Oswald the Lucky Rabbit
Encyclopedia
Oswald the Lucky Rabbit (also known as Oswald the Rabbit or Oswald Rabbit) is an anthropomorphic rabbit
and animated cartoon
character created by Ub Iwerks
and Walt Disney
for films distributed by Universal Pictures
in the 1920s and 1930s. The majority rights to the character are currently held by The Walt Disney Company
, with exceptions of Winkler and Walter Lantz
cartoons that starred Oswald, which are owned by Universal. Oswald is the main protagonist
of the cartoon series.
had run its course. Disney signed a new contract with Universal Studios
head Carl Laemmle
where he would produce a series of cartoons for Charles Mintz and George Winkler. The first Oswald cartoon, Poor Papa, was rejected by the Universal studio heads due to poor production quality and the sloppiness and age of Oswald. After this, Disney, together with Ub Iwerks
, created a second cartoon called Trolley Troubles
featuring a much younger, neater Oswald. The short officially launched the series and proved to be Disney's greatest success yet. Poor Papa was finally released a year later.
"Oswald the Lucky Rabbit" became Disney Brothers' first major hit in 1927. But within a year, Walt was outmaneuvered by his distributor (Universal) which hired away most of Disney's animators in a bid to shut Disney out of the Oswald franchise. Walt initially thought he could continue making Oswald shorts with new animators and a new distributor, but after reading the fine print of his contract, he was devastated to learn that Universal owned the copyrights.
Upon finishing the remaining Oswald cartoons, Disney and Iwerks created another character who would become The Walt Disney Company
's lasting symbol: Mickey Mouse
(a slightly altered Oswald the Rabbit to avoid litigation), the most famous of Walt Disney's characters.
There has been many confusions where many believe Oswald and Mickey are brother's.This fact is not confirmed and also it is invalid. For this to be true then Pete along with Donald and Goofy would also be considered Oswald's brothers as well.
By a coincidence, Disney and Mintz each produced nine cartoons the first year and 17 the next before Oswald was taken over by others. Laemmle selected Walter Lantz
to produce the new series of Oswald shorts (the first of which was 1929's Race Riot
). Lantz consulted Disney about Oswald and he gave Lantz his blessing to continue the Oswald series as the Mickey Mouse shorts had become more successful so the two became close friends.
Over the next decade, Lantz would produce 142 Oswald cartoons, making for a grand total of 194 films that the character starred in, spanning the work of all three producers. After Lantz took over production in 1929, the character's look was changed to some degree over the following years: Oswald got white gloves on his hands, shoes on his feet, a shirt, a "cuter" face with larger eyes, a bigger head, and shorter ears (pictured left). With 1935's Case of the Lost Sheep, an even more major makeover took place: the character was drawn more realistically now, with white fur rather than black, shoes are removed, plus wearing suspenders instead of a shirt and shorts. This new Oswald model was adapted directly from a non-Oswald bunny in another Lantz cartoon: the two-strip Technicolor
Fox and the Rabbit (1935), released some two months earlier as the last of the early Cartune Classics series.
The cartoons containing the new, white-furred Oswald seemed to be different from their predecessors in more than one way, as the stories themselves became softer. Minor changes in the drawing style would continue, too. With Happy Scouts (1938), the second-to-last Oswald film produced, the rabbit's fur went from being all-white to a combination of white and gray.
Unlike the Disney shorts, in which Oswald did not speak, Lantz's cartoons began to feature actual dialogue for Oswald, although most of the cartoons were still silent to begin with. Animator Bill Nolan
did the voice of Oswald in Cold Turkey, the first Lantz cartoon with dialogue, and the following year Pinto Colvig
, who was working as an animator and gag man at the studio, started voicing Oswald. When Colvig left the studio in 1931, Mickey Rooney
took over the voicing of Oswald until early in the following year. Starting in 1932, Lantz ceased to use a regular voice actor for Oswald, and many studio staff members (including Lantz himself) would take turns in voicing the character over the years. June Foray
provided Oswald's voice in The Egg Cracker Suite, which was the final theatrical short to feature the character.
