As Disney looks to revive Oswald the Lucky Rabbit for an upcoming Disney Plus series, Epic Mickey director Warren Spector commented on the game's role in bringing the character back.
At the latest D23 event – amid all of the Marvel and Star Wars announcements and Kingdom Hearts 4 news – Jon Favreau introduced a first look at his upcoming Disney Plus animation and live action series Oswald. This features Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, who was created by Walt Disney before Mickey Mouse. Disney was unable to use the character for decades, as he was owned by Universal, but in 2006 then-Disney president Bob Iger spearheaded an effort to bring him back into the fold for a video game.
That's Oswald video game project that would become Epic Mickey, which was led by Warren Spector – a developer best known for legendary immersive sims like Deus Ex and Thief.
Spector posted about the Oswald series' new reveal on LinkedIn, saying "I’m seriously looking forward to it but it seems as if people are looking at it as the debut of the character. Call me small-minded but that ain’t right." Spector explains that with Epic Mickey, "the team at Junction Point featured Oswald in his first Disney role since 1928," adding that 2012's Epic Mickey 2 "was the first time he ever spoke in a Disney story." He also notes that "we gave Ortensia her name, her voice, her personality and her role as Oswald’s paramour. None of that dates back to Disney."
"I have to admit that I’m a little bitter about the lack of credit the team gets for all this," Spector adds, explaining, "I was blown away that Disney trusted us and saw fit to reintroduce the little guy in a game. But the team did a great job and deserves to be recognized for it before Hollywood makes people forget the games ever existed."
The series will reportedly feature a plot similar to Epic Mickey, in which Oswald realises he'd been replaced by Mickey while he remained forgotten for so many years. This time around, it features Oswald in the real world, as opposed to Mickey ending up in Oswald's world. Perhaps the developers will get their due in the full series, but how rarely comic creators have gotten their dues in the credits of MCU movies, I could easily see this pivotal part of Oswald's history remain unmentioned.
