General

Dirty Disney and Jessica Rabbit Tales

Our Jim Korkis festival continues with an article about unauthorized uses of Disney’s cartoon characters, particularly Roger Rabbit’s lovely — and ever-lovin’ — wife, the curvaceous Jessica Rabbit.

Published

20 years ago

August 19, 2003

Jim Korkis

Jim Hill’s mention of the “Disney Memorial Orgy” drawing done by Wally Wood for the centerfold of THE REALIST (issue #74) in 1967 and later turned into a popular blacklight poster brought back some memories because I used to have a copy of that poster framed in the hallway leading to my bathroom in my old apartment in Glendale. It was interesting the reactions that poster could generate because on first glance it looked like a typical Disney poster and only on closer inspection did you see that Jiminy Cricket was dropping his pants near a stripping Tinker Bell and Dumbo was proving a greater menace than pigeons.

What Jim didn’t have space to mention is that Krassner picked Wally Wood to illustrate that drawing because Wood had been doing the Disney comics parodies in MAD magazines for many years in a clean style very reminiscent of standard Disney comic art. Also, Wood had no objections to erotic topics and in fact in his later years earned much of his income from parodies of popular comic characters doing sexual things. (If you are a Disney fan or a Wally Wood fan, you should immediately go order a copy of MAD ABOUT THE FIFTIES where there is a wonderful six page satire of the DISNEYLAND television series drawn by Wally Wood.)

Disney with its emphasis on family entertainment and cleanliness has always been an easy target.

Most people are familiar with the infamous “Tijuana Bibles,” also referred to as “eight pagers.” These pornographic pamphlets gained popularity because they featured thinly disguised caricatures of famous actors or cartoon characters engaged in frantic sexual escapades. Even the Disney characters couldn’t escape such dubious fame. Somewhere in my archives I have an early example from 1937 entitled “Of Mice and Women by Salt Pisney” which featured the sexual antics of Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Clarabelle Cow and a very obliging human girl. (It is amazing what they were offering for sale at the early Disney collector conventions in California in the late Seventies. That was also where I got my Disney Orgy poster.)

In 1967, the same year the Disney Orgy poster appeared, Joel Beck drew a poster issued by the Print Mint called “Odalisque.” An odalisque is a female slave or concubine in a harem. In this particular case, the nude female was Daisy Duck. Disney sued unsuccessfully because the court determined that since this Daisy had a pair of teats it was sufficiently different from the Disney duck.

Beck had a fascination for the Disney characters. In “Marching Marvin,” one of the earliest underground comix, written and drawn by Beck a mercenary “Meakey Moose” beguiles the crowd while “Vault Dizzy” is revealed as a child molester! The Print Mint also printed a tabloid called YELLOW DOG and it featured Beck’s “Mickey Mouse Today” series. One episode had Donald Duck waiting patiently at the bedside of Daisy Duck who is just about to give birth. When the egg cracks open, a small Mickey Mouse pops out. Donald goes crazy and Daisy cries that Mickey promised her a part on the tv show and that was why she was unfaithful.

And let’s not forget that the September 1970 issue of NATIONAL LAMPOON featured a cover of a classic Thirties Minnie Mouse flashing her top and revealing her small breasts covered with flower pasties. The editors hoped that this would stir the ire of the Disney organization and bring some publicity to this new magazine. Disney never rose to the bait.

Jim Hill also recommended Bob Levin’s great new book: THE PIRATES AND THE MOUSE: Disney’s War Against the Counterculture (Fantagraphics Books, June 2003) and I echo that recommendation just based on reading the two part excerpt that appeared last year in THE COMICS JOURNAL. The story of the Air Pirates is fascinating.

Dan O’Neill is perhaps the most infamous of the underground comix artists to use the Disney characters. He did so in his daily ODD BODKINS syndicated newspaper strip without arousing the attention of the Disney organization. However, when O’Neill brought together a group of talented underground artists and produced the first issue of AIR PIRATES FUNNIES in July 1971, things started happening quickly.

