When we finally got to “Dumbo” I was pretty much played out. He was so cute. When they took away his mother and then did the “Baby Mine” number the tears started flowing again. The whole show basically put me through the ringer and amounted to one big crying jag. Gee! Thanks Uncle Walt. In his defense, I was probably an overly sensitive child. My parents were no doubt happy that, having gone through the ringer of emotional distress, I was most likely tired out and ready for bed by the time the end credits roled. Maybe Disney new what he was doing after all. While I don’t want to think about “Lobo”, “Dumbo” has, oddly enough, become my favorite Disney character. I guess the happy ending eventually sank in.

What do you do with a mad one? Everyone is, of course, within their rights to come to any conclusion not contradicted by the facts of the case but I think it was safe to assume the makers of Dumbo wanted us to believe Dumbo’s mother was going to be put down as a presumed mad elephant (much as would be done with a rabid dog). I refer you to the case of Topsy v. the Circus, 1903.

Trusty DID die in the original script of Lady and the Tramp. It was Peggy Lee (who wrote the score and voiced Peg) that pitched a fit and got them to change the ending.

The one that always gets me is Sleeping Beauty, where the good fairies carry on like she’s dead even though they know darn well she ain’t.

You wanna see a good Disney death? Check out “Willie the Operatic Whale” in Make Mine Music. He gets harpooned. On camera. Doesn’t come back. The end.

In Robin Hood, poor Robin falls into the moat with arrows through his hat. It’s only after Little John grows sad that we find Robin survived. In the Fox & the Hound (a movie I still have a hard time watching because of this scene) we see Tod the fox fall to ‘his death’ off a waterfall after battling a bear. His best friend, Copper, finds him alive at the bottom, but only after we’ve been treated to a moment of horror.

In The Great Mouse Detective, Basil of Baker Street is yanked by the evil Ratigan off his balloon platform to fall ‘to his death’. Again, we have a five second pause before he’s revealed to be alive and well and hanging on to a flying contraption.

Now, those were offscreen–but one of the best on-screen fake deaths is the only Oscar Nominated animated film–Beauty & the Beast. Though I don’t think anyone believed he was really DEAD, the Beast did fall ‘unconscious’ from his wounds until Belle whispered she loved him (cue the happy magical transformation into good-looking prince).

And as mentioned above, the death on the Lion King about overshadows everything else. It was bad enough to see Mufasa murdered by Scar and fall into the stampede, but then to see his body approached and cuddled by traumatized little Simba? Yikes! I get teary even now!