On Disneyland and Magic
To me, the thing about Disney is that they are integrated into my childhood which means they play a specific role in my formative years. For some time now I’ve shuffled my feet when confronted head on with the truth of my affection for the company and its intellectual property, especially as terms like “intellectual property” have crept into my vocabulary and the cynicism of adulthood has crowded out the blissful ignorance of youth. Disappointments along the way as well as just a pseudo-hipster posture of being sort of half annoyed by everything, particularly if it has intentionally broad commercial appeal had soured me somewhat on thinking of myself as a fan of any corporate entity. I catch myself doing this even with companies that my behavior would indicate places me squarely in the fanboy camp like Apple or Google or Marvel or TiVo or Fantasy Flight Games. It’s as if my smirking, shrugging adopted attitude of feigned nonchalance insulates me from the horrific outward impression of enthusiasm.
And yet I continue to wax philosophical about the aspects of favored enterprises. Case in point, when I think of Disney I dissect it down to the point where I acknowledge that I admire the way that Disney, when they’re being successful in my eyes, are a company that focuses on aesthetic. This harkens back to what Stephenson referred to when he talked about Disney as purveyors of excellence in interface design; it’s visible in the whimsical title animation, now updated from the stylized Disney castle logo of my childhood and beyond the reminiscent 3D one found on Disney/Pixar films, including a chugging train, a quiet dusk setting and a tranquil river leading to a triumphant castle, all towering spires and soft orange lighting. As fireworks light the sky above the waving banners, a sparkling arc of pixie dust hastens the fade in of the company logo and the orchestra swells with an overture of “When You Wish Upon A Star.” In these 30 seconds, Disney conveys a number of things about what they represent, or at least what they mostly try to embody: Hope, dreams, imagination, wonder, and a child-like innocence rooted firmly in a sanitized version of the past that—hopefully—still applies today.
Truth is, I like the concept, perhaps even the worldview, that Disney, to varying degrees of success, traffics in. Worlds where phrases such as “Happily Ever After” aren’t scoff-worthy, where fairies and princesses burst into catchy songs, where tough times are just obstacles to overcome on journeys of self-discovery (often with the comic relief of anthropomorphized animal companions), where wishes and dreams and books and imagination are virtuous, where love can happen with a glance and where magic just is. The adult in me knows there are issues with this perspective, and particularly in the way Disney has handled their own ouvre: The whitebread protagonist syndrome (even dipping into darker, overt racism in earlier work), the implied materialism, the sometimes conflicted role of women or the frequently one-dimensional male figure offering timely salvation, the simplistic moral reductionism and so on. Better minds than mine have and will continue to pick apart the stories and products Disney produces, but those grown-up critiques are separate from the point that on its best days, Disney resonates with kids and with adults who are  still able to divorce their world weariness from their inner child and find joy in movies about dreamers, attractions featuring singing bunnies and shorts about an affable talking mouse and his slapstick-happy pals.
Disney isn’t a charity enterprise, and money sullies everything, so naturally there will be problems inherent with blind acceptance; no one wants indoctrination or the creation of the Cult of Disney. Excessive merchandising, hasty direct-to-video sequels, and inflated premium-brand pricing exists to mine the pockets of exhausted parents. Even the very act of creating that Disney mythos leads to princess culture and pink femininity which can itself be worrisome. It’s easy to over think it. Ahem. Obviously.
It was probably during our second session on Tuesday that it started to dawn on me as I struggled to not burden Callie with a toddler’s incessant need for reassurance that she was, in fact, having a good time and was understanding how cool everything was. It started during a solo stint where Nik and her sister, Sam, and Sam’s husband Chase went off in search of lunch that Callie and I weren’t as interested in. We wandered through “a bug’s land” in California Adventure and she noted an elaborate water play area, one side designed like a giant outdoor water spigot with a concrete hose running and the leaky connector poured a fine mist of rain over an area; around the other side of the land the faux hose terminated with a giant sprinkler head that shot water in hops and jumps from both the functional head and several jets set into the ground. We weren’t fully prepared for a soaked child, but it was hot and Callie kept asking about it. At once I felt my mantle as responsible father, constantly worrying about safety and preparedness and mindful limits, slip off completely. “Yeah, buddy,” I heard myself say, “you can play in the water. We’ll figure it out afterward.”
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