Disney brought back one of its oldest characters to star in his first in-house short in over 94 years on Thursday. Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, which is available on the studio’s YouTube channel, sees the titular character getting into some 1920s-style mischief and comes as Disney gears up for its 100th anniversary next year.
Oswald, who was created by studio co-founder Walt Disney in 1927, was among the first animated characters with a distinct personality. He debuted in that year’s Trolley Troubles and showed up in a bunch of shorts subsequently.
However, Walt lost the rights to use Oswald in 1928. This drove him and animator Ub Iwerks to co-create a replacement character — Mickey Mouse. Oswald showed up in a bunch of shorts over the next decade, but gradually faded into obscurity.
In 2006, Disney CEO Bob Iger (who returned to the role last month) made a deal with NBC/Universal to bring Oswald home. He’s shown up in video games like 2010’s Epic Mickey, on merchandise and in the parks since then, but Thursday brought us his first Disney-produced short since 1928.
“Oswald is such a plucky scamp. We wanted to bring Oswald back, and in the short, he literally returns to his original home, the movie screen,” director Eric Goldberg said in a release. “We wanted to have Oswald do all of the ‘squash-and-stretch,’ ‘rubber hose’-animation style, celebrating that first generation of Walt Disney’s artists.”
Also Thursday, Disney launched an Oswald Snapchat lens globally so you can hang out with an augmented reality (AR) version of the character. Which would probably have blown Walt’s mind.
