In 1989 The Walt Disney Company invented the children’s movie as we know it today. That was the year that Disney Studios released The Little Mermaid, the undersea musical that kicked off a remarkable run of successful animated films: Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), The Lion King (1994), Pocahontas (1995), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Mulan (1998) and Tarzan (1999). If you were born in the late 80’s or early 90’s, as I was, this string of hits, now known as the “Disney Renaissance,” may well have been a defining phenomenon of your childhood.
Before the Disney Renaissance, kids’ movies were anything but consistently good. After a run of misfires spanning the 1970’s and 80’s culminating with the inexplicably dark and terrifying The Black Cauldron (1986)), the animation arm of Disney Studios was almost dissolved. How, then, did they suddenly pull off this incredible sequence of hits? What recipe did they suddenly stumble on in 1989?
Well, let’s analyze. I can identify four unshakeable rules that apply to every Disney Renaissance film:
- Good triumphs over evil
- An uncontroversial moral theme is emphasized
- Colors are vibrant and dazzling
- A formulaic plot trajectory is adhered to
Let’s call these the Four Laws of Kids’ Movies. Adult movies generally don’t adhere to all of them; at most, they may follow one or two. In The Godfather (1970), for instance, good doesn’t defeat evil, if the two are even distinguishable at all. Pulp Fiction (1994) doesn’t teach us a lesson about moral goodness, and it doesn’t follow a familiar plot arc. Schindler’s List (1993) doesn’t, um, dazzle us with colors.
But for children, these rules are natural fits. Most would agree, for example, that many young kids aren’t fully ready to confront a situation in which evil triumphs over good or in which the clash is ambiguous, so in kids’ entertainment, it’s probably advisable for good to defeat evil. And kids may not have crystallized their moral compasses yet, so reinforcing various aspects of goodness may be suitable and healthy. Thirdly, it’s well known that kids are drawn to colorful things, so the rainbow brilliance of Disney Renaissance flicks comes as no surprise. And finally, the not-fully-developed information processing capabilities of children may lead them to struggle with unpredictable or complicated plots, so it’s better to stick with a formula that won’t cause confusion or unsettlement.
Again, kids’ movies before The Little Mermaid had not yet adopted these rules as essential. You’ll quickly notice if you watch scenes from such movies online that their color palettes are relatively drab and dull, even though bright colors (#3) were perfectly accessible to the animators. And these older films often take random detours into bizarre and scary situations, messing with the paced predictability (#4) that could have been achieved.
Even the memorable successes helmed by Walt Disney himself, such as Pinocchio (1940) and Dumbo (1941), trip over these avoidable stumbling blocks. Nowadays we associate the Disney brand with safe and sentimental plots—but back in Walt’s day, Pinocchio, a wooden marionette, transformed halfway into a literal jackass because he was drinking and gambling (?), then without any explanation for this development, was forced to personally hunt down an infamous whale that ate his father off-screen without ever having been introduced into the movie until that point.
Then, he became a real boy.
That was then. During the Renaissance, no more of that. Lessons of tolerance, like the one emphasized in Dumbo, were retained in accordance with Law #2, but were woven into formulaic, never-in-doubt romances like Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin, rather than meandering, occasionally nightmarish journeys like the older films. Supporting characters became (literally) colorful charmers, like Flounder from The Little Mermaid and Zazu from The Lion King. Villainy and intolerance, rather than being immutable characteristics of larger society, as Dumbo all-too-honestly portrayed them, were henceforth perpetrated by a single larger-than-life baddie, who was always thoroughly beaten—all in accordance with Law #1.
With the Four Laws firing on all cylinders, Disney had a killer product on its hands, captivating a generation of kids. But unfortunately from Disney’s business perspective, kids grow up. And this means that the brand loyalty that Disney had built for itself during the Renaissance, although intense and widespread, had an expiration date: the adolescence of its viewers. Unless something were done, Disney was primed to have built the most devoted customer base in entertainment history only to have it completely disintegrate via puberty.
But something was done. In the mid-90’s Disney partnered with and later acquired then-unknown newcomer Pixar Studios, which released an industry revelation: Toy Story (1996), a film in new CGI technology that, in the modern Disney tradition, stuck to the Four Laws—but also offered jokes and tidbits to the more mature members of the audience. (Sheriff Woody: “The word I’m searching for… I can’t say, because there are children present.”) Pixar also did away with catchy, bubbly songs, a modification surely approved by very cool twelve-year-old boys, and it nixed the recurring motif that one of the characters be a princess, because fourteen-year-old girls were, like, past that phase.
With Pixar’s slightly different take on the same Four Laws foundation, Disney prevented the imminent exodus of its customers while still attracting new ones. Young children who missed out on the Disney Renaissance loved Finding Nemo (2003), while adolescents who lived through the Renaissance were kept in the fray due to the less theatrical tone and the scattered witty quips. The money doesn’t lie: Finding Nemo became the largest grossing animated movie ever made, surpassing Renaissance titan The Lion King. Disney was still producing child-friendly movies adhering to the Four Laws, but had pulled off the impressive feat of convincing teens and preteens to stick around.
Even more eye opening than Finding Nemo to those in the industry was Pixar’s next film, which was expected to reap relatively meager totals but became a surprise smash hit and critical sensation. The film was The Incredibles (2004), a story about a family of superheroes.
You see where I’m going with this. In 2009, with Pixar still seemingly unstoppable, The Walt Disney Company acquired Marvel Studios, which had just launched what would come to be known as the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a canon of intertwining superhero sagas. Since 2008’s Iron Man, the MCU has spawned 22 films grossing a combined eighty zillion dollars, or something, and the series of MCU mashups known as The Avengers has produced four of the top eight grossing movies of all time.
