Pre-class post for Dorfman and Mattelart

The first thing I asked myself after reading this piece was what would the authors say about the presence of a father-figure, yet absence of a mother in many of the Disney “princess” movies? Granted these authors are responding to the comics specifically, and some of the original characters of Disney that existed before Walt died. They seemed to attack Walt personally rather than Disney as a company. This is understandable on some level, but what would they say now that he is gone and there is more than one person in charge of writing and creating Disney fiction? How much, if any, does the parent-child relationship change when there is a physical parent present? In the text they claim “physical presence would be superfluous, even counterproductive” (127). Why then, would the creators of Disney today offer cartoons and films with parents present? Granted there is a huge gap in time and a huge change between a few guys in a small studio and the corporate conglomerate that Disney is today. I would say there has to be at least a slight change in the vision of the company from Walt writing as the father these authors discuss and the staff in charge now (which may be a collection of “Walts” or maybe an entirely different generation of creators). Of course, you could argue that this staff is of a generation raised on the very comics that these authors are critiquing. Which, if they are correct, would mean these individuals were once the “pure child” who “will replace the corrupt father, preserving the latter’s values” (126).