Oswald made a cameo appearance in the first animated sequence with both sound and color (two-strip Technicolor), a 2½ minute animated sequence of the live action movie The King of Jazz (1930), produced by Laemmle for Universal. However, it was not until 1934 that Oswald got his own color sound cartoons in two-strip Technicolor, Toyland Premiere and Springtime Serenade. The Oswald cartoons then returned to black-and-white, except for the last one, The Egg Cracker Suite (1943), released as a part of the Swing Symphonies series. Egg Cracker was also the only Oswald cartoon to use three-strip Technicolor. But before he was permanently retired, Oswald made a final cameo appearance in The Woody Woodpecker Polka
(1951), also in three-strip Technicolor, which by then had become the rule in the cartoon industry.
from NBC Universal as part of a deal that sent sportscaster Al Michaels
from Disney's ABC
and ESPN
to NBC Sports
. At the time, ABC had lost its contract for NFL
broadcast rights, and despite recently signing a long-term contract with ESPN, Michaels was interested in rejoining broadcast partner John Madden at NBC for the Sunday night package. Universal transferred the copyright in a cartoon character to Disney, and in exchange, Disney released Michaels from his employment contract, allowing him to sign with NBC
.
The deal includes the rights to the character and the original 26 short films made by Disney (namely, most of the Oswald films produced from 1927 to 1928). Rights to the Lantz/Universal-produced Oswald films and other related products were not included, and therefore Oswald appears in both Disney releases and in Universal's Woody Woodpecker and Friends collection.
Walt Disney's daughter, Diane Disney Miller, issued the following statement after the deal was announced:
Around the same time, the Kansas City Chiefs
and New York Jets
made a similar deal, the Chiefs giving the Jets a draft pick as compensation for releasing coach Herm Edwards from his contract. Referring to this trade, Michaels said:
In January 2007, a T-shirt
line from Comme de Garçon seems to have constituted the first new Disney Oswald merchandise. Following in December
was a two-disc DVD
set, The Adventures of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, included in Wave Seven
of the Walt Disney Treasures
series. Several Oswald collectors' figurines and a stuffed animal appeared shortly after the DVD set's release. The Disney Store has also begun to introduce Oswald into its merchandise lines, starting with a canvas print and Christmas ornament that became available Fall
2007. A limited edition grayscale plush toy was sold at Christmas 2007; a standard-issue color plush toy appeared in late 2010.
and California
on the day Disney reacquired him, Oswald is not currently a character in the parks to meet and greet, like so many others are. Disney officials stated that he probably would be someday; they did not want to just haphazardly add him. When the character's future is determined, they are planning a big splash.
In 2010, Tokyo Disneyland
produced a float featuring Oswald for their first Easter holiday event.
In 2011, he appeared with other old Disney characters on the Construction walls for the Disney California Adventure new entrance.
In 2011, he appeared on a poster as a magician's rabbit in Town Square Theater in Magic Kingdom
park.
In 2011, he appears on various items of clothing available for purchase at Disneyland Paris, in the shops on Main Street USA.
featured him in the series New Fun (later More Fun). His adventures, drawn by Al Stahl, were serialized one page to an issue for the magazine's first year, after which they ceased. The original black-furred version of Oswald was featured, even though Oswald was by this time a white rabbit on screen.
Oswald's second run in the comics began in 1942, when a new Oswald feature was initiated in Dell Comics
' New Funnies, this time modeled after the latest cartoon version of Oswald and influenced by the drawing style of other Lantz comic book characters at the time. Following the typical development seen in most new comics, the New Funnies stories slowly morphed the character in their own direction.
At the start of the New Funnies feature, Oswald existed in a milieu reminiscent of Winnie the Pooh: he was portrayed as a live stuffed animal, living in a forest together with other anthropomorphized toys. These included Toby Bear, Maggie Lou the wooden doll, Hi-Yah Wahoo the turtle-faced Indian, and Woody Woodpecker
—depicted as a mechanical doll filled with nuts and bolts (hence his "nutty" behavior). In 1944, with the addition of writer John Stanley
, the stuffed animal motif was dropped, as were Maggie Lou, Woody, and Wahoo. Oswald and Toby became flesh and blood characters living as roommates in "Lantzville". Initially drawn by Dan Gormley, the series was later drawn by the likes of Dan Noonan and Lloyd White.
In 1948, Toby adopted two orphan rabbits for Oswald to raise. Floyd and Lloyd, "Poppa Oswald's" new sons, stuck around; Toby was relegated to the sidelines, disappearing for good in 1953. Later stories focused on Oswald adventuring with his sons, seeking odd jobs, or simply protecting the boys from the likes of rabbit-eating Reddy Fox and (from 1961) con man Gabby Gator—a character adapted from contemporary Woody Woodpecker cartoon shorts. This era of Oswald comics typically featured the art of Jack Bradbury
, known also for his Mickey Mouse work.