Disney characters were featured in activities displaying their sexuality very blatantly. Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Donald were featured in this underground comix which was purposely designed to evoke a remembrance of the DELL comic books that featured Disney characters in the 1940s. (O’Neill dubbed his version “HELL Comics”.) Two issues of AIR PIRATES FUNNIES and one issue of TORTOISE AND HARE (featuring some of the same underground versions of Disney characters) were produced before Disney finally managed to stop the young artists.

It was O’Neill’s first contention that the Disney characters in these “earlier designed versions” from the 1930s were in public domain since they had been unused for years and did not reflect the current Disney versions of the characters. Disney probably found that contention even more offensive that the off color antics of their characters in these comix. Later, O’Neill shifted his defense to claim he was only doing parody and parody needed to be protected.

The US District Court of Northern California granted an injunction against the Air Pirates in June 1972 and three years later in August 1975 found that “AIR PIRATES FUNNIES constituted copyright infringement, trademark infringement, unfair competition and trade disparagement.” The matter was appealed to the Ninth District Court of Appeal which in September 1978 reversed the lower court ruling on trademark, competition and trade disparagement but upheld the ruling that AIR PIRATES FUNNIES infringed Disney’s copyright. The attorneys appealed to the US Supreme Court which on January 1979 decided to let stand the lower court rulings, including the $190,000 in damages for copyright infringement that had been assessed by Judge Albert Wollenberg.

Obviously, the Air Pirates (as the artists themselves were now called) didn’t have that kind of money and the legal action had taken years which seriously depleted any funds they did have. So, Dan O’Neill fought back. The Spring 1979 issue of THE CO-EVOLUTION QUARTERLY (#21) featured a four page comic book style story by O’Neill starring Mickey and Minnie Mouse and entitled “Communique#1 from MLF” (Mouse Liberation Front). In fact several MLF communiques had been circulated at various comic book conventions. Artists were assigned numbers so that their names did not have to appear in print. This action was clearly in contempt of court and the Disney legal staff again took action. By now, more a nuisance than a threat, especially since the court’s decision could be used on future offenders of the Disney sanctity, an out of court settlement was arranged in 1980 which included the proviso that none of the participants could reveal the terms. (This is a very common condition in Disney lawsuits.)

There is so much more to the story and the personalities involved (especially O’Neill) are so colorful that I recommend getting a copy of Levin’s very well-researched book.

Today, the Disney character that seems to attract the most hormonal attention is Jessica Rabbit who in WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT claims that: “I’m not bad; I’m just drawn that way.” However, that may not be the complete truth.

In the original 1981 novel WHO CENSORED ROGER RABBIT?, Jessica is a much harder character and not above using her sexual favors to get what she wants. She had “a body straight out of one of the magazines adolescent boys pore over in locked bathrooms” wrote author Gary Wolf.

Later in the book, detective Eddie Valiant pays two hundred dollars for a rare Tijuana Bible “titled LEWD, CRUDE, AND IN THE MOOD, and it portrayed in graphic detail the antics of a randy, female nurse. The nurse was played by a younger, slimmer, blonder, but definitely recognizable Jessica Rabbit.” When confronted with a copy of the book, Jessica claims she was only eighteen at the time and Sid Sleaze drugged her and took the pictures.

That harder description influenced director Darrell Van Citters and designer Mike Giaimo when they first tackled an animated version of the character for the Disney Company back in the early Eighties and made her more of a femme fatale who looked like a young Lauren Bacall, very slender and with high cheekbones. The final more endowed version in the Robert Zemeckis film owes a debt to the work of Tex Avery and Preston Blair and their creation of “Red Hot Riding Hood” for the MGM cartoons.

When the laserdisc version of WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT was released, there was a lot of media controversy about a scene where supposedly Jessica Rabbit does her imitation of Sharon Stone in BASIC INSTINCT by flashing her private area to the camera.

The scene is where Jessica and Eddie are both thrown from a taxi. Jessica spins out of the car which causes her red dress to start hiking up her body and her legs spread apart briefly. For a few frames of Jessica’s second spin her underwear supposedly disappears, revealing Jessica’s nether regions.

