Steamboats are not the fastest way to travel. The animated short Steamboat Willie, the first official appearance of Mickey Mouse, should have entered the public domain years ago but kept encountering legislative delays. But, at long last, it’s arrived—over 95 years after its maiden voyage.
Importantly, Steamboat Willie has arrived alone. All subsequent versions of Mickey and Minnie retain full copyright protections, and all associated trademarks will remain in effect for as long as Disney continues to use them. I am not a lawyer, and nothing here is legal advice, but maybe think twice before adding a prominent set of mouse ears to your creative works. If your work looks like a Disney product at first glance, you may be in trouble. This NPR article gives a good rundown, in my non-lawyerly opinion.
Where Mickey has ventured, Superman should follow in ten years and Batman in eleven. But again, it will only be the earliest iterations. When Action Comics #1 first enters the public domain, you better not depict a Superman who flies. You probably shouldn’t even call him Superman on any cover art.
If you want to write a story about the Christopher Reeve version of Superman, for example, you’ll have to wait at least until the 2080s, but even then, you’d need to be careful not to copy anything that originated in the much more recent Superman ’78 comic book series. So we’ll just have to be patient and possibly immortal. And, of course, trademarks will continue to complicate things further. Do your own homework.
With all that said, this does still open some new opportunities, provided everyone is careful. Though there are restrictions, Steamboat Willie can serve as a springboard to create something new. To a point, we get to combine our imaginations with the imaginations of Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks—sort of like how we could already combine our imaginations with that of Shakespeare, as he did with the writers of even older stories.
So I took the opportunity to indulge in a creative exercise. I watched the original cartoon, which you can also watch on YouTube, and I considered how I might build upon it without infringing on the trademark. The following short story resulted. And let me be clear …
This is NOT associated with Disney in any way.
It’s not even about the Disney company or anyone who’s ever been involved with it. It is not about Mickey the corporate symbol, nor is it about Mickey the character as we know him. It’s just a standalone story that builds on Steamboat Willie and only Steamboat Willie. And no, it is not a gruesome horror story.
The names have been changed to protect the trademark. The characters known as Mickey and Pete in the original are here reimagined as Mouse and Captain—because, again, this is not about the character we’re all so familiar with.
This is my point of inspiration:
It brings to mind this quote from Alexander Solzhenitsyn in The Gulag Archipelago:
Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either—but right through every human heart—and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains ... an unuprooted small corner of evil.
Since then I have come to understand the truth of all the religions of the world: They struggle with the evil inside a human being (inside every human being). It is impossible to expel evil from the world in its entirety, but it is possible to constrict it within each person.
So let’s pick up from there and then continue beyond the original story …
This Mouse … This Monster?
By Daniel Sherrier
The cat reminded him of Captain. That’s why Mouse grabbed it by the tail, swung it round and round, and launched it at the hanging lid. As the cat’s head crashed against the unforgiving metal, Mouse experienced a frightening spike of joy.
And he lost himself in the music. Animals made such wondrous music when he squeezed and pulled them. The unclothed animals, anyway.
Perhaps he got a bit carried away. Maybe he shouldn’t have stretched that duck’s neck or tweaked that pig’s nipples for his own amusement. But for once, he was in control. It was such a novelty for a mouse, even a mouse who wore clothes. Sound bowed to his will. The steamboat harmonized at his insistence. He was a maestro enchanting the river.
Until Captain returned. Mouse should have smelled the tobacco sooner, but his symphony masked the stench.
Ever ruthless, Captain banished Mouse to the potato bin. As Mouse peeled the potatoes and pitched them into the bucket, he imagined each one as the Captain’s head. It was almost cathartic.
The parrot ruined it by laughing at him.
It perched itself there, right in the porthole, and it delighted in his misfortune, creating a joyful noise that Mouse could not control.
So he chucked a potato at the parrot, then replaced the bird’s incessant laughter with his own.
The splash echoed in his ears, and Mouse stopped laughing. He had just wanted the bird to scram, not—could parrots swim?
Mouse climbed the potatoes and peered out the porthole. His dark eyes squinted at the water, then widened.
The parrot floated on its back, eyes shut, a passive rider of the waves. The potato bobbed alongside the body.
Mouse slumped down and melted into a puddle. He had killed a bird whose only crime was to laugh at him. He hadn’t even considered such an outcome when he threw the potato. The moment’s rage had blinded him to any consequences, and it cost a parrot its life.
The door opened, revealing the scowling visage of Captain. Finding the rodent apparently lounging on the job, Captain puffed up his chest and rolled up the fur along his arms. Those were impressive biceps for a cat. Granted, he was an unusually massive cat.
Mouse was powerless before Captain’s strength. Day after day, whenever Mouse attempted to enjoy his work on the steamboat, whenever he indulged in a cheerful whistle and played the steamboat’s pipes like an organ, Captain appeared—an ominous, smile-crushing specter whose only joy in life was the eradication of all pleasure.
This cost the parrot its life, Mouse decided. Mouse was no killer, after all. Captain drove him to it.
Captain stomped down into the room. His enormous fists seemed to swell—fists that could do with Mouse whatever they pleased.
The potato knife lay on the floor. Right there. Within reach.
Captain noticed it. The nervous flash in his eyes was delicious.
They both lunged for the knife. Mouse was faster.
“A-ha!”
