As recently as last year, the future looked bright to me as a fan of Lucasfilm– not just a Star Wars fan, but an admirer of the company assembled by George Lucas to create a variety of entertainment. For the first time since the Walt Disney Company purchased the studio outright from Lucas in 2012, it was being permitted to flourish outside the borders of A Galaxy Far, Far Away. We were getting not only a new Indiana Jones film– the fifth and theoretically final in the franchise– but also a Willow sequel series following up on the events of the 1988 Ron Howard adventure/fantasy movie. We also got a new Monkey Island game for the first time in a while from Lucasfilm Games, but that’s sort of beside the point I’m trying to make here.
Cut to last fall, when Willow debuted on Disney+ and evidently underperformed. I wasn’t the world’s biggest fan of the show– I thought it relied a bit too heavily on fourth-wall-breaking comic relief– but I did think it was pretty good overall, featured a really fun cast of characters plus some excellent visual effects, and displayed a lot of potential for future seasons (two of which were, by the way, teased in the finale’s credits). And now after a sudden cancellation back in March, the Willow series is being removed from Disney+ entirely.
A decade or two ago this wouldn’t mean much, but in the streaming era Disney+ is currently the only way to legally watch Willow, which means that after this Friday anyone who would like to check out the show would have to do so using means that I assume Disney discourages– downloading it from any number of pirate file-sharing websites. There’s no Blu-ray, no DVD, no way to purchase it on Amazon or by other means. Willow is effectively being wiped from existence by the company that green-lighted and paid for its creation, and it’s not alone. Other Disney+ originals like Big Shot starring John Stamos, The Jim Henson Company’s innovative puppet talk show Earth to Ned, and the kid-lit adaptation The Mysterious Benedict Society are also going bye-bye with no indication whatsoever of if and when they might appear again. Now, I am not a business-minded person in any fashion, but my (admittedly very limited) understanding of the reasons why these shows (among other content) are being removed is for money-saving purposes, so Disney can write off their losses come tax season and cease paying the talent involved royalties on output that has underperformed.
I get that Disney exists as a company to turn a profit. I truly understand that, I do. But what kind of a precedent is this debacle setting for creatives coming into (or already in) a business that so heavily relies on their talent? The lesson here is clear: if your efforts are not immediately, massively successful, they can and will be deleted. Not just canceled, which is much less of an unheard-of surprise for a TV show that’s not raking in the bucks, but wiped from our servers. Now, while the above-mentioned Stamos has called “BS” on Disney’s move via Twitter, Willow showrunner Jonathan Kasdan has taken a decidedly more diplomatic approach, saying that he’s actually “kinda into it” because it reminds him of how Disney animated movies would disappear into the Vault for a while when he was a kid. The difference here, of course, is that when Bambi was released on VHS, fans at the very least had the opportunity to make it part of their permanent collections. I’ll also mention that Kasdan’s comments strike me as overly optimistic, just as when he opined that the series wasn’t necessarily canceled, in those traditional terms, when that news broke in March.
So what is the solve here? I don’t think anyone expects Disney to keep dumping money into something that isn’t generating them a return, like the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser immersive resort experience that also announced its closure on the same day last week. In my opinion, the least that Disney could do is offer up the Willow series– in addition to the other Disney+ original films and TV shows being removed from the service– for purchase, either on physical media or digital download, or both. Would that mean they would no longer be able to claim the material as a loss on their taxes? Maybe, I don’t know. But it would show support for the content, at the very least, and allow the company to continue sharing whatever profits are made with the people who deserve them– the creative minds that brought this entertainment to life on the screen. To do otherwise seems crass to me in a way that I didn’t really imagine Disney to be capable of. This is a company that was created to bring people joy– yes, in exchange for money– not to remove any chance of consuming it altogether.
And as far as Lucasfilm goes, last year I had hoped we were entering into a new era where the now-Disney-owned subdivision would be allowed to spread its wings and explore new (or at least different) territory, much like George Lucas himself did with the company throughout the 1980s and beyond. Instead it seems as though Lucasfilm will recede back into the position of only churning out Star Wars, and not even at the rate we had come to expect from the first few years of Disney+. Willow and the Galactic Starcruiser were both somewhat experimental outings (tied to existing properties, of course) that I do believe could have found their footing with the right amount of attention and the proper marketing. That didn’t pan out, as we know, but I’d really hate to see the wrong lesson learned from this– that Disney has to restrict its subdivisions to sticking with proven formulas and intellectual properties. There are only so many Toy Storys and Frozens that can be made, after all. At some point somebody’s going to have to come up with the next big thing, and the only way to do that is to experiment.
It’s a tough, tumultuous time for the entertainment industry. I understand that as well. But as current CEO Bob Iger steers the Walt Disney Company toward the future and makes efforts to figure out what the company needs to be during this transitional period, I hope that it can learn to embrace its missteps instead of sweeping them under the rug, which is what this admittedly very disheartening Disney+ move comes across as to me. Even this collection of shows and movies that didn’t quite “move the needle” on a grand scale have found passionate fans and devotees who are willing to go to bat for them. That’s why I’ll conclude this opinion piece by asking one last time for Disney to make this content available legally in some form or another. I’ve never been in favor of media piracy, as it takes away compensation from the creative talent involved– not to mention the company who fronted the bill in the first place– so I’d really hate for that to be the only option.
As it stands, Willow will be removed from Disney+ this Friday, May 26th.