Post-1960s Oswald comics tended to be produced outside the United States, for example in Mexico
and Italy
. Through the end of the 20th century, the foreign comics carried on the look and story style of the Dell Oswald stories. More recently, they featured a "retro" attempt at recreating the original Disney Oswald.
A 1995 Bonkers
comic story in Disney Adventures
("Temple of Doom" in the March and April 1995 issues) had Bonkers and Lucky Piquel, in their quest to save the fabled Toonstone, meet its keeper, Nimrod the Rabbit. This character is designed looking very similar to Oswald, and also resembles how Oswald would have looked if he had gone through a redesign similar to that of Mickey's. Especially with adding pupils in the black dot eye, the same with Mickey Mouse when Fantasia
was made in the late 1930s.
In 2010, Oswald starred in the digi-comic series Epic Mickey: Tales of the Wasteland, a prequel to the Epic Mickey video game, telling about what the Wasteland was like before Mickey arrived there.
, and were primarily made available as prizes in UFO catchers
. Typically manufactured by Taito
and/or Medicom, these products included puppet
s, inflatable dolls, keyrings, and watch
es. They were generally based on a navy-blue version of the original Disney/Iwerks character. Oswald made his first Disneyland appearance at Tokyo Disneyland
on March 31, 2010 as an Easter float.
video game Epic Mickey
, which was released in 2010. The world of Epic Mickey is called "Wasteland" and it is similar to Walt Disney World, but it is for forgotten Disney characters, including Oswald who rules the place. Actually, Oswald fashioned it after Disneyland, but he put images of himself in the place of Mickey in the statue with Walt Disney and other places throughout the town. Oswald was the first cartoon character to be "forgotten" and inhabit Wasteland. Oswald dislikes Mickey for stealing his popularity that he felt he deserved. Oswald tries to make Wasteland a better place for forgotten characters, especially his "bunny children" and his girlfriend Ortensia. The Blot, the main villain of the game, put Oswald's girlfriend in suspended animation by soaking her in thinner. At the end of Epic Mickey, Oswald's girlfriend "Ortensia" is revived by a rain of paint caused by the death of the Blot, Oswald and Ortensia kiss and cuddle. Both Mickey and Oswald have also reconciled becoming more like true friends. And it has been confirmed that Epic Mickey will have a sequel in which Oswald will also be playable.
Rabbit
Rabbits are small mammals in the family Leporidae of the order Lagomorpha, found in several parts of the world...
and animated cartoon
Animated cartoon
An animated cartoon is a short, hand-drawn film for the cinema, television or computer screen, featuring some kind of story or plot...
character created by Ub Iwerks
Ub Iwerks
Ub Iwerks, A.S.C. was a two-time Academy Award winning American animator, cartoonist, character designer, inventor, creator of Mickey Mouse, and special effects technician, who was famous for his work for Walt Disney....
and Walt Disney
Walt Disney
Walter Elias "Walt" Disney was an American film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, entertainer, international icon, and philanthropist, well-known for his influence in the field of entertainment during the 20th century. Along with his brother Roy O...
for films distributed by Universal Pictures
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
in the 1920s and 1930s. The majority rights to the character are currently held by The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...
, with exceptions of Winkler and Walter Lantz
Walter Lantz
Walter Benjamin Lantz was an American cartoonist, animator, film producer, and director, best known for founding Walter Lantz Productions and creating Woody Woodpecker.-Early years and start in animation:...
cartoons that starred Oswald, which are owned by Universal. Oswald is the main protagonist
Protagonist
A protagonist is the main character of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical narrative, around whom the events of the narrative's plot revolve and with whom the audience is intended to most identify...
of the cartoon series.