The frames in question are frames 2170-2172 on side 4 of the laserdisc version. During these three frames Jessica’s pubic region is darker than the surrounding flesh-colored areas of her legs and certainly not a dark red like the color of her underwear. Animator and Disney historian Mark Kausler studied those frames carefully and it is his expert opinion that it is just a paint error where the underwear wasn’t painted in for those few frames and the dark background of her dress showed through the unpainted cel.

The cover of the November 1988 issue of PLAYBOY featured an airbrushed photo of September Playmate Laura Richmond portraying Jessica Rabbit. The cover appeared at a time when Disney was having difficulty handling the success of its sexy star and was toning down her cleavage and slit skirt for her appearances in storybooks, coloring books and related items.

The PLAYBOY cover was apparently a spontaneous inspiration occurring within a twenty-four hour period. Photographer Stephen Wayds and art director Tom Staebler photographed model Richmond with Jessica-style hair, gown and pose and then subjected the work to a dye transfer process which resulted in an animated look. Some airbrushing was necessary to pull in the waist to the more cartoon proportions of the animated Jessica.

PLAYBOY figured that Disney would have a sense of humor about the whole thing, but officially, Tom Deegan, who was then director of corporate communications for Disney, went on record by saying, “We don’t have any reaction (to the PLAYBOY cover). We don’t think anything about it at all. Anyway, that’s not really Jessica on the cover. It’s PLAYBOY’s interpretation of her.”

Disney was less cavalier when the French edition of the July 1989 issue of PENTHOUSE was released. Supposedly at that time, Disney had not yet copyrighted the character internationally. An oversight quickly corrected when they saw the issue featuring a cel-like drawing of a topless Jessica with long purple gloves, purple garter belt and purple bikini panties.

The interior ten page spread mixed artwork from the Disney animated feature with new color artwork of a topless Jessica posing seductively. The article was an interview with “Zita Hayworth” (a fictional actress who supposedly played the part of Jessica). No mention was made that the real voice of Jessica was supplied by the breathy delivery of actress Kathleen Turner with Steven Spielberg’s ex-wife Amy Irving doing the singing voice.

(A very little known fact was that Jessica’s “body performance model” was actress Betsy Brantley. Brantley was in her early Thirties when she went through the movement for the character like walking down the stage in the INK AND PAINT CLUB, much like the body movement actress/writer Sherri Stoner did for the character of Ariel in LITTLE MERMAID. Betsy played the role of the mother in PRINCESS BRIDE around the same time period if you’d like an indication of how she looked at the time but some may best remember her as “Jan Armstrong” in the tv mini-series FROM EARTH TO MOON.)

Victoria’s Secret supermodel Heidi Klum helped GQ magazine (Gentleman’s Quarterly) celebrate its 45th birthday in the September 2002 issue by posing in a photo layout where she was done up to mimic great sex symbols like Marilyn Monroe and Raquel Welch. According to an interview at the time, her favorite photo was the one where she portrayed Jessica Rabbit.

There is just something about Jessica that seems to stir the hormones of people. The July 31, 1989 issue of SCREW featured a three page comic strip entitled “The Tramp of Toonturf” featured a character who looked suspiciously like Jessica doing an awful lot of off-color naughtiness in only twenty-four panels. And you don’t have to look very long on the internet to find even more extreme examples of poor Jessica being abused by amateur artists.

This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the examples of how Disney icons were corrupted. The purity of the Disney image will continue to be assailed by satirists and pornographers for quite some time to come. That’s just one of the hazards of being the stuff that dreams are made of I guess.

General

Seward Johnson bronzes add a surreal, artistic touch to NYC’s Garment District

Published

8 years ago

June 23, 2015

Jim Hill

Greetings from NYC. Nancy and I drove down from New
Hampshire yesterday because we'll be checking out
Disney Consumer Products' annual Holiday Showcase later today.

Anyway … After checking into our hotel (i.e., The Paul.
Which is located down in NYC's NoMad district), we decided to grab some dinner.
Which is how we wound up at the Melt Shop.

