What's Walt Disney going to do without Miley Cyrus?

Now picture this, you're a Disney executive with a cushy job and things couldn't be better. You have a hit show Hanna Montana on the Disney Channel and you got teen idol Miley Cyrus plastered all over the place. You walk into the world's biggest department store, Wal-mart and you find Hanna Montana all over the place. You step into a JC Penney and there she is again, Miley Cyrus, aka Hanna Montana.  

Yes life is good for you. You’re reaping the rewards of knowing that you have a bonfire smash hit with Hanna Montana and a guaranteed draw with Miley Cyrus. Yet there is something bothering you in the back of your head, something you dare not face, or even want to contemplate. So your laid back in that cozy arm chair of yours and try desperately not to fall asleep, cause in your nightmares it plays out as vividly as any Disney classic, be it Snow white and the seven dwarfs or Cinderella. Except in this Disney classic there is no magical fairy or Prince Charming to rescue you. Like in all good fairy tales, time has caught up to Walt Disney in the form of Miley Cyrus growing up.  

Forget about Michael Eisner the former CEO of The Walt Disney Company as being the saviour of Disney. That title goes to Miley Cyrus, for she is the golden child of the Walt Disney Company. It is Miley Cyrus aka Hanna Montana that has created the new essence of The Walt Disney Company and unleashed the Disney philosophy which is now live action versus Walt Disney’s very own tradition animation. I wonder what Walt Disney himself would think if he was alive? Not that it matters, cause all that seems to matter now to Disney executives is the direction that they’ve undertaken which is to annihilate the very essence of what Walt Disney is, and that is classic 2D animation, or as I like to put it hand drawn animation.

Disney executives secret weapon to annihilate what Walt Disney himself had built in his life time is a spunky teenaged girl named Miley Cyrus, who is the daughter of actor and country great Billy Ray Cyrus. Miley Cyrus’s career was launched as Hanna Montana which debuted on March 24, 2006 on the Disney Channel. The series is about a girl who happens to live a double life as an average teenage school girl named Miley Stewart and a famous pop singer named Hanna Montana. The best part of the show is Billy Ray Cyrus who’s Miley’s real father in real life and plays her pretend father in Hanna Montana, who in real life is her real father. Careful there will be a quiz on this afterwards. The honest truth being that I’ve been unable to even sit through even one episode of Hanna Montana even though I’m a huge Billy Ray Cyrus fan. Now that doesn’t necessarily mean the show is all bad, but it’s no Disney’s Kim Possible or American Dragon, Jake Long. Even though that is my personal opinion, the very premise of the show is very cheesy and down right original. What keeps the show together even boggles me, as I’m sure it boggles Disney executives just as much, not that they seem to care as long as it makes money and Hanna Montana happens to make Disney a whole lot of money. Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert and Hanna Montana: The Movie raked in huge profits for the Walt Disney Company, add Hanna Montana merchandise to those numbers and you got the makings of record profits, which obviously keeps share holder happy, but doesn’t address the issues facing the Walt Disney Company when it comes to it’s fans world wide, most of them disliking the new direction Disney has undertaken and wanting to see Disney return to its heritage and the very roots that Walt Disney himself planted.

Which brings us back to the nightmare that each Disney executive must be having, the very nightmare that gives them sleepless nights. What happens when Miley Cyrus finally decides that she doesn’t want to play Hanna Montana anymore, and even a worse fear for Disney executives is if Miley Cyrus decides to shed her innocent Annette Funicello image as to not be type casted for future roles. Miley Cyrus already brought a scare to Disney executives with her Vanity Fair photograph and I’m sure the thought has crossed Disney executive minds in countless sleepless nights of Miley Cyrus doing a Vanessa Hudgens on them.  

So a word of advice to Disney executives everywhere, enjoy that cozy armchair, sit back and enjoy the ride of Hanna Montana, Camp Rock and High School Musical cause it won’t last forever. Keep listening to all those letters and e-mails from Kim Possible and American Dragon fans out there cause there not out to destroy Disney or bash Disney out loud, there simply there to voice something that Disney executives have forgotten. That you can only recycle live shows so many times before people just get tired of them and tune out. Eventually your going to have to look at the legacy that your founder Walt Disney himself has left for you as a blue print to follow. Animation and not just computerized animation like Pixar, but tradition, quality animation is what once made The Walt Disney Company great. You were on the right path with the 2007 combined live action and tradition Disney animation of “Enchanted.”  Now you just need to feel that magic again, which is why I suggest you all make yourselves extremely comfortable in your cozy executive armchairs, get yourselves some salty snacks and plenty of pop or bottled water to wash it down and pop in a DVD of the Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Hercules, Beauty and the Beast and the Lion King and then you’ll all see for yourselves what we the fans of Disney have been trying to say all along.