Creation under Disney
Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was introduced in 1927 after Disney's series of Alice ComediesAlice Comedies
The "Alice Comedies" are a series of animated cartoonscreated by Walt Disney in the 1920s, in which a live action little girl named Alice and an animated cat named Julius have adventures in an animated landscape....
had run its course. Disney signed a new contract with Universal Studios
Universal Studios
Universal Pictures , a subsidiary of NBCUniversal, is one of the six major movie studios....
head Carl Laemmle
Carl Laemmle
Carl Laemmle , born in Laupheim, Württemberg, Germany, was a pioneer in American film making and a founder of one of the original major Hollywood movie studios - Universal...
where he would produce a series of cartoons for Charles Mintz and George Winkler. The first Oswald cartoon, Poor Papa, was rejected by the Universal studio heads due to poor production quality and the sloppiness and age of Oswald. After this, Disney, together with Ub Iwerks
Ub Iwerks
Ub Iwerks, A.S.C. was a two-time Academy Award winning American animator, cartoonist, character designer, inventor, creator of Mickey Mouse, and special effects technician, who was famous for his work for Walt Disney....
, created a second cartoon called Trolley Troubles
Trolley Troubles
Trolley Troubles is a 1927 animated short subject film, produced and directed by Walt Disney. The cartoon is noted for being the first appearance of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, a character that Disney and Ub Iwerks created for Universal Pictures and Charles B. Mintz...
featuring a much younger, neater Oswald. The short officially launched the series and proved to be Disney's greatest success yet. Poor Papa was finally released a year later.
"Oswald the Lucky Rabbit" became Disney Brothers' first major hit in 1927. But within a year, Walt was outmaneuvered by his distributor (Universal) which hired away most of Disney's animators in a bid to shut Disney out of the Oswald franchise. Walt initially thought he could continue making Oswald shorts with new animators and a new distributor, but after reading the fine print of his contract, he was devastated to learn that Universal owned the copyrights.
Upon finishing the remaining Oswald cartoons, Disney and Iwerks created another character who would become The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...
's lasting symbol: Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse
Mickey Mouse is a cartoon character created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks at The Walt Disney Studio. Mickey is an anthropomorphic black mouse and typically wears red shorts, large yellow shoes, and white gloves...
(a slightly altered Oswald the Rabbit to avoid litigation), the most famous of Walt Disney's characters.
There has been many confusions where many believe Oswald and Mickey are brother's.This fact is not confirmed and also it is invalid. For this to be true then Pete along with Donald and Goofy would also be considered Oswald's brothers as well.
Universal takes direct control
Mintz, meanwhile, opened his own studio consisting primarily of former Disney employees, where he continued to produce Oswald cartoons, among them the first Oswald with sound, Hen Fruit (1929). While things were going in Mintz's favor, animators Hugh Harman and Rudolf Ising asked Laemmle to remove Mintz, suggesting they would be the ones to continue the Oswald series. But Laemmle denied their requests and even terminated Mintz's contract, opting to have the Oswald cartoons produced right on the Universal lot instead.By a coincidence, Disney and Mintz each produced nine cartoons the first year and 17 the next before Oswald was taken over by others. Laemmle selected Walter Lantz
Walter Lantz
Walter Benjamin Lantz was an American cartoonist, animator, film producer, and director, best known for founding Walter Lantz Productions and creating Woody Woodpecker.-Early years and start in animation:...
to produce the new series of Oswald shorts (the first of which was 1929's Race Riot
Race Riot
Race Riot is a 1929 animated short subject, featuring Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. The short concerns Oswald trying to convince his horse, Mopey, to run in a horse race and win it. The cartoon is noted for being the first entirely produced and directed by Walter Lantz. It was released by Universal...
). Lantz consulted Disney about Oswald and he gave Lantz his blessing to continue the Oswald series as the Mickey Mouse shorts had become more successful so the two became close friends.
Over the next decade, Lantz would produce 142 Oswald cartoons, making for a grand total of 194 films that the character starred in, spanning the work of all three producers. After Lantz took over production in 1929, the character's look was changed to some degree over the following years: Oswald got white gloves on his hands, shoes on his feet, a shirt, a "cuter" face with larger eyes, a bigger head, and shorter ears (pictured left). With 1935's Case of the Lost Sheep, an even more major makeover took place: the character was drawn more realistically now, with white fur rather than black, shoes are removed, plus wearing suspenders instead of a shirt and shorts. This new Oswald model was adapted directly from a non-Oswald bunny in another Lantz cartoon: the two-strip Technicolor
Technicolor
Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
Fox and the Rabbit (1935), released some two months earlier as the last of the early Cartune Classics series.
The cartoons containing the new, white-furred Oswald seemed to be different from their predecessors in more than one way, as the stories themselves became softer. Minor changes in the drawing style would continue, too. With Happy Scouts (1938), the second-to-last Oswald film produced, the rabbit's fur went from being all-white to a combination of white and gray.