Mouse brandished the knife like a swordsman wielding the finest blade. He slashed the air, and the Captain recoiled. Mouse laughed at his fear. For once, Captain was at his mercy.
Mouse’s delight was short-lived. Captain destroyed it with a simple sigh and a weary shake of his head.
The knife-wielding arm drooped. “Huh?”
“I fought in the Great War,” Captain said. “I have seen horrors you couldn’t fathom. But you, Mouse, are nature’s most dangerous creature—a weak man. I’ve watched how you treat the unclothed animals. What you did to that poor defenseless pig …” Captain shuddered. “I’m astonished your girlfriend hasn’t left you yet. Then again, she’s not much better, is she?”
That enraged Mouse anew. He firmed his grip on the knife.
Captain batted it out of his hand.
“Do you know why I’m always so hard on you?” Captain advanced, and Mouse cowered against the wall. “Because it is my duty. You’re a monster, Mouse, and God help us all if you ever acquired any real power.”
Captain picked up the knife and strode toward the door.
“I still want those potatoes peeled,” he said, tossing a shorter, much duller blade onto the floor. “Then we’ll talk about the damage you keep causing to my pipes.”
The door slammed shut. Empty hands quaked. Mouse had Captain at his mercy—he had him! He had brought fear into his eyes for one glorious moment. Mouse delighted in that fear, however briefly it flickered.
Was Captain right? Was there a monster hiding within Mouse? Did his innocent face conceal a cruel mind?
Did the animals not enjoy the beautiful music they made?
Mouse wanted to use Captain as a musical instrument, wanted to make him squeal and squawk out the perfect notes …
The smooth surface of the bucket caught his reflection, and Mouse gasped. He looked into his own dark eyes and saw it. The monster within. The animal dominator. The parrot slayer.
The parrot had looked dead. But was it?
Mouse rose to his feet and straightened his back. Perhaps there was a monster within him. But it didn’t have to remain alone in there.
He ascended the potatoes, dove out the porthole, and splashed into the water. And he swam—as fast as he could.
The current opposed him. It flung him off balance and filled his mouth with sediment. He spit it out, only for another wave to wallop and submerge him.
Mouse lost all sense of direction as he tumbled beneath the water. His lungs burned, demanding the elusive fresh air. Which way was it?
Only darkness lay ahead. So Mouse went the other way.
He burst through the water and gasped. Adrift, Mouse inhaled several slow, deep breaths as he gathered his strength. Strength had to be in there somewhere. Captain couldn’t be right.
The river rushed against him, a linear tempest. It could have swept the parrot into oblivion several times over by now.
Mouse had every reason to give up. It was likely too late to help the parrot, and if he stopped now, he might still be able to catch up with the steamboat. Thoughts of surrender tempted him. Too tempting. But then he considered what he might be surrendering to, and he kept going.
He saw it. A wing in the water. Across the river, the parrot struggled, a captive of the current. Captured alive. The waves kept drenching it, depriving the bird of flight. Every time the parrot tried to launch to freedom, the river beat it down. Mouse understood the feeling, and he attempted to intercept the oncoming bird.
The parrot hurtled right past Mouse.
“Agh!”
At last able to swim with the current, Mouse pursued. But the river declined to be too cooperative; it jostled him every which way. The river was bigger, stronger, tougher.
Though he was no match for its relentless force, Mouse refused to yield. He couldn’t overpower the river, but he didn’t need to. He needed only to persist.
Thin, aching limbs powered forth even as the river battered him. Stroke after painful stroke brought him closer to the parrot. After an eternity of swimming, their eyes met.
Mouse strained and stretched his hand out. The parrot climbed on and clambered up to his shoulder. Looking into the bird’s exhausted, drenched eyes, Mouse knew he owed the parrot an apology. He searched for the right words but wasn’t sure they existed.
But the parrot pointed its sopping-wet wing toward the steamboat, which continued onward, its lead ever increasing. Claws pinched into Mouse’s shoulder. Mouse ignored the pain and swam. The current helped, but it was a clumsy assistant, and it threw him up against a boulder.
Muscles spent, nothing left to give, Mouse barely managed to climb onto the smooth, rocky surface, where he collapsed.
Mouse urged the parrot to fly on ahead, save itself. The parrot hesitated. It lifted Mouse’s arm and tugged, but it couldn’t handle the burden.
Eyelids drifting shut, the last thing Mouse saw was the parrot flying toward the steamboat as it dwindled in the distance. He had never been so happy to see a bird in flight.
*****
The crane fished Mouse off the boulder. He collapsed onto the deck, his clothes still soaked. The scent of tobacco hung in the air.
Captain plucked him off the floor and set him on his feet. The parrot, perched on Captain’s shoulder, gave Mouse a respectful nod.
“You’re not getting off that easy,” Captain said, scowl affixed. “The potatoes are waiting for you.”
Shoulders slumped, face drooping, Mouse started for the lower decks.
“Hold on. You’ll need this.”
Captain handed him the long knife.
“Just a few more potatoes.” The scowl eased slightly. “Then it’s your turn at the helm.”
Mouse whistled as he peeled the potatoes. He lost himself in the music, music that came entirely from within, the only music he ever needed to control.
Hopefully that experiment proved somewhat entertaining. If you enjoyed it, here’s another cartoon-themed short story I wrote. The regular weekly schedule will resume on Friday with a look back at the Justice League animated series. Thanks for reading!