-wife didn't hurt, either.

It was just smooth sailing from here on out.

BOOM.

Chaos.

The back of the plane was missing. The explosion from what Plotnik could only assume had been an engine exploding or--God forbid--a bomb had disintegrated half of the vehicle and sent the whole thing into a tailspin of epic proportions.

He clung to his seat for dear life. Bags, suitcases, books, and even people were thrown out the gaping maw, sucked out by the rushing winds and thrown into the endless blue skies. Oxygen masks descended heroically from the ceiling, as if to say, Don't worry! Just put us on and you'll be fine!

The masks were swiftly torn from their cords by the raging air.

A hardcover novel spun from the front of the plane and slammed into Plotnik's fingers, causing him to yelp in pain and let go. In an instant, he was gone, clawed away from his last piece of solid ground.

He tumbled down, down, down, the earth and sky spinning with him in a mess of blue, green, and brown. He screamed. And the world went dark.

--------------------------------
"I... I just don't know what to say. I'm speechless. Ladies and gentlemen, earlier today United Airlines Flight 444, on its way from Chicago to Washington, D.C., went down in flames over West Virginia. There was, according to early reports, an onboard explosion that snapped the plane in two. The explosion and crash together killed all seventy-eight passengers and crew aboard, with no survivors."
--John Chancellor, from the November 15, 1979 edition of the NBC Nightly News

"We call this guy the Unabomber, because he's sent bombs to both the University of Illinois and now an airline. He's taken credit for both but managed to stay anonymous. But now that the Federal Bureau of Investigation is on the job, he won't keep hidden for long. We're going to get this son of a bitch."
--President Jimmy Carter to Head of Central Intelligence William H. Webster, overheard outside the Oval Office on November 15, 1979
 
Thanks for using one of my ideas, @HeX; didn't see this coming, though...

Methinks the Unabomber will be caught a lot sooner than OTL...

BTW, this is the second disaster for American Airlines in six months (American Airlines Flight 191, the deadliest plane crash in American history to this day IOTL, occurred in May); American will lose a lot of business from this in the short-term...
 
So far, I can safely say I prefer TTL to American Magic.
Thanks, I appreciate that.

Life's been a little hectic recently, which is why my last few posts have been both short and infrequent. The next one will be a big one, though, finally the one focusing on Woody Woodpecker. It just won't be out for a few days.
 
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