Customer Reviews

Disney Dossiers: Files of Character from the Walt Disney Studios

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is where ones expectations can color ones opinion. Although a nicely done book, I thought there'd be more depth into what went into the creation of the character, more background, etc. Instead, this is more like a children's book written for the more adult fan.

Fun book, but book does not live up to the wealth of information in The Encyclopedia of Walt Disney's Animated Characters (which is now out of print). I do like the inclusion of some of the disney posters and early rough sketches of the characters, but I would recommend the Encyclopedia version over this. Would be great to see some of the archival illustrated material from this book in the next edition of the Encyclopedia.

Disney Dossiers may look like a fantastic book. As given by the title, it presents nicely-designed profiles for the characters who starred in most (but not all) of Disney's animated features. Each of the characters are also fittingly grouped under different categories, such as "Standards" and "Almost Standards" for Mickey and the gang, "Unlikely Heroes" and "Royalty" profiling protagonists mostly from the movies that spawned the "Disney Princess" merchandise line, and "Villains" and "Extra-Evil Villains" for, well, the villains of these movies (though I think a more appropriate title for the latter category would be "Marketable Villains", because it profiles the villains who actually appear in the "Disney Villains" merchandising line).

So why did I give this two stars? Well, frankly, it seems to me that this book was written by someone who didn't do as much research as he should've done. If your favorite Disney character originated in the comic books or TV cartoons, you're out of luck, 'cause they're not profiled here. Of course, considering the way Disney's treating their TV animation division nowadays, that's to be expected (though maybe it would be better if they profiled the TV/comic characters in a second volume). And as I stated earlier, even some of the movies, such as "Robin Hood" and "The Black Cauldron", don't get their characters profiled here (though they are listed in the role call at the end of the book), so that makes it pretty surprising that the book does present profiles for characters from "The Great Mouse Detective" and (gasp!) "Song of the South". But frankly, I see no excuse as to why they left out Pete, Chip 'n Dale, and Uncle Scrooge.

But that's small potatoes compared to the real reason I gave this a low score - the errata. Almost every profile features a mistake of some sort, particularly if it's for a character who starred in a movie that spawned a direct-to-video sequel or a TV series. Among the mistakes I noticed:

* Donald Duck's filmography includes the "DuckTales" movie, which he was not even mentioned in.
* Aladdin's profile claims he has no parents. But wait - didn't "Aladdin and the King of Thieves" reveal that his father is alive?
* Kuzco's profile says he has no significant other. So does that mean Malina doesn't exist?
* Sebastian's filmography forgets to list the "Marsupilami" show (where he starred in his own 7-minute shorts).
* Timon's last name (Berkowitz) and Scar's real name (Taka) are not given.
* All the Tarzan characters' filmographies list the TV series as having the same title as the movie and coming out in 2003. It's actually The Legend of Tarzan, and it came out in 2001.
* Morty and Ferdie were not in "Gulliver Mickey" or "Mickey's House of Villains" like their filmography claims.
* Max's profiles states that he "bears some unknown relationship to the red-headed Goofy, Jr." Huh? I always thought they were the same person!
* Why does Cody's profile list Jake the Kangaroo Rat as his sidekick? They don't even meet till near the end of the movie!
* And some of the characters' voice actors are not listed - Cam Clarke for Simba, J.P. Manoux for Kuzco, Pamela Segall for Baloo, Corey Burton for Mad Hatter, April Winchell for Cruella DeVil, etc.

And as the title says, these are supposed to be the characters' official profiles. So why did the studio let the author make so many mistakes?! Yes, you could say that he decided to just ignore the sequels (with the obvious exception of "The Rescuers Down Under") and TV spin-offs other than listing them in the filmographies. But if that were true, that wouldn't explain why Timon's profile uses his backstory from "The Lion King 1½", or why Ursula's profile actually has a picture of her sister from "The Little Mermaid II" (and yet Ariel's profile doesn't mention poor Melody). Maybe it's a good thing Chip 'n Dale and Pete didn't get profiled here - the author probably would've disregarded the facts about them from "Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers" and "Goof Troop"!

Compare this to the fan-made profiles on the web page Disney's HooZoo, which also profiles characters created for the comics and TV shows. True, that site hasn't been updated since 2001, but at least for the characters it profiled, it remembered the details that this book did not. That's pretty sad when a fan can get more of the facts straight than the company itself can. So, sorry, Jeff Kurttii, but it's hard to recommend your book when even I know more about these characters.

This is a nice book, but not quite what I expected. A few characters are missing, or have smaller, less complete entries (including Jasmine!) I would recommend this book for the pictures, especially for children.

My family is going to Disney In may of 2012, so we are all excited. My little sister had a Birthday and I thought this was a good Idea for her, that way she can get autographs in this book when we go to Disney world. I looked throught the pages it showed and i thought It looked great so I ordered it. After I ordered it I began to worry because I read the discription and It said It was geared tward adults(my sister is 7). I began to worry more once I saw the negitive reviews. Once I got this product I looked it over, preparing to return it if it was to mature for her and, surprisinly it was not. She loves it along with the rest of my family. Its perfect because It has the perfect amount of information that both adults, teens and kids would like, and It has tons of pictures.

I think alot of people gave this a bad review beacause of the lack of info, but unless you are a extreme die hard disney fan, this book has every character you can imagine(except for some reason the characters from pooh and robin hood) from Micky mouse to merlin to jane to hades.

This is a really great book!

This book was a gift for my neice. It arrived in a timely fashion and was in great condition. I was pleased and so was she!

I enjoyed the book, but there are charcters that should not have been left out. For instance where are the characters from the Hundred Acre Woods, I think Winnie-the-Pooh is a lot more inportant to the Disney canon than Oliver and Company or Great Mouse Detective.
All in all thou the sketches and pictures are fantastic. I'm just what you'd call a super disney nerd.

I love this book - it's a great compilation of classic Disney and movie characters (the Disney afternoon characters, sadly, are missing). It has great character info like personality traits, voice actors, etc., beautiful pictures, and sketches.

The book isn't as thorough as I or, I'm guessing some other Disney fans, would like but it is a great source of information and a great addition to a library. Hardcore fans will be delighted that rare characters like Mickey's nephews and Daisy's nieces make appearances in this book.

This book is a must for any Disney enthusiast! Great photos - fun comments and a wealth of information about almost every (but a few are missing) Disney character from the movies from the last century!

My daughter is using this for a resource for her classes at the Art Institute - Computer Animation Major