Photo by Jim Hill

Which is this restaurant that only sells grilled cheese sandwiches.
This comfort food was delicious, but kind of on the heavy side.

Photo by Jim Hill

Which is why — given that it was a beautiful summer night
— we'd then try and walk off our meals. We started our stroll down by the Empire
State Building
…

Photo by Jim Hill

… and eventually wound up just below Times
Square (right behind where the Waterford Crystal Times Square New
Year's Eve Ball is kept).

Photo by Jim Hill

But you know what we discovered en route? Right in the heart
of Manhattan's Garment District
along Broadway between 36th and 41st? This incredibly cool series of life-like
and life-sized sculptures that Seward
Johnson has created.

Photo by Jim Hill

And — yes — that is Abraham Lincoln (who seems to have
slipped out of WDW's Hall of Presidents when no one was looking and is now
leading tourists around Times Square). These 18 painted
bronze pieces (which were just installed late this past Sunday night / early
Monday morning) range from the surreal to the all-too-real.

Photo by Jim Hill

Some of these pieces look like typical New Yorkers. Like the
business woman planning out her day …

Photo by Jim Hill

… the postman delivering the mail …

Photo by Jim Hill

… the hot dog vendor working at his cart …

Photo by Jim Hill

… the street musician playing for tourists …

Photo by Jim Hill

Not to mention the tourists themselves.

Photo by Jim Hill

But right alongside the bronze businessmen …

Photo by Jim Hill

… and the tired grandmother hauling her groceries home …

Photo by Jim Hill

… there were also statues representing people who were
from out-of-town …

Photo by Jim Hill

… or — for that matter — out-of-time.

Photo by Jim Hill

These were the Seward Johnson pieces that genuinely beguiled. Famous impressionist paintings brought to life in three dimensions.

Note the out-of-period water bottle that some tourist left
behind. Photo by Jim Hill

Some of them so lifelike that you actually had to pause for
a moment (especially as day gave way to night in the city) and say to yourself
"Is that one of the bronzes? Or just someone pretending to be one of these
bronzes?"

Mind you, for those of you who aren't big fans of the
impressionists …

Photo by Jim Hill

… there's also an array of American icons. Among them
Marilyn Monroe …

Photo by Jim Hill

… and that farmer couple from Grant Wood's "American
Gothic."

Photo by Jim Hill

But for those of you who know your NYC history, it's hard to
beat that piece which recreates Alfred Eisenstaedt's famous photograph of V-J Day in Times Square.

Photo by Jim Hill

By the way, a 25-foot-tall version of this particular Seward
Johnson piece ( which — FYI — is entitled "Embracing Peace") will actually
be placed in Times Square for a few days on or around August 14th to commemorate the 70th
anniversary of Victory Over Japan Day (V-J Day).

Photo by Jim Hill

By the way, if you'd like to check these Seward Johnson bronzes in
person (which — it should be noted — are part of the part of the Garment
District Alliance's new public art offering) — you'd best schedule a trip to
the City sometime over the next three months. For these pieces will only be on
display now through September 15th.

General

Wondering what you should “Boldly Go” see at the movies next year? The 2015 Licensing Expo offers you some clues

Published

8 years ago

June 10, 2015

Jim Hill

Greeting from the 2015 Licensing Expo, which is being held
at the Mandalay Bay
Convention Center in Las
Vegas.

Photo by Jim Hill

I have to admit that I enjoy covering the Licensing Expo.
Mostly becomes it allows bloggers & entertainment writers like myself to
get a peek over the horizon. Scope out some of the major motion pictures &
TV shows that today's vertically integrated entertainment conglomerates
(Remember when these companies used to be called movie studios?) will be
sending our way over the next two years or so.

Photo by Jim Hill

Take — for example — all of "The Secret Life of
Pets" banners that greeted Expo attendees as they made their way to the
show floor today. I actually got to see some footage from this new Illumination
Entertainment production (which will hit theaters on July 8, 2016) the last time I was in Vegas. Which
was for CinemaCon back in April. And the five or so minutes of film that I viewed
suggested that "The Secret Life of Pets" will be a really funny
animated feature.

