Walt Disney Dies in the Early 1940's.

[Glass Onion]

I was wondering-would how would Walt Disney be remembered if he had passed away after he had pioneered feature length animated films-but years before Disneyland and before his own image had become as large a part of his studios' brand as would be the case from the 1950's onward.

Would Walt Disney the person be remembered at all by the average person as a personality? I think the first animated films could have a long pop cultural shelf life even if Walt Disney made nothing after 1942. But I'm not so sure what impression Disney as a public personality

What would have happened to Disney the company without Disney the man that early on? What studio would end up with the distribution rights to Disney's films if the company collapses?

 

[markedward]

At the PoD Disney would have died here, his films were being distributed by RKO.

To my knowledge, a large chunk of the RKO library fell into the hands of Ted Turner/Warner Entertainment for North America and Australia. They would probably release Warner Archive style DVD sets of the short cartoons. TCM already had a Disney short cartoon retrospective when I was near cable TV one night, so that could likely happen ITTL too.

I also know from years of browsing the Internet Archive that there is a great number of RKO films in the public domain. Worst case scenario is that happening. RKO itself has a website up that leaves out the Turner stuff. Actress/Post cereals heiress Dina Merrill and her husband Ted Hartley own the company itself.

EDIT: An even more interesting twist regarding the distribution rights would be if RKO aren't run to the ground by Howard Hughes here. Hughes did beat out J. Arthur Rank IOTL, which could have maybe gone better with the right choices.

 

[eltf177]

Besides no Disneyland or Walt Disney World there would be no Wonderful World of Disney on ABC, which brought a lot attention to both his films and resorts.

Unless the films got released in theaters or on TV IMHO he would quickly slide into obscurity...

 

[Glass Onion]

I think that Snow White is likely to be well remembered. In the pre-home video era Disney films were frequently or semi-frequently rereleased in theaters.

Snow White is the sort of film that would probably be frequently be rereleased even if RKO is making the decision with no input from a defunct Disney Studio.

The same might be true of Disney's other films-perhaps to a lesser extent.

The question is whether those films pop cultural imprint will be large enough for people to remember Disney himself.

The shorts are different. Without Disneyland and everything Disney did in the 1950's I could easily see Mickey Mouse being relegated to obscurity.

I suspect this might be the case because Mickey Mouse as a character as opposed to as a mascot is a creature of 1930's animation. Even by the 1940's the style had changed from the days of Mickey Mouse, Felix the Cat etc.

Unlike say Bugs Bunny or Disney's feature films I have my doubts that a lot of people would still watch Mickey Mouse cartoons by the 1950's.

Then again if Fantasia sees an upsurge of interest at some point that might mitigate that to an extent. Or else we'd hear some film critic explaining just who the Wizard's Apprentice character was.

That's if television and home video still happen here and aren't butterflied somehow.