> those stories have always been public domain and you can write a book or movie about them with no problem.
Those stories were retelling of stories which were retelling of stories which were... Disney made it law that no one is allowed to retell their stories but them. Approaching or alluding to their retelling can carry stiff penalties. It's antithetical to a universal human institution that has existed since before recorded history.
This is interesting to think about. The Disney retellings in some ways are evolutionary winners that are also dead ends. Outside of Disney they can’t evolve unlike pre-Disney. The Disney retellings are so popular that other retellings are almost extinct. When Disney goes away, does the story lineages disappear? Do copies of older retellings resurge? Do totally different story lineages take the place of the Disney stories?
It would be interesting to do a study on popular myths/fairy tales that have and have not been adapted by huge media companies.
For example, if I search "Beowulf" in Amazon, the first link is for 2007 movie, the second for the book, and the third for a TV show. If I search for "The Little Mermaid", the whole page is dominated by the Disney franchise or some off-brand adaptations. Hans Christian Andersen's book is nowhere to be seen.
Those stories are dead. Most people think Disney came up with all of their ideas and have no idea that most of them stem from ancient stories--some existed before writing as we know it.
They will probably dig up these stories from Sumeria (tablets in UK) or other yet un-studied texts some day and rehash them completely anew...starting the cycle again.
Heck, the bible has a lot of good stuff if you can shed the religious/Christian connotations.
> They will probably dig up these stories from Sumeria
Yes, a Snow Crash reference! Chapter 28:
"'Rife Bible College, which he founded , has the richest archaeology department in the world. They have been conducting a dig in Eridu, which was the cult center of a Sumerian god named Enki.'"
[...]
"'Sumer was a civilization of clay. They made their buildings of it and wrote on it, too. . . . So all the data of the Sumerians have survived. Egypt left a legacy of art and architecture; Sumer's legacy is its megabytes.'"
[...]
"'If there was some phenomenon that moved through the population, altering their minds in such a way that they couldn't process the Sumerian language anymore. Kind of in the same way that a virus moves from one computer to another, damaging each computer in the same way. Coiling around the brainstem.'"
Those stories were retelling of stories which were retelling of stories which were... Disney made it law that no one is allowed to retell their stories but them. Approaching or alluding to their retelling can carry stiff penalties. It's antithetical to a universal human institution that has existed since before recorded history.