Photo by Jim Hill

Mind you, Universal Pictures wanted to make sure that Expo
attendees remembered that there was another Illumination Entertainment production
coming-to-a-theater-near-them before "The Secret Life of Pets" (And
that's "Minions," the "Despicable Me" prequel. Which
premieres at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival next week but
won't be screened stateside 'til July 10th of this year). Which is why they had
three minions who were made entirely out of LEGOS loitering out in the lobby.

Photo by Jim Hill

And Warner Bros. — because they wanted "Batman v
Superman: Dawn of Justice" to start trending on Twitter today — brought
the Batmobile to Las Vegas.

Photo by Jim Hill

Not to mention full-sized macquettes of Batman, Superman and
Wonder Woman. Just so conventioneers could then see what these DC superheroes
would actually look like in this eagerly anticipated, March 25, 2016 release.

Photo by Jim Hill

That's the thing that can sometimes be a wee bit frustrating
about the Licensing Expo. It's all about delayed gratification. You'll come
around a corner and see this 100 foot-long ad for "The Peanuts Movie"
and think "Hey, that looks great. I want to see that Blue Sky Studios production
right now." It's only then that you notice the fine print and realize that
"The Peanuts Movie" doesn't actually open in theaters 'til November
6th of this year.

Photo by Jim Hill

And fan of Blue Sky's "Ice Age" film franchise are in for an even
longer wait. Given that the latest installment in that top grossing series
doesn't arrive in theaters 'til July
15, 2016.

Photo by Jim Hill

Of course, if you're one of those people who needs immediate
gratification when it comes to your entertainment, there was stuff like that to
be found at this year's Licensing Expo. Take — for example — how the WWE
booth was actually shaped like a wrestling ring. Which — I'm guessing — meant
that if the executives of World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. didn't like
the offer that you were making, they were then allowed to toss you out over the
top rope, Royal Rumble-style.

Photo by Jim Hill

I also have to admit that — as a longtime Star Trek fan —
it was cool to see the enormous Starship Enterprise that hung in place over the
CBS booth. Not to mention getting a glimpse of the official Star Trek 50th
Anniversary logo.

Photo by Jim Hill

I was also pleased to see lots of activity in The Jim Henson
Company booth. Which suggests that JHC has actually finally carved out a
post-Muppets identity for itself.

Photo by Jim Hill

Likewise for all of us who were getting a little concerned
about DreamWorks Animation (what with all the layoffs & write-downs &
projects that were put into turnaround or outright cancelled last year), it was
nice to see that booth bustling.

Photo by Jim Hill

Every so often, you'd come across some people who were
promoting a movie that you weren't entirely sure that you actually wanted to
see (EX: "Angry Birds," which Sony Pictures Entertainment / Columbia
Pictures will be releasing to theaters on May 20, 2016). But then you remembered that Clay Kaytis —
who's this hugely talented former Walt Disney Animation Studios animator — is
riding herd on "Angry Birds" with Fergal Reilly. And you'd think
"Well, if Clay's working on 'Angry Birds,' I'm sure this animated feature
will turn out fine."

Photo by Jim Hill

Mind you, there were reminders at this year's Licensing Expo
of great animated features that we're never going to get to see now. I still
can't believe — especially after that brilliant proof-of-concept footage
popped up online last year — that Sony execs decided not to go forward
with production of Genndy Tartakovsky's
"Popeye" movie. But that's the
cruel thing about the entertainment business, folks. It will sometime break
your heart.

Photo by Jim Hill

And make no mistake about this. The Licensing Expo is all
about business. That point was clearly driven home at this year's show when —
as you walked through the doors of the Mandalay
Bay Convention Center
— the first thing that you saw was the Hasbros Booth. Which was this gleaming,
sleek two story-tall affair full of people who were negotiating deals &
signing contracts for all of the would-be summer blockbusters that have already
announced release dates for 2019 & beyond.

Photo by Jim Hill

"But what about The Walt Disney Company?," you
ask. "Weren't they represented on the show floor at this year's Licensing
Expo?" Not really, not. I mean, sure. There were a few companies there hyping
Disney-related products. Take — for example — the Disney Wikkeez people.

