Oswald the Lucky Rabbit: Difference between revisions

''You'll be lucky, too!''|'''The [[Walter Lantz]] Oswald theme'''.}}

Still inspired by his viewings of [[Charlie Chaplin]] films, [[Winsor McCay]]'s "[[Gertie the Dinosaur]]", as well as [[Otto Messmer]]'s [[Felix the Cat]] and Paul Terry's "Aesop's Fables" and [[Fleischer Studios|Max Fleischer's]] ''[[Out of the Inkwell]]'', Walt began striving for higher-quality animation and more dynamic use of rubber-hose animation, as well as much heavier emphasis on personality, story-based gags, and much more attention to story -- this made the series a huge advancement over Walt's earlier [[Alice Comedies]].

But alas, his success with Oswald was not to last. In 1928, Disney got into a hassle with Charles Mintz, then ''de facto'' boss of Winkler Pictures. When Disney confronted Mintz to ask for a budget increase (so that he could continue improving his animation standards), he was told not only that he would receive no budget increase, but that he had to accept a 20% budget ''decrease''. As if things weren't bad enough, Mintz informed Walt that he had hired away most of Walt's animation staff under a new contract -— and in the biggest blow of all, he reminded Walt that he technically ''did not own the character or trademark rights to Oswald''. (In fact, it has been said that Charles Mintz actually chose the name for Oswald out of a hat.) So Mintz gave Disney an ultimatum: take the budget cut and loss of staff control, or lose the right to use Oswald altogether.

[[Foregone Conclusion|We all know how this turned out, folks]]. After completing the remaining Oswald cartoons they were contracted to make, Walt, Ub, and their two apprentice animators who stuck with them, Les Clark and Wilfred Jackson, left Winkler and Universal altogether. Walt, very hurt by the ordeal, learned from there on out to be his own boss, and to always make sure that he owned the full rights to every character he owned.

Meanwhile, back at [[Universal]], Charles Mintz got a second season of cartoons made starring Oswald...but was soon handed over to [[Walter Lantz]], a former Winkler director who would now open a studio of his own, after he won the rights to Oswald in a poker game. Over the next few years, Oswald continued to star in moderately successful cartoons, at least prior to the mid-30's. Lantz, with the help of industry veteran [[Bill Nolan]] and young staffers like [[Tex Avery]] (who would occasionally direct a few shorts in Nolan's steed), took the Oswald series into a more cartoony, fantasy driven direction than what Walt had done with him, distinguishing Oswald from being merely Disney's take on [[Felix the Cat]]. The animation became much more loose and organic than Disney's product due to Nolan's fast speed, a compensation for Lantz's low budgets on the series, and the strong narratives and personality were dropped in favor of improvised, freewheeling musical-oriented fests, with plenty of off the wall animation to boot. Oddly, Oswald had no regular voice actor in the Lantz era (apart from a period of about a year-and-a-half early on, when Pinto Colvig regularly served as his voice), and studio staff would just take turns voicing him.

You can find information on the [[Walter Lantz]] Oswald shorts on the [https://web.archive.org/web/20101219063815/http://lantz.goldenagecartoons.com/ Walter Lantz Cartune Encyclopedia].

* [[Anti-VillainHero]]: When [[Mickey Mouse]] first arrives in [[Crapsack World|the Cartoon Wasteland]] in ''[[Disney Epic Mickey]]'', [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit|Oswald]] sets up obstacles in his pathwants to prevent [[Mickey Mouse|Mickey]] from [[Follow the White Rabbit|followingget him]]. And it's repeatedly hinted at after that that [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit|Oswald]] plans to steal [[MacGuffin|Mickey's heart]] and use the Moonliner Rocket to escape [[Crapsack World|the Wasteland]]. So, all in all, he's aout Typeof IIwasteland.

** The ''[[House of Mouse]]'' character Dennis the Duck, from the [[Retraux]] episode of the same name, also seems to be one of [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit|Oswald]].

* [[Explosive Breeder]]: In ''[[Epic Mickey]]'', [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit|Oswald]] and his [[Interspecies Romance|feline]] love Ortensia have 420 bunny kids.

* [[Leitmotif]]: The [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit|Oswald]] DVD set gives him one in the newly orchestrated scores.

* [[R EmakeRemake]]: [[Disney]] later remade ''Sky Scrappers'' as the [[Mickey Mouse]] short ''[[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|Building A Building]]''.

* [[Everything Sounds Sexier in French]]: The duet Oswald and his cat girlfriend (here referred to as "Marie") sing in "Not So Quiet".

* [[Leitmotif]]: [[Oswald the Lucky Rabbit|Oswald]] has a leitmotif in this series in the form of a snippet of the song "Turkey in the Straw." Funny, considering that was the [[Steamboat Willie|same song played in the first hit]] [[Mickey Mouse|of his half-brother.]]

* [[Lost Him in a Card Game]]: In a meta-example, this was how Lantz gained the rights to Oswald from Universal founder Carl Laemmle.

** Hot For Hollywood (1930): A print exists, but it has no soundtrack.

* [[Please Shoot the Messenger]]: (General) Pegleg Pete does this to Oswald in "Not So Quiet".

* [[Stock Footage]]: "The Unpopular Mechanic" reuses animation from "The Barnyard Five".

* [[Super Strength]]: It revealed in Oswald cartoons "Fiery Firemen" and "Not So Quiet" that Oswald have super strength. In the end of "Fiery Fireman", Oswald could lift a hippo with just one hand. In "Not So Quiet", Oswald was carrying a gun a few times of his own height and weight and when he was about to be shot at sunrise he shattered many cannonballs that were firing at him into pieces with just one punch. Oswald have shattered shooting cannonballs before in "Great Guns" made during the Disney/Iwerks era of Oswald, when was Fanny was still his girlfriend.

[[Category:Works by Walter Lantz]]