Is Iron Man Vs. Goofy Next?

A soft rain pours into Spiderman’s eyes. He slowly creeps down the skyscraper and tilts his head as if peering into a window. He shoots a gentle web onto the window sill and slides it open. Once inside, his Spidey sense tingles like never before. Somebody is inside. He prepares himself for the worst. He turns the corner and sees a giant mouse sitting in his favorite easy chair.

“Hi-ya, Pal. How you been?” retorts the rat with over-sized ears.

Spiderman knows a new era has dawned.

Ok, so this may be overstating the point, but it was announced recently that Disney has decided to purchase Marvel Entertainment. As you can imagine it has stirred a lot of debate in and around comic book circles as to where this leaves both Marvel and, more importantly, the fans of both! Although I can only dream of a Spiderman-Mickey Mouse crossover or a Wolverine Meets The Lion King Special Widescreen Edition, I find it only fair to look at both companies as a whole before making my judgment.

Let’s start with Disney. When Michael Eisner was the head of Disney I boycotted Mickey and the Gang for several years. I didn’t like the way Disney treated their artists and, quite frankly, their movies were crap. So, I stopped watching them and supporting them altogether. Disney first threw a monkey wrench into my boycotting ways when I learned they bought Pixar in 2006. I had to make a choice—include Pixar in my “Disney is Communist” mantra or find a different route. I chose a different route. Pixar is just too good.

Now that Eisner is out of the picture I feel I made the right decision about not boycotting Pixar. I will say the idea of having a Pixar movie marathon just to catch up on all the films I would’ve boycotted would be an awesome party, but I’m glad I enjoyed them all in the theater. I liken the acquisition of Pixar to that of Marvel Entertainment. It’s not going to stop production (hopefully) and maybe make Marvel even bigger than they are now (like Walmart big). Now that I put it that way Disney might be trying to take over the world.

Now let’s look at Marvel. They have been one of the most successful comic book entities in history. They have given us numerous icons that will go down in history. Money wise? They’ve seen their fair share of roller coaster economics. They have been “saved” by the likes of Todd Macfarlane, Joe Quasada, and others many times over. Just when you think they are down, they come back stronger than before. Like them or hate them, they have managed to persevere.

So where does this leave the fans? Let’s take a look at Pixar. There was a heated battle between Steve Jobs (yes, the Mac guy) and Eisner in early 2004. Jobs owned Pixar at this point (yes, the man’s a genius) and was looking for potential buyers. Eisner wanted to control the marketing and the distribution of the films. Jobs said Pixar was perfectly capable of marketing and the two butted heads for months. In the end, Disney bought Pixar, Eisner has faded from memory and Jobs is smelling like a rose while contemplating his next big Apple project (no, I can’t wait). In the end, everybody won.

I see this is being the case for Marvel. Do I expect this to be easy? No. You have two giant corporate, creative minds with ideas how to advance the company forward. There will be some debating and it may even get nasty. However, when you see Joe Quasada riding Magic Mountain and wearing a combination of Mickey Mouse ears and a Wolverine T-shirt you can bet all is right with the world again.

Let’s face it. Pixar is a god in the movie industry. Disney realized the best way to make money from them is to step back and let them do their thing. If they are truly intelligent they will know Marvel has enough fanfare and talent to keep going for the next 30 years. If Disney helps facilitate their needs they can give me one episode of X-Men Vs. Mickey Mouse Club!