Another Year, Another Disney+ Discussion

Well, my Disney+ rolled over again; it must be time to talk about the state of the service again.

Actually, an article recently came out listing 32 Disney movies you’ve never heard of. Long-time readers will be unsurprised to know that I’ve seen 29 of them, and one of them is only a co-production with Disney anyway. Heck, I’ve covered most of them for this column, and friends, a lot of movies we’ve covered have been more obscure than The Great Mouse Detective. I had, on the other hand, once again forgotten Condorman exists. It is not on Disney+. But on the list was also The Castaway Cowboy, perpetual column punching bag, which is, yes, still available.

The Vault is still not fully open, and we still aren’t talking about Song of the South. Sure, also not Song of the South, but Make Mine Music remains unavailable. Not even with the warning they’ve started putting at the beginning of things. This is the bare minimum for an open Vault to me, and we haven’t gotten it. There are an awful lot of live-action movies, especially given we aren’t just looking at Disney properties, and a huge amount of TV, to say nothing of the shorts. However, the bare minimum for a true opening of the Disney Vault is the release of the entire theatrical-release Disney animated feature collection. Which they have not done.

Speaking of collections, let’s talk about their collection concept. In theory, it’s a good one. Even, to a certain extent, in practice. Sure, it’s ambitious to call something a “collection” if it’s two movies, one short, and an upcoming short series, but sure, it’s nice to have it all in one place. Their collections of minority voice-themed programming are also a good idea, though I haven’t gone through them to see how well done the actual collections are. (I could do that now, but I got distracted by the idea of watching Melody Time.) What annoys me is that they’ve no longer given us the option of searching the collection by decade.

That is because there is a shocking lack of interest given to the older Disney properties. Mickey, sure, and a few of the older animated features. But only some of them. And that’s in my recommendations, despite my watching almost nothing but classic stuff and some of the newer documentaries. (And the entire animated canon except the You’d Have To Pay Me Trio.) You can watch all of Zorro now, except I think for the movies, but of course the movies are part of the stuff made for The Wonderful World of Disney, almost none of which is on the service. I understand why they haven’t put literal decades of content from it up, but as I do keep saying, Walt is surprisingly absent from Disney+.

There are five movies with Tommy Kirk on the service, and that includes both Absent-Minded Professor movies, where he’s a minor character. Annette Funicello’s only search results are for Babes in Toyland and The Shaggy Dog, though the availability of Zorro proves that’s incomplete. Dean Jones does pretty well with eight results; Hayley Mills proves the search function is broken with three results, none of which are the available-on-the-service Pollyanna. Kurt Russell will get you six, if you upgrade and get access to Silkwood and Tombstone, though that doesn’t include his MCU appearance. Jodie Foster has two of her four.

Look, I know I care more about the older stuff than most people, but I will die on the hill that it’s part of Disney’s problem. If nothing else, they could be pulling some of those sweet, sweet Boomer dollars. My mom’s Silent Generation, barely, so her possible childhood crush on Guy Williams isn’t part of this—though, again, it’s covered. But Stephen King’s a Boomer and I’m sure would appreciate some classic Annette. It’s clear they’re hitting for the Millennials with their wealth of made-for-Disney Channel stuff, and it’s true that one of the problems I had with the Disney Channel in their childhood was that it was already turning away from the Vault. When I was in college, there was Vault Disney, but that went off the air within a few years.

But even so, the programming should be there if you want it and easy to find if you’re looking for it. There are lots of ways you could use it as a draw, and lots of ways to make it interesting. They’re clearly trying to draw a younger demographic, with live streaming options—I haven’t looked into those much, either, but I know the Criterion Channel’s been getting praise for something similar. And goodness knows there’s the idea of parents raising their kids Disney, as I am indeed doing myself. But I also think there’s room to get the kids hooked the way I was, the way I am, let’s be real, hooking my own kids.

One of the collections they’re offering me is the Predator collection, and that one I did look at; it told me the content’s unavailable. I suspect I’d have to bundle with Hulu, though for $175 a year, they could bundle that for me. I know roughly $14 a month isn’t as high as it could be, but it’s started going up every year, and it’s a big chunk of every November’s budget for me. I know Walt’s vision was Family Friendly, and I do appreciate the family programming. I dealt with the election by watching Nazi-punching media, and it was nice to have Bedknobs and Broomsticks and The Rocketeer as options. But my daughter couldn’t watch Moana on her profile because she was too young, and that’s taking things too far.