Disney+ Could Get R-Rated Content

In the oceanic depths of online content, there was a tiny litigious rodent named Mickey Mouse that consumed corporate giants to monopolize its stronghold on streaming platforms. When Mickey isn’t floating around on his corporate steamboat Willie enjoying the excesses of his luxurious frugal billionaire lifestyle, this chauvinistic rat is pedaling G-rated content to millions of children all across the world with his new streaming service Disney+. Children’s parents religiously subscribe to monthly subscription fees to keep their children glued to the TV for as long as possible. It’s hard to ignore the amount of content available on Disney+, which signed up 10 million subscribers on its November 2019 launch, and the promise of more original content still on the way . While the children melt their brains with reruns of “Ducktales” or “Kim Possible” downstairs, what adult content (if any) do the parents get to watch on Disney+?

Neeraj Chand’s article claims that the “Mouse Empire,” as he lovingly refers to it, is exploring how to implement newly acquired assets from its recent procurement of Fox. The idea is to be able to access these mature titles in the Disney+ app with a possible pin code scenario in hopes of keeping adult rated titles away from the innocent minds of our youth. Chand refers to Bill Hunt from The Digital Bits who suggests that this could allow mature subscribers access to R-rated titles including the “Deadpool” franchise, “Alien,” and “Bohemian Rhapsody.” It is doubtful that parents will enjoy watching the same G-rated content to which their children have access. How many times can someone watch “Frozen” with their children and not lose their sanity? Chand goes on to suggest that the Mouse Empire “needs to look beyond family-friendly content” if it wants to expand its audience demographics. Disney dominates the “teen and tween subscribers” market. According to Chand, the next obvious step is to entice the parents who already pay for these subscriptions with R-rated content.

Streaming platform options are endless. Most households subscribe to multiple services, the cumulative cost of which is beginning to feel as if we are back to the exorbitant cable TV prices. There is a recent trend where platforms are losing licensing rights to shows and movies and that content is returning to the studios that originally produced it. Programs like “The Office” are leaving Netflix (now on NBC’s new platform Peacock .) “Friends” is being shown exclusively on HBO MAX . Amazon Prime and Apple+ are also producing one-off originals to stay afloat in this content profusion. Chand wants Disney to come to terms with shedding its squeaky clean “singing, dancing, fairytale world” image and embrace the “unwanted step-children” of adult content acquired through Fox and other production companies. This move will indeed have a leg up on the competition especially with more 4k content.

During an episode of “Parks and Recreation” actor Patton Oswald went on an improvised eight minute rant eloquently discussing how Thanos could implement Disney’s newly acquired Fox titles into the monolithic mouse universe by utilizing the Gem Stone he has on his infamous Infinity Gauntlet. Mickey needs to rethink his marketing strategy if he does not want to lose this battle of the streaming wars. The epic rant of Oswald should be taken seriously by the Disney overlords as they begin to embrace their true dark side. The wizards over at Disney can easily create some sorcery and develop a Tony Stark tech-esque iris scanner allowing adult subscribers access to more mature content on the app. Theoretically, Disney could produce crossover films like “The Seven Dwarfs Vs. The Predator,” a buddy cop movie pairing “Die Hard’s” John McClane with “Wall-E,” or a live action “Sleeping Beauty” movie that takes place in the “Alien” universe. Imagine Ellen Ripley going to save Princess Aurora after slaying the Xenomorph Queen. Finally, Ripley can tell that evil Maleficent to “stay away from her you witch!”

It also seems that Disney is not afraid to experiment in markets where it has the opportunity. The Disney+ service in India is a weird combination of children’s fare and R Rated content – possibly the only territory where it has positioned itself that way.

The online platform Hotstar, part of the Fox network in India, launched in 2015 and has been a very popular service with over 300 million active users, far ahead of Netflix and Amazon. In 2019 when Disney completed its acquisition of 20 ^th Century Fox, it acquired Hotstar Instead of starting a completely new service. Disney decided to ride on the platform’s popularity and rebranded it as Disney+ Hotstar. Within a year the service has 8 million paid subscribers out of the Disney+ 50 million worldwide subscriber count. Hotstar also has ongoing agreements with HBO, Showtime and FX. The streaming service now has an interesting concoction of both “Mickey Mouse” and “Game of Thrones.”

Clearly this is an effective solution that the Mouse Empire should continue stateside. As Chand suggested earlier, Disney must try and come to terms with its remonstrated adult titles. It cannot shield them from the public eye, heroically locked away as secrets in its precious vault. Consider when Andy decided to go to college in “Toys Story 3.” Even he was smart enough to know that it was time to move on from playing with dolls to chasing his own collegiate cowgirls. Everyone grows up. It is only natural we give in to our primordial gene for contentious content.