Unlike the Disney shorts, in which Oswald did not speak, Lantz's cartoons began to feature actual dialogue for Oswald, although most of the cartoons were still silent to begin with. Animator Bill Nolan
Bill Nolan (animator)
William "Bill" Nolan was an Irish-American animated cartoon writer, animator, director, and artist. He is best-known for creating and perfecting the rubber hose style of animation and for streamlining Felix the Cat. From 1925 to 1927, he worked on a loose animated adaptation of George Herriman's...
did the voice of Oswald in Cold Turkey, the first Lantz cartoon with dialogue, and the following year Pinto Colvig
Pinto Colvig
Vance DeBar "Pinto" Colvig was an American vaudeville actor, radio actor, newspaper cartoonist, prolific movie voice actor, and circus performer whose schtick was playing clarinet off-key while mugging....
, who was working as an animator and gag man at the studio, started voicing Oswald. When Colvig left the studio in 1931, Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney
Mickey Rooney is an American film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and stage appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. He has won multiple awards, including an Honorary Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award...
took over the voicing of Oswald until early in the following year. Starting in 1932, Lantz ceased to use a regular voice actor for Oswald, and many studio staff members (including Lantz himself) would take turns in voicing the character over the years. June Foray
June Foray
June Foray is an American voice actress, best known as the voice of many animated characters...
provided Oswald's voice in The Egg Cracker Suite, which was the final theatrical short to feature the character.
Oswald made a cameo appearance in the first animated sequence with both sound and color (two-strip Technicolor), a 2½ minute animated sequence of the live action movie The King of Jazz (1930), produced by Laemmle for Universal. However, it was not until 1934 that Oswald got his own color sound cartoons in two-strip Technicolor, Toyland Premiere and Springtime Serenade. The Oswald cartoons then returned to black-and-white, except for the last one, The Egg Cracker Suite (1943), released as a part of the Swing Symphonies series. Egg Cracker was also the only Oswald cartoon to use three-strip Technicolor. But before he was permanently retired, Oswald made a final cameo appearance in The Woody Woodpecker Polka
The Woody Woodpecker Polka
The Woody Woodpecker Polka is the 37th animated cartoon short subject in the Woody Woodpecker series. Released theatrically on October 29, 1951, the film was produced by Walter Lantz Productions and distributed by Universal International.-Plot:...
(1951), also in three-strip Technicolor, which by then had become the rule in the cartoon industry.
Return to Disney ownership: the Al Michaels trade
In February 2006, a number of minor assets including the rights to Oswald were acquired by The Walt Disney CompanyThe Walt Disney Company
The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...
from NBC Universal as part of a deal that sent sportscaster Al Michaels
Al Michaels
Alan Richard "Al" Michaels is an American television sportscaster. Now employed by NBC Sports after nearly three decades with ABC Sports, Michaels is one of the most prominent members of his profession...
from Disney's ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
and ESPN
ESPN
Entertainment and Sports Programming Network, commonly known as ESPN, is an American global cable television network focusing on sports-related programming including live and pre-taped event telecasts, sports talk shows, and other original programming....
to NBC Sports
NBC Sports
NBC Sports is the sports division of the NBC television network. Formerly "a service of NBC News," it broadcasts a diverse array of programs, including the Olympic Games, the NFL, the NHL, MLS, Notre Dame football, the PGA Tour, the Triple Crown, and the French Open, among others...
. At the time, ABC had lost its contract for NFL
National Football League
The National Football League is the highest level of professional American football in the United States, and is considered the top professional American football league in the world. It was formed by eleven teams in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, with the league changing...
broadcast rights, and despite recently signing a long-term contract with ESPN, Michaels was interested in rejoining broadcast partner John Madden at NBC for the Sunday night package. Universal transferred the copyright in a cartoon character to Disney, and in exchange, Disney released Michaels from his employment contract, allowing him to sign with NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
.
The deal includes the rights to the character and the original 26 short films made by Disney (namely, most of the Oswald films produced from 1927 to 1928). Rights to the Lantz/Universal-produced Oswald films and other related products were not included, and therefore Oswald appears in both Disney releases and in Universal's Woody Woodpecker and Friends collection.
