Dream from an early age with Toy Story, or with fairytale Princesses. You have all the possible Star Wars memorabilia at home, and maybe children with whom you have filled the little room with Mickey Mouse. Make a regular stop on Disney + to watch all the boundless filmography of a brand that has always made you dream. And you are destroying Western cultural pluralism.
I'm exaggerating? Likely. I do, sometimes. But you have to admit that a company with so much control over entertainment is not normal.
Let's start from Disney's 'home', the United States. In 1983, 90% of American media was operated by 50 companies. Today in the USA everything is managed by only SIX companies. They call them the Big Six: General Electric, News-Corp, Viacom, Time Warner, CBS and of course Disney, which holds a large share of the total. And, given the data in hand, it is the most voracious company of all, which can swallow up many others, but perhaps won't.
Disney is no longer white magic
There is an emblematic phrase from "Batman, the Dark Knight" that could be applied perfectly to Disney: "Either you die a hero, or you live long enough to become the villain." In the early 20s, Walt Disney fought tooth and nail to create a company that made quality animation for families. He wanted to change the way people saw cartoons, and he succeeded.
For nearly 50 years, Disney has been the undisputed queen of family entertainment. Then something happened.
In 1996, with the position of CEO entrusted to Michael Eisner, Disney has transformed from a creative powerhouse to a profit machine. He stopped taking risks (which in the past led to some flops but also some milestones) giving the green light only to successes infallible.
But will it still work for a long time?
Barring who knows what unlikely twists, Marvel Studios' superhero blockbusters as a pop culture phenomenon seem to have exhausted their strength with Avengers Endgame. Since then it has only been a decline after the other: directors resort to cheap emotions like:
- Fanservice movies like Spiderman: No Way Home
- Muddy movies like Dr. Strange 2: MoM
- Films that 'squeeze' titles like Thor
- Boring Disney + series that cut out anyone who doesn't have a Disney + account
Sure, superhero movies are still very, very profitable for the most part, but they are starting to see them collapse. And the details are revealing: you start messing with already revised plots and looking for solutions to perpetuate the same pattern over and over.
Just like when westerns plummeted in popularity (after being the genre of choice for decades): there are so many ways to shoot a man in a hat, before people get bored. How about a Marvel Pixar? It will happen? They will all be tempted. But sooner or later, people will be bored anyway.
And do we want to talk about Star Wars?
“All those Star Wars movies… I loved them, I created them, I was very involved in them, and I sold them to white slavers.” —George Lucas
You read that right: man who created Star Wars and sold it to Disney defined the House of Mickey Mouse as a mass of "white slavers". Lucas also said he regrets not making a greater effort to maintain control over the franchise and selling it for "just under" what it's worth. The (partial) retraction of this old, sensational interview changes little in the overall economy of the discussion.
In other words, Lucas believes Disney destroyed his life's work! I can't blame him. Star Wars as a theatrical experience he died. The last Jedi they split the fan base and the movie Solo e Skywalker's rise they went so badly that Disney canceled their plans for more films.
Same trajectory with Marvel. Disney is too "shy" (or greedy?) to take risks, so all it does is replace all the original characters with different versions, perhaps to satisfy the request (legitimate, of course) to also represent other genres and types of people. The truth is that Disney is only adopting gimmicks, no original ideas.
Star Wars and Marvel are totally bankrupt creatively.
So will we see Disney in dire straits very soon?
Brake, we're not in 2008 and when I say "Too big to fail" this time I don't think I'm wrong. Probably not, Disney won't fail at all. But a part of him risks dying, seriously.
Indeed, we are already witnessing the death of what made Disney great: creativity, courage to take risks and quality storytelling. Today's Disney is a shell of its former self. It's a corporate behemoth that values profits over art.
I don't make movies to make money. I make money to make movies.
Walt Disney
I'm sure one day these guys will have to make a huge change to stay afloat. It's a prediction. In the meantime, they will continue to milk their franchises until they are as dry as the desert: and this, believe it or not, will continue to impoverish the entire Western culture and the next generation for years.
