Did You Know that there’s Censorship on Disney+! — Immortallium’s Blog
I don’t think there can be any doubt that Disney+ has been a massive success with an estimated 73.7 million subscribers as of the 20th of September 2020. I can still remember the massive hype surrounding the service as it approached its 12th of November 2019 release and it seems that many people are pleased with the content. However, it’s important to know that several of Disney+’s releases feature censorship in strange and unusual ways.
The confusion surrounding censorship on Disney+ began with a statement that plays before several of their programs/films. Basically, it states that the program/film is presented in its original form but contains outdated depictions. This may seem to be acceptable (a similar statement appears in a lot of Osamu Tezuka’s manga) but the problem lies in the fact that the programs/films ARE censored with films such as the 1992 Aladdin, Toy Story 2 and Lilo & Stitch featuring censorship despite possessing this message. The statement was altered recently and now features a message that I find surprisingly similar to Whoopi Goldberg’s message at the beginning of the Looney Tunes Golden Collection. Even so, the fact that censorship is occurring while Disney continue to claim that the programs/films are presented in their original form is, as you might imagine, something that I’m fundamentally opposed to.
Something else that is rather strange are the methods that Disney are using to censor these programs/films. As I mentioned in my article “ My Thoughts on Censorship in Manga “, while I am opposed to censorship in general, preferring to watch the original work whether or not it contains offensive material, it is also important that, if censorship is present, it be imperceptible, with the viewer unaware that any censorship has taken place.
Instead, what we are seeing are some terrible censorship jobs that are surprisingly amateurish considering all of the money and talent Disney have under their disposal. One of the more amusing examples of this comes from the 1984 fantasy romantic comedy film “Splash”. The scene in question features Tom Hanks’ character receiving a kiss from a naked mermaid (played by Daryl Hannah) who then proceeds to run into the ocean. In the original version, you briefly see Daryl Hannah’s backside but the Disney+ version features a very unconvincing CG shot to extend her hair to cover her bottom. While I don’t believe that the film should have been censored in the first place, it is unbelievable that Disney considered this visual effect to be acceptable.
Another excellent example of this clumsy censorship comes from the seemingly harmless Wizards of Waverly Place. In a particular episode of the show, the character Theresa Russo (played by Maria Canals-Barrera) wears a top that reveals a, I really want to emphasise this next word, tiny amount of cleavage. Disney decided that they needed to censor this and they ultimately decided to blur the offending area with what appears to be a basic blur tool used in programs such as Photoshop. As you might imagine, the effect is very distracting and causes the show to suffer for it.
However, it’s important to note that not all censorship decisions come directly from Disney. The Simpsons’ season 3 opening episode “Stark Raving Dad”, the episode that featured singer Michael Jackson, is absent from Disney+ but, in contrast to the previous examples, the decision to pull the episode wasn’t made by Disney but by the Simpsons producers many months before the release of Disney+. Around March in 2019, a HBO documentary named Leaving Neverland was aired that accused Michael Jackson of sexually assaulting children. In response, the Simpsons producers decided to pull the episode from circulation which included any streaming services that the Simpsons was available on.
Disney+ is an important service, particularly during this harrowing time where it provides a source of entertainment for people, but it’s important that we know that programs/films on the service are censored and call them out when they claim that certain content features no censorship. Let me know your thoughts on Disney+ and censorship, what examples you have come across, if you know any examples other than the Simpsons where content was censored prior to being released on Disney+ and any additional information you might have on the topic.
Hopefully you have found this article interesting and informative and, if you wish to seek any of the works I mentioned, don’t hesitate to use amazon.co.uk or amazon.com for all of your needs!
Originally published at https://immortalliumblog.com on November 26, 2020.