MNSSHP Hocus Pocus Merch - Read if You Went on Friday!
I attended the Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party on Friday. I was hoping to buy the new Hocus Pocus pin and shirt, but it was unavailable. I heard that the Hocus Pocus merchandise had been delayed. I wanted to reach out to you to see if there will be a way to purchase the items either online or over the phone once they are available, since I live in California and will not be able to attend the event any other day this year.
Thank you!
[FONT=&]Hello Tessa,[/FONT]
[FONT=&]Thank you for contacting Merchandise Guest Services. Unfortunately, the Hocus Pocus merchandise is currently unavailable and we do not have any further information on whether or not these items will be available for purchase at a later date.[/FONT]
[FONT=&]I apologize for the inconvenience and we would like to offer a different, complimentary Limited Edition Halloween pin. Please provide a full name, address, telephone number and proof of your Halloween party ticket from Friday, 8/25 and we will ship the pin to you as soon as it's available.[/FONT]
[FONT=&]Thank you for your understanding.[/FONT]
People on facebook have pointed out the style is VERY similar to the ghastlies? If Disney hired an illustrator, or used one of their already existing ones, to do the artwork for Hocus Pocus and it was ripped off of this without any permission or anything that could be a big legal screw up and someone will definitely be out of a job. But, if they did have permission or it was done by this person then others are speculating that the shipments just didn't arrive in time?
So more about the Hocus Pocus merch.
You may have seen my post in the 2017 Pin Releases thread:
Well... All of the Hocus Pocus merch has now been pulled from even the Halloween merch preview on Disney Parks Blog.
It will probably never surface now. While you can't copyright an artistic style I'm wondering if there are other related issues going on. I mean, [/COLOR]Winifred looks almost EXACTLY like the center knitting Ghastlie character (these Ghastlies designs have been around since at least 2011 from what I'm seeing). If this is the case someone at Disney seriously screwed up. This is a ton of lost profit for them and I could definitely see one or more people losing their jobs over this screw up.
All of the Hocus Pocus merch has now been pulled from even the Halloween merch preview on Disney Parks Blog.
That is super interesting. I was thinking that the Ghastlie artist is who they hired for the merch art as it is so close. So, I did some research. The Ghastlies appear to be a fabric pattern for Alexander Henry Fabrics. On the Alexander Henry site, they describe that the style is inspired by Edward Gorey (who passed in 2000). I cannot find the name of the fabric design artist, but I would not be surprised if it is the same freelancer and was hired by Disney to design the merchandise.
One cannot copyright or trademark an art style. If the Ghastlie character designs themselves are trademarked, then there might be a conflict with the fabric company. Or there really could have been an issue with delivery, although it is odd the entire line of merch was pulled.
Being as how a handful of people were able to purchase the Hocus Pocus magic bands before they were pulled it's safe to say the delivery issue is not the story.
And with the Edward Gorey style-as-inspiration thing is how you do "inspiration" right. It's similar in that it's mostly thin, sketchy, hand draw-style linework. It conveys the essence of his work without being a copy. The Hocus Pocus illustrations are just way too close to the source material.
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