Photo by Jim Hill

I'm assuming that some Disney Consumer Products exec is
hoping that Wikkeez will eventually become the new Tsum Tsum. But to be blunt,
these little hard plastic figures don't seem to have the same huggable charm
that those stackable plush do. But I've been wrong before. So let's see what
happens with Disney Wikkeez once they start showing up on the shelves of the
Company's North American retail partners.

Photo by Jim Hill

And speaking of Disney's retail partners … They were
meeting with Mouse House executives behind closed doors one floor down from the
official show floor for this year's Licensing Expo.

Photo by Jim Hill

And the theme for this year's invitation-only Disney shindig? "Timeless
Stories" involving the Disney, Pixar, Marvel & Lucasfilm brands that
would then appeal to "tomorrow's consumer."

Photo by Jim Hill

And just to sort of hammer home the idea that Disney is no
longer the Company which cornered the market when it comes to little girls
(i.e., its Disney Princess and Disney Fairies franchises), check out this
wall-sized Star Wars-related image that DCP put up just outside of one of its
many private meeting rooms. "See?," this carefully crafted photo
screams. "It isn't just little boys who want to wield the Force. Little
girls also want to grow up and be Lords of the Sith."

Photo by Jim Hill

One final, kind-of-ironic note: According to this banner,
Paramount Pictures will be releasing a movie called "Amusement Park"
to theaters sometime in 2017.

Photo by Jim Hill

Well, given all the "Blackfish" -related issues
that have been dogged SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment over the past two years, I'm
just hoping that they'll still be in the amusement park business come 2017.

Your thoughts?

General

It takes more than three circles to craft a Classic version of Mickey Mouse

Published

8 years ago

June 9, 2015

Jim Hill

You know what Mickey Mouse looks like, right? Little guy,
big ears?

Truth be told, Disney's corporate symbol has a lot of
different looks. If Mickey's interacting with Guests at Disneyland
Park (especially this summer, when
the Happiest Place on Earth
is celebrating its 60th anniversary), he looks & dresses like this.

Or when he's appearing in one of those Emmy Award-winning shorts that Disney
Television Animation has produced (EX: "Bronco Busted," which debuts
on the Disney Channel tonight at 8 p.m. ET / PT), Mickey is drawn in a such a
way that he looks hip, cool, edgy & retro all at the same time.

Looking ahead to 2017 now, when Disney Junior rolls out "Mickey and the
Roadster Racers," this brand-new animated series will feature a sportier version
of Disney's corporate symbol. One that Mouse House managers hope will persuade
preschool boys to more fully embrace this now 86 year-old character.

That's what most people don't realize about the Mouse. The
Walt Disney Company deliberately tailors Mickey's look, even his style of
movement, depending on what sort of project / production he's appearing in.

Take — for example — Disney
California Adventure
Park's "World of Color:
Celebrate!" Because Disney's main mouse would be co-hosting this new
nighttime lagoon show with ace emcee Neil Patrick Harris, Eric Goldberg really had
to step up Mickey's game. Which is why this master Disney animator created
several minutes of all-new Mouse animation which then showed that Mickey was
just as skilled a showman as Neil was.

Better yet, let's take a look at what the folks at Avalanche Studios just went
through as they attempted to create a Classic version of Mickey & Minnie.
One that would then allow this popular pair to become part of Disney Infinity
3.0.

"I won't lie to you. We were under a lot of pressure to
get the look of this particular version of Mickey — he's called Red Pants
Mickey around here — just right," said Jeff Bunker, the VP of Art
Development at Avalanche Studios, during a recent phone interview. "When
we brought Sorcerer Mickey into Disney Infinity 1.0 back in January of 2014,
that one was relatively easy because … Well, everyone knows what Mickey Mouse
looked like when he appeared in 'Fantasia.' "

"But this time around, we were being asked to design
THE Mickey & Minnie," Bunker continued. "And given that these Classic
Disney characters have been around in various different forms for the better
part of the last century … Well, which look was the right look?"

