Please sign the "Save Roger Rabbit" petition

[Philip Kippel]

Here's something I've been wanting to share with you all. I know it's not Muppet/Henson-related, so that's why I'm posting it here on the General Discussion...

Earlier this year, I created a petition to try and get Disney and Amblin Entertainment to put aside their differences so that Roger Rabbit and his co-stars (Jessica, Baby Herman, Benny the Cab, the Weasels, etc.) can be able to appear in new Disney projects.

As a lover of Roger Rabbit and Co., I have been very disappointed with not seeing new Roger Rabbit stuff and not seeing him in the Disney Theme Parks.

As of today (9/22/2002), the current number of signatures is 754.

The address for this petition is:

http://www.petitiononline.com/RRABBIT/petition.html

P-P-P-P-P-P-Please sign it and tell others about it.

Thank you.

 

[frogboy4]

As a longtime fan of the film and owner of original artwork from the production - i most certainly will sign the petition. I always found the fight quite silly and rather greedy (mostly on Disney's part by not sharing the shorts with Spielverg films).

Nonetheless - I say free the rabbit. Oh, that didn't sound right!

 

[Bean Bunny]

Well, Disney is releasing a special edition 2-Disc DVD next year of the film with new menu animation and boat load of extras.

 

[frogboy4]

eeeeeek! that last release really did kind of bite. and i never found the preview that was supposed to be on it.

 

[Traveling Matt]

Sure thing, Philip.

WFRR is one of my all-time favs!

- Billy

 

[Crazy Harry]

Is this why the rabbit got left out of Kingdom Hearts?

 

[Drtooth]

Stupid copyrights always mess with our fun! Let's hope the Rabbit will return, and the Muppets have a nice long stay!

Obviously I signed!

 

[beaker]

I think what people dont realize, is how rare it was for something like Roger Rabbit to happen...the late 80's were a rare, magical time. Disney and Spielberg's Amblin entertainment would be difficult to pull together int he 90's or now, and the rights to use all the non Looney Tunes/Disney characters they used...oh man, a pure trademark rights logistical nightmare.

Btw, when exactly did the bad blood between these two happen?
As they did produce some shorts after the movie.

Anyways, I would love to see more Roger Rabbit...one of the coolest cinema experiences of the late 80's. That film was a cartoon lovers dream, as it was in my opinion the ultimate company crossover ever. Sadly, Disney and Amblin dont like to play nice anymore.

>>>Well, Disney is releasing a special edition 2-Disc DVD next year of the film with new menu animation and boat load of extras<<<

Theyre not gonna butcher the film are they again? I know for the first dvd they totally bungled up Baby's opening int he interest of 'politically correct'. (PG was a much more lenient rating in the 80's) But now that the PC times arehopefully over, Disney needs to release RR uncut, and finally release Song of the South.
There should be a petition for that as well.

As for Roger Rabbit in Kingdom Hearts, that would have been great. But again, the mouse and the ET cant play nice.

 

[tygerbug]

The man who animated Roger Rabbit, Richard Williams, is about as far from Disney as you can get, and one of the greatest animators of our times. You can learn an immense amount from his work ... I highly recommend his book "The Animator's Survival Kit," and if you ever get a chance to research his "lost" film The Thief and the Cobbler, which he worked on for 30 years, please do, it's a wonderful film which is unfortunately only available today in a butchered version ... the horribly butchered cut (butchered by Disney!) you can rent at any video shop (and probably should, but you may have to watch it with the sound off, as the soundtrack openly mocks the film ... I told you it was a butchered cut .... all the best scenes are removed for no clear reason and there is MST3K-like commentary over the entire film ... not to mention a lot of bad animation inserted into Williams' unfinished masterpiece ...) You can get a much better cut in a rare version in Australia, called The Princess and the Cobbler.

Why was the movie butchered? Essentially, Williams never finished it, and eventually Disney released a movie called Aladdin which I know you've all seen, which for no clear reason ripped off every character design wholesale from "Thief and the Cobbler!" With such competition, there was nothing to do but for Disney to buy the film, chop it to bits and release it quietly as an apparent Aladdin ripoff ... the opposite, obviously, is the truth ...

 

[Rufus]

Roger Rabbit rocks! Can't wait for the new DVD (which has been rumored for a long time now... hope it shows up eventually). I was hearbroken when the second film was officially canned a couple years ago, but after being strung along for so long, guess it was good to just have a definitive decision on it.

Too bad there hasn't been some really good Roger Rabbit merchandise - especially of Jessica, which is why I had to make my own!:

http://www.geocities.com/rufustein/SCUjess.html

And there was a Roger Rabbit figure made for the 100 years of Disney (or whatever it was) for Mcdonalds... one of the non-ToyFare magazines (Lee's or Tomart's) had an article on the company the made those, and they had a picture of the Roger Rabbit one... wonder if the Disney/Amblin dispute was the reason it wasn't released?

- R -