Walt Disney's daughter, Diane Disney Miller, issued the following statement after the deal was announced:
Around the same time, the Kansas City Chiefs
Kansas City Chiefs
The Kansas City Chiefs are a professional American football team based in Kansas City, Missouri. They are a member of the Western Division of the American Football Conference in the National Football League . Originally named the Dallas Texans, the club was founded by Lamar Hunt in 1960 as a...
and New York Jets
New York Jets
The New York Jets are a professional football team headquartered in Florham Park, New Jersey, representing the New York metropolitan area. The team is a member of the Eastern Division of the American Football Conference in the National Football League...
made a similar deal, the Chiefs giving the Jets a draft pick as compensation for releasing coach Herm Edwards from his contract. Referring to this trade, Michaels said:
In January 2007, a T-shirt
T-shirt
A T-shirt is a style of shirt. A T-shirt is buttonless and collarless, with short sleeves and frequently a round neck line....
line from Comme de Garçon seems to have constituted the first new Disney Oswald merchandise. Following in December
December 2007
December 2007 was the twelfth month of that year. It began on a Saturday and, after 31 days, ended on a Monday.-Portal:Current events:...
was a two-disc DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
set, The Adventures of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, included in Wave Seven
Walt Disney Treasures: Wave Seven
-The Chronological Donald, Volume Three:50,000 sets produced.-Disc one:1947* Straight Shooters, 18 April 1947* Sleepy Time Donald, 9 May 1947* Donald's Dilemma, 11 July 1947...
of the Walt Disney Treasures
Walt Disney Treasures
The Walt Disney Treasures is a two-disc DVD set of classic Disney works. They cover work from the studio's earliest days to their more recent work...
series. Several Oswald collectors' figurines and a stuffed animal appeared shortly after the DVD set's release. The Disney Store has also begun to introduce Oswald into its merchandise lines, starting with a canvas print and Christmas ornament that became available Fall
Autumn
Autumn is one of the four temperate seasons. Autumn marks the transition from summer into winter usually in September or March when the arrival of night becomes noticeably earlier....
2007. A limited edition grayscale plush toy was sold at Christmas 2007; a standard-issue color plush toy appeared in late 2010.
Theme park appearances
Though the character Oswald showed up at the parks in FloridaFlorida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
and California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
on the day Disney reacquired him, Oswald is not currently a character in the parks to meet and greet, like so many others are. Disney officials stated that he probably would be someday; they did not want to just haphazardly add him. When the character's future is determined, they are planning a big splash.
In 2010, Tokyo Disneyland
Tokyo Disneyland
is a 115 acre theme park at the Tokyo Disney Resort located in Urayasu, Chiba, Japan, near Tokyo. Its main gate is directly adjacent to both Maihama Station and Tokyo Disneyland Station. It was the first Disney park to be built outside of the United States and opened on April 15, 1983...
produced a float featuring Oswald for their first Easter holiday event.
In 2011, he appeared with other old Disney characters on the Construction walls for the Disney California Adventure new entrance.
In 2011, he appeared on a poster as a magician's rabbit in Town Square Theater in Magic Kingdom
Magic Kingdom
Magic Kingdom Park is one of four theme parks at the Walt Disney World Resort located near Orlando, Florida. The first park built at the resort, Magic Kingdom opened Oct. 1, 1971. Designed and built by WED Enterprises, the park's layout and attractions are similar to Disneyland in Anaheim, California...
park.
In 2011, he appears on various items of clothing available for purchase at Disneyland Paris, in the shops on Main Street USA.
Oswald's career in comics
Oswald made his first comic book appearance in 1935, when DC ComicsDC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is one of the largest and most successful companies operating in the market for American comic books and related media. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment a company of Warner Bros. Entertainment, which itself is owned by Time Warner...
featured him in the series New Fun (later More Fun). His adventures, drawn by Al Stahl, were serialized one page to an issue for the magazine's first year, after which they ceased. The original black-furred version of Oswald was featured, even though Oswald was by this time a white rabbit on screen.
Oswald's second run in the comics began in 1942, when a new Oswald feature was initiated in Dell Comics
Dell Comics
Dell Comics was the comic book publishing arm of Dell Publishing, which got its start in pulp magazines. It published comics from 1929 to 1973. At its peak, it was the most prominent and successful American company in the medium...
' New Funnies, this time modeled after the latest cartoon version of Oswald and influenced by the drawing style of other Lantz comic book characters at the time. Following the typical development seen in most new comics, the New Funnies stories slowly morphed the character in their own direction.