Which is why Jeff and his team at Avalanche Studios began watching hours &
hours of Mickey Mouse shorts. As they tried to get a handle on which look would
work best for these characters in Disney Infinity 3.0.

"And we went all the way back to the very start of Mickey's career. We began
with 'Steamboat Willie' and then watched all of those black & white Mickey shorts
that Walt made back in the late 1920s & early 1930s. From there, we
transitioned to his Technicolor shorts. Which is when Mickey went from being
this pie-eyed, really feisty character to more of a well-behaved leading
man," Bunker recalled. "We then finished out our Mouse marathon by
watching all of those new Mickey shorts that Paul Rudish & his team have
been creating for Disney Television Animation. Those cartoons really recapture
a lot of the spirit and wild slapstick fun that Mickey's early, black &
white shorts had."

But given that the specific assignment that Avalanche Studios had been handed
was to create the most appealing looking, likeable version of Mickey Mouse
possible … In the end, Jeff and his team wound up borrowing bits & pieces
from a lot of different versions of the world's most famous mouse. So that
Classic Mickey would then look & move in a way that best fit the sort of
gameplay which people would soon be able to experience with Disney Infinity
3.0.

"That — in a lot of ways — was actually the toughest
part of the Classic Mickey design project. You have to remember that one of the
key creative conceits of Disney Infinity
is that all the characters which appear in this game are toys," Bunker
stated. "Okay. So they're beautifully detailed, highly stylized toy
versions of beloved Disney, Pixar, Marvel & Lucasfilm characters. But
they're still supposed to be toys. So our Classic versions of Mickey &
Minnie have the same sort of thickness & sturdiness to them that toys have.
So that they'll then be able to fit right in with all of the rest of the
characters that Avalanche Studios had previously designed for Disney Infinity."

And then there was the matter of coming up with just the
right pose for Classic Mickey & Minnie. Which — to hear Jeff tell the
story — involved input from a lot of Disney upper management.

"Everyone within the Company seemed to have an opinion
about how Mickey & Minnie should be posed. More to the point, if you Google
Mickey, you then discover that there are literally thousands of poses out there
for these two. Though — truth be told — a lot of those kind of play off the
way Mickey poses when he's being Disney's corporate symbol," Bunker said.
"But what I was most concerned about was that Mickey's pose had to work
with Minnie's pose. Because we were bringing the Classic versions of these
characters up into Disney Infinity 3.0 at the exact same time. And we wanted to
make sure — especially for those fans who like to put their Disney Infinity
figures on display — that Mickey's pose would then complement Minnie.

Which is why Jeff & the crew at Avalanche Studios
decided — when it came to Classic Mickey & Minnie's pose — that they
should go all the way back to the beginning. Which is why these two Disney icons
are sculpted in such a way that it almost seems as though you're witnessing the
very first time Mickey set eyes on Minnie.

"And what was really great about that was — as soon as
we began showing people within the Company this pose — everyone at Disney
quickly got on board with the idea. I mean, the Classic Mickey that we sculpted
for Disney Infinity 3.0 is clearly a very playful, spunky character. But at the
same time, he's obviously got eyes for Minnie," Bunker concluded. "So
in the end, we were able to come up with Classic versions of these characters
that will work well within the creative confines of Disney Infinity 3.0 but at
the same time please those Disney fans who just collect these figures because
they like the way the Disney Infinity characters look."

So now that this particular design project is over, does
Jeff regret that Mouse House upper management was so hands-on when it came to
making sure that the Classic versions of Mickey & Minnie were specifically
tailored to fit the look & style of gameplay found in Disney Infinity 3.0?

"To be blunt, we go through this every time we add a new character to the
game. The folks at Lucasfilm were just as hands-on when we were designing the
versions of Darth Vader and Yoda that will also soon be appearing in Disney
Infinity 3.0," Bunker laughed. "So in the end, if the character's
creators AND the fans are happy, then I'm happy."

This article was originally posted on the Huffington Post's Entertainment page on Tuesday, June 9, 2015