What accounts for this unprecedented popularity? Well, it appears that Disney is doing exactly what it did with Pixar, only casting an even wider net than before.
Just as Pixar added a slightly more mature flavor to the Four Laws to keep then-adolescents interested, Marvel has tilled the soil for even older audiences, employing a variety of adult-friendly add-ons to draw in 20-somethings. For example, Hollywood’s biggest stars are regularly paid boatloads to appear in MCU movies even for minuscule screen times, so if you just think Chris Hemsworth is super hot, you’ll be in the seats, minus $14. (Next to you will be a six year old with a toy hammer.) Subtle clues and Easter eggs are dropped mid-credits, so if you like deciphering things on Reddit all day, you’re invited to the party. (Also on the guest list, a seven year old whose mom doesn’t let him use the Internet.)
As I said, a wider and wider net. MCU films are aimed at kids (as their source material was), but also appeal to the now-adolescents who grew up on Pixar movies, and also to the now-adults who grew up with the Disney Renaissance and enjoyed Pixar in their adolescences. This last generation, the Renaissance generation (my generation) might be the mother load for Disney: we’re old enough to drive to theaters and buy tickets with our own earned money. Disney, in other words, has successfully carried us late-80’s and early 90’s babies from toddlers to ticket buyers without ever sacrificing its appeal to children.
Such a sacrifice has never been necessary because Marvel Studios, like Pixar and Disney Studios before it, founds its films squarely on the Four Laws. Clashes between forces of good and evil comprise the substance of MCU plots (#1), lessons of tolerance and responsibility add the thematic flavor (#2), and shiny beams of CGI color are the icing on the cake (#3). And just like a cake, every part is pretty much the same (#4).
That brings us to Avengers: Endgame (2019). The plot, in conjunction with its precursor Avengers: Infinity War (2018), revolves around a charismatic, cynical purple villain who seeks and eventually obtains control of a virtually unlimited power, only to suffer an improbable final defeat.
Does that sound familiar to anyone? Let me jog your memory.
Look. We are still consuming the same product that we were introduced to as young children: the Disney product, the Four Laws product. This despite the fact that—to get to my inevitable point—this product is simply not appropriate for adults.
Yes, the Four Laws are great for children, for the reasons I outlined earlier. But in no way are they relevant to our sensibilities as grown human beings. A triumphant victory of good over evil (#1), for example, has no heft for adults, because we know now that things aren’t so defined and easy. Moral lessons from a movie (#2) aren’t useful to us, either, because unlike children, we’ve already learned these lessons, and if we haven’t, a movie will hardly change our perspectives. Flashy color schemes (#3) might still be fun, but they aren’t needed when we have the ability to concentrate on more realistic palettes. Finally, the presence of a predictable plot (#4) shouldn’t still be essential, since adult brains can easily process and assimilate unexpected information.
You might be expecting me to criticize Endgame. But I’m not going to—frankly, it’s an excellent movie. I have every respect for it. It features strong acting, appealing visuals, excellent buildup and pacing, and satisfying character arcs. But its excellence is designed for a child—for the worldview of someone without the experience and perspective that we now have. No matter how hard I try, I can no longer genuinely share in the enjoyment of that kind of excellence.
My generation, though, barely has anything to contrast against Avengers, so for many it passes as genuinely profound. Most of us have never graduated to adult entertainment, since Disney’s successful business model has excused us from having to make that transition. The most blatant example of this is that Disney has taken to simply rereleasing its own Renaissance animated films in live action form. Talk about predictable: we’ve already seen these movies, shot for shot! And yet, the regurgitation of Beauty and the Beast (2017) was the second highest grossing film of the year! The cringeworthy Aladdin (2019) made an undeserved sultan’s ransom, and up next is The Lion King, sure to be the most lucrative yet.
Disney would have us view these as nostalgia projects that allow us to turn back the clocks and feel like kids again. But what adult-oriented movies did we flock to the theaters to see, to then return to Disney? Are we reliving our childhoods… or did we never grow up?
You may still argue that the Four Laws merely comprise escapism. And they do. But while there’s nothing wrong with escapism, what does it say about our generation that our particular escapist fantasies involve reverting to tenants of a child’s view of reality?
It says, actually, all the worst things that are often said about us: that we’re black-and-white absolutists (#1), that we’re moral puritans (#2), that we have broken attention spans (#3), and that we shrink from novelty and unpredictability (#4). Especially criticized for their juvenility these days are men, who make up the MCU viewer majority.
Entertainment has always been a way to make early connections with a more mature, truer version of the world, and because of the efforts of various corporations, Disney included, we haven’t had the same exposure to such entertainment that previous generations did. It only makes sense that this would affect us in our attitudes toward and interactions with the world around us.
But this problem, though significant, may be resolving itself thanks to the growing accessibility of content via streaming services. Produced with less studio and network meddling than are typical in traditional entertainment models, streaming content now offers various nuanced, adult entertainments for our easy perusal. Of course, Disney has noticed, and is now planning a rollout of its own streaming service, “Disney+”, which will feature new superhero shows and other content related to its various franchises. If the past is any indication, they’ll continue to produce child-centric content while pandering as best they can to adults.
So it’s time to band together, moviegoers! We must resist this tyrant! On our own we’re weak, it’s true, but together as a team—a team of heroes, you could say—we’re strong! Yes, Disney owns an intimidating array of Four Laws studios—an Infinity Gauntlet of studios, if you will—but despite this awesome power, our teamwork and collective virtue can pull us through! No corporate power is insurmountable!
So…anyone have a time machine?
–Jim Andersen
For more analysis, check out my commentary on Daniel Craig’s James Bond.
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