At the start of the New Funnies feature, Oswald existed in a milieu reminiscent of Winnie the Pooh: he was portrayed as a live stuffed animal, living in a forest together with other anthropomorphized toys. These included Toby Bear, Maggie Lou the wooden doll, Hi-Yah Wahoo the turtle-faced Indian, and Woody Woodpecker
Woody Woodpecker
Woody Woodpecker is an animated cartoon character, an anthropomorphic acorn woodpecker who appeared in theatrical short films produced by the Walter Lantz animation studio and distributed by Universal Pictures...
—depicted as a mechanical doll filled with nuts and bolts (hence his "nutty" behavior). In 1944, with the addition of writer John Stanley
John Stanley (comics)
John Stanley was a comic book creator, best known for writing Little Lulu from 1945 to 1959. While mostly known for scripting, Stanley also was an accomplished artist who drew many of his stories, including the earliest Little Lulu issues. His specialty was humorous stories, both with licensed...
, the stuffed animal motif was dropped, as were Maggie Lou, Woody, and Wahoo. Oswald and Toby became flesh and blood characters living as roommates in "Lantzville". Initially drawn by Dan Gormley, the series was later drawn by the likes of Dan Noonan and Lloyd White.
In 1948, Toby adopted two orphan rabbits for Oswald to raise. Floyd and Lloyd, "Poppa Oswald's" new sons, stuck around; Toby was relegated to the sidelines, disappearing for good in 1953. Later stories focused on Oswald adventuring with his sons, seeking odd jobs, or simply protecting the boys from the likes of rabbit-eating Reddy Fox and (from 1961) con man Gabby Gator—a character adapted from contemporary Woody Woodpecker cartoon shorts. This era of Oswald comics typically featured the art of Jack Bradbury
Jack Bradbury
Jack Bradbury was an American animator and comic book artist.Bradbury began working for Disney at age 20 and was responsible for key scenes in movies like Bambi, Fantasia, and Pinocchio...
, known also for his Mickey Mouse work.
Post-1960s Oswald comics tended to be produced outside the United States, for example in Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
and Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. Through the end of the 20th century, the foreign comics carried on the look and story style of the Dell Oswald stories. More recently, they featured a "retro" attempt at recreating the original Disney Oswald.
A 1995 Bonkers
Bonkers (TV series)
Bonkers is an animated American television series that aired from September 4, 1993 to February 23, 1994 in first-run syndication . The syndicated run was available both separately, and as part of The Disney Afternoon...
comic story in Disney Adventures
Disney Adventures
Disney Adventures was a children's entertainment and educational magazine published ten times per year by The Walt Disney Company. It should not be confused with the Disney Magazine...
("Temple of Doom" in the March and April 1995 issues) had Bonkers and Lucky Piquel, in their quest to save the fabled Toonstone, meet its keeper, Nimrod the Rabbit. This character is designed looking very similar to Oswald, and also resembles how Oswald would have looked if he had gone through a redesign similar to that of Mickey's. Especially with adding pupils in the black dot eye, the same with Mickey Mouse when Fantasia
Fantasia (film)
Fantasia is a 1940 American animated film produced by Walt Disney and released by Walt Disney Productions. The third feature in the Walt Disney Animated Classics series, the film consists of eight animated segments set to pieces of classical music conducted by Leopold Stokowski, seven of which are...
was made in the late 1930s.
In 2010, Oswald starred in the digi-comic series Epic Mickey: Tales of the Wasteland, a prequel to the Epic Mickey video game, telling about what the Wasteland was like before Mickey arrived there.
2004 Oswald toy craze in Japan
Not long before Disney reacquired Oswald, Universal was marketing the character actively overseas. In 2004 and 2005, Oswald products were popular in JapanJapan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, and were primarily made available as prizes in UFO catchers
Claw vending machine
A claw crane is a type of arcade game known as a merchandiser, commonly found in video arcades, supermarkets, restaurants, movie theaters, and bowling alleys...
