It is painfully clear that the author of this article is NOT at all familiar with the history of Disney animation. I could write an extensive comment extolling the virtues of the Disney classics, pointing out how three mediocre straight to DVD movies do not exempt their dozens of absolutely horrible counterparts, each of which degrade the integrity of the original. Instead, I will simply suggest that before writing about a topic as rich in history (interestingly enough) as Disney animation, you should learn how to swim before jumping into the deep end.

There is a very simple quote for which Walt was famous in animation. Anyone with the most basic knowledge of Disney history knows it..."You can't top pigs with pigs." Sadly, neither this author nor apparently Michael Eisner (back in his time as the head of the Mouse House) knew anything about it. It was Walt Disney's philsophy on sequels. He didn't like them and didn't believe in them as a focus of Disney's artistic efforts in feature animation. He believe in innovation and taking the art form to the next level...always seeking the next great story, characters and songs. Not simply reprising the past successes. So when he was asked shortly after the release of the wildly popular Three Little Pigs cartoon if he would produce another one in response to the overwhelming audience response (it was, after all, a piece about the Great Depression that resonated at the time)...he said no....more specifically, he said "You can't top pigs with pigs." A delightfully elequent way to sum up what we now know as "Disney Magic." Being an innovator...no, THE innovator, is what always set Disney apart. And NOT being innovative...but instead churning out horrible straight to video sequel after sequel, crummy rides, etc. in pursuit of the almighty bottom line and not in pursuit of innovation and quality is what has jeopardized the modern Disney.

Lasseter and company were brought in to restore that magic. Anyone who knows anything about Disney history, and especially animation (along with anyone who wants to write about it) should be wise enough to heed Walt's words and understand that they are the cornerstone upon which "the magic" is built.

Well put.

Not to mention that the movies, despite their simple appeal, have content that is truly vapid and superficial when compared against the rich storytelling of the originals, despite the author's obvious enjoyment.

Be that as it may, it was a profitable division with very little risk. It seems rather stupid from a business perspective, and, frankly, it seems more like a vendetta against traditional American animation than a decision with any legitimate artistic or economic rationale. This isn't about art, it's about empire building by the Pixar twats.

"Very little risk"??? How about the risk of having your company's most beloved and profitable characters reduced, in the minds of the consumers, to the same level as the gang from All Dogs Go to Heaven? The risk of letting the creative competitive advantage your company has enjoyed for 50 years stagnate and wither under the weight of marketing-driven, poorly-written drivel? Or the risk that a parent, like our columnist here, stops being able to tell the difference, quality-wise, between a Disney classic and a written-by-committee, animated-in-India Saturday morning cartoon? Disney Animation's market position *was* the premier provider of quality family entertainment. By losing that to slipping quality and product oversaturation, they became just another Nickelodeon or Hanna Barbera. Pixar is now the gold standard in the US, for better or worse, so it only makes sense that Pixar's leadership MIGHT be able to restore Disney to something resembling its former glory.

narkspud:

"Very little risk"??? How about the risk of having your company's most beloved and profitable characters reduced, in the minds of the consumers, to the same level as the gang from All Dogs Go to Heaven?

How, exactly, is that a risk, given that the end consumers of this stuff are in all likelihood under the age of 8? You're not 'damaging' these properties, you're creating brand loyalty. These low investment, high return projects may seem like crass commercialism (and they are), but their audience doesn't care...and they help pay the bills every time the Pixar boys want to upgrade the rendering software or hire A-list voice talent or roll out a $50 million ad campaign for their next wannabe summer family blockbuster.

The risk of letting the creative competitive advantage your company has enjoyed for 50 years stagnate and wither under the weight of marketing-driven, poorly-written drivel?

Come now, Disney has always supplemented its high art features with slapped together product for the sake of a buck. A lot of those old shorts are nothing more than pratfalls and slapstick thrown together without any more noble goal in mind than inducing laughter and padding the coffers. Disney has been exploiting cheaply made crap on TV since the 1950s to pay the freight for their 'serious' projects. There's absolutely nothing new or scandalous about any of this. The only thing that's changed is the format.

As I said before, this smacks more of empire building than of anything more noble or rational. There seems to be little real benefit to Disney as a whole here, with the Pixar imports being the only real beneficiaries. Killing off this department effectively kills off any remaining institutional presence of traditional Disney animation at Disney. It's not about artistic integrity, it's about eliminating the internal opposition.

I don't think the cheapquels would be so reviled if they weren't so, well, cheap. Substandard products do not build brand loyalty, not even among 8-year-olds, who have a tendency to grow up and learn to recognize garbage when they see it. And how sad that Disney has been reduced to being a babysitter for 8-year-olds! Profits from Pirates of the Caribbean and Ratatouille are buying Pixar all the software they need, thanks, and A-list voice talent is practically beating down their door for a role. That certainly wasn't the case with the cheapquels. Your comment about Disney "exploiting cheaply made crap on TV" in the 50s is going to require some examples. The TV animation was not as elaborate as the theatrical stuff, but it was never allowed to sink to the embarassing artistic nadir of The Little Mermaid III, at least not until the Gummi Bears and Wuzzles premiered in 1985 under Michael Eisner. As to "killing off . . . traditional Disney animation," perhaps you are unaware that right now, in development at Disney, there is a brand new, full-budget animated feature called "The Princess and the Frog." It's written and directed by the same guys who did The Little Mermaid and Aladdin, and unlike the cheapquels, it's being animated in Burbank, USA rather than outsourced to India and Singapore. Its scheduled for release December 2009. Eisner was the guy who killed off Disney traditional animation after "Home on the Range" wrapped. Iger and "the Pixar imports" have brought it back.