I think, on the contrary, that Disney make it their business model to own these stories.
There are legal limits as to what they can claim, and they go to the very edge and as far beyond as they can get away with, but that's not their whole plan. Their main business is to take classic stories, and make sure that when you think of Hercules, or the Little Mermaid, or Sleeping Beauty, or the Hunchback of Notre Dame, or Aladdin, or Pinnochio, or the Beauty and the Beast, you think of their version first and, if possible, only their version.
And while they can't own the story, they can own their representation of it, and if that is the only version people can think of (and when you remember that most of these are aimed directly at children), then they effectively do own the story, in terms of mindshare.
How many people see Ares and Pluto as an actively malevolent adversaries, rather than as a not-very-smart soldier and a Power who is bound by his own, inscrutable and inhuman rules, respectively?
Cause that's the problem. They're taking those pagan stories, repackaging them as their own, and in the process completely missing the point of the stories.
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Date: 2009-02-21 10:05 pm (UTC)There are legal limits as to what they can claim, and they go to the very edge and as far beyond as they can get away with, but that's not their whole plan. Their main business is to take classic stories, and make sure that when you think of Hercules, or the Little Mermaid, or Sleeping Beauty, or the Hunchback of Notre Dame, or Aladdin, or Pinnochio, or the Beauty and the Beast, you think of their version first and, if possible, only their version.
And while they can't own the story, they can own their representation of it, and if that is the only version people can think of (and when you remember that most of these are aimed directly at children), then they effectively do own the story, in terms of mindshare.
How many people see Ares and Pluto as an actively malevolent adversaries, rather than as a not-very-smart soldier and a Power who is bound by his own, inscrutable and inhuman rules, respectively?
Cause that's the problem. They're taking those pagan stories, repackaging them as their own, and in the process completely missing the point of the stories.