. Typically manufactured by Taito
Taito
Taito may mean:*Taito Corporation, a Japanese developer of video game software and arcade hardware*Taito, Tokyo, a special ward located in Tokyo, Japan*Taito, also known as matai, paramount chiefs according to Fa'a Samoa...
and/or Medicom, these products included puppet
Puppet
A puppet is an inanimate object or representational figure animated or manipulated by an entertainer, who is called a puppeteer. It is used in puppetry, a play or a presentation that is a very ancient form of theatre....
s, inflatable dolls, keyrings, and watch
Watch
A watch is a small timepiece, typically worn either on the wrist or attached on a chain and carried in a pocket, with wristwatches being the most common type of watch used today. They evolved in the 17th century from spring powered clocks, which appeared in the 15th century. The first watches were...
es. They were generally based on a navy-blue version of the original Disney/Iwerks character. Oswald made his first Disneyland appearance at Tokyo Disneyland
Tokyo Disneyland
is a 115 acre theme park at the Tokyo Disney Resort located in Urayasu, Chiba, Japan, near Tokyo. Its main gate is directly adjacent to both Maihama Station and Tokyo Disneyland Station. It was the first Disney park to be built outside of the United States and opened on April 15, 1983...
on March 31, 2010 as an Easter float.
2010 Epic Mickey appearance
Oswald plays the role of one of the central protagonists, in the WiiWii
The Wii is a home video game console released by Nintendo on November 19, 2006. As a seventh-generation console, the Wii primarily competes with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. Nintendo states that its console targets a broader demographic than that of the two others...
video game Epic Mickey
Epic Mickey
Epic Mickey is a 2010 Mickey Mouse action-adventure platforming video game designed by Warren Spector and developed by Junction Point Studios for the Wii console...
, which was released in 2010. The world of Epic Mickey is called "Wasteland" and it is similar to Walt Disney World, but it is for forgotten Disney characters, including Oswald who rules the place. Actually, Oswald fashioned it after Disneyland, but he put images of himself in the place of Mickey in the statue with Walt Disney and other places throughout the town. Oswald was the first cartoon character to be "forgotten" and inhabit Wasteland. Oswald dislikes Mickey for stealing his popularity that he felt he deserved. Oswald tries to make Wasteland a better place for forgotten characters, especially his "bunny children" and his girlfriend Ortensia. The Blot, the main villain of the game, put Oswald's girlfriend in suspended animation by soaking her in thinner. At the end of Epic Mickey, Oswald's girlfriend "Ortensia" is revived by a rain of paint caused by the death of the Blot, Oswald and Ortensia kiss and cuddle. Both Mickey and Oswald have also reconciled becoming more like true friends. And it has been confirmed that Epic Mickey will have a sequel in which Oswald will also be playable.
Reissues
- Some earlier Oswald shorts are in the public domain, and have thus been available for some years in various lower quality video and DVD compilations.
- A professional restoration of the surviving Disney Oswald shorts, under the title The Adventures of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, appeared as a two-disc volume in Walt Disney Treasures: Wave Seven, released December 11, 2007. The cartoons included Ozzie of the Mounted, Tall Timber, and a much extended version of Bright Lights, all newly rediscovered at the time.
- Six Walter Lantz Oswald cartoons, including Hells Heels and Toyland Premiere, have been included in the recent The Woody Woodpecker and Friends Classic Cartoon CollectionThe Woody Woodpecker and Friends Classic Cartoon CollectionThe Woody Woodpecker and Friends Classic Cartoon Collection is a three-disc DVD collection of theatrical cartoons produced by Walter Lantz Productions for Universal Pictures between 1940 and 1956...
Vol. 1 DVD. - Five additional Lantz Oswald shorts, including Wax Works and Springtime Serenade, are included in The Woody Woodpecker and Friends Classic Cartoon Collection: Volume 2The Woody Woodpecker and Friends Classic Cartoon Collection: Volume 2The Woody Woodpecker and Friends Classic Cartoon Collection: Volume 2 is a three-disc DVD collection of theatrical cartoons starring Woody Woodpecker and the other Lantz characters , produced by Walter Lantz Productions for Universal Pictures between 1932 and 1958...
DVD. - The full version of Oh, What A Knight is included as an unlockable cartoon in Epic MickeyEpic MickeyEpic Mickey is a 2010 Mickey Mouse action-adventure platforming video game designed by Warren Spector and developed by Junction Point Studios for the Wii console...
by collecting various film reels in the game.
See also
- Animation in the United States during the silent eraAnimation in the United States during the silent eraAnimated films in the United States date back to at least 1906 when Vitagraph released Humorous Phases of Funny Faces. Although early animations were rudimentary they rapidly became more sophisticated with such classics as Gertie the Dinosaur in 1914, Felix the Cat, and Koko the Clown.Originally a...
- Golden Age of American animation