Disney just revived a character it lost the rights to in 1928

To celebrate Disney’s 100th anniversary, the studio released a new animated short featuring one of the company’s oldest and most forgotten characters, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.

If you’ve heard of Oswald, it may be because the character appeared in the 2010 game. epic mickey. Walt Disney and animator Ub Iwerks designed the brave rabbit in 1927 while their fledgling animation studio was under contract to Universal Pictures. Oswald starred in a number of popular shorts, but when Universal claimed ownership of the character and continued to produce Oswald shorts without Disney, it removed the rabbit from its own stable of animated characters and created Mickey Mouse as a replacement to be owned by Disney. your company.

Oswald returned to the ownership of the Walt Disney Corporation in 2006, and while the character has subsequently appeared in games, merchandise, and in the parks, this is his first appearance in an animated short since.

“Oswald is such a brave rascal. We wanted to bring Oswald back, and in short, he literally returns to his original home, the movie screen,” says director Eric Goldberg. “We wanted Oswald to do the whole ‘smash and stretch,’ ‘rubber hose,’ style of animation, celebrating that first generation of Walt Disney artists.”

The short is currently available on YouTube.