Mickey Mouse, Long a Symbol in Copyright Wars, to Enter Public Domain

Dan O’Neill was 53 years ahead of his time.

In 1971, he launched a countercultural attack on Mickey Mouse. In his underground comic book, “Air Pirates Funnies,” the lovable mouse was seen smuggling drugs and performing oral sex on Minnie.

As O’Neill had hoped, Disney sued him for copyright infringement. He believed it was a legal parody. But after eight years in court, he was saddled with a judgment he could not pay. To stay out of prison, he agreed never to draw Mickey Mouse again.

“It’s still a crime for me,” said O’Neill, 81, in a phone interview from his home in Nevada City, Calif. “If I draw a picture of Mickey Mouse, I owe Walt Disney a $190,000 fine, $10,000 more for legal fees, and a year in prison.”

Mickey and Minnie will enter the public domain on Jan. 1. From then on, Disney will no longer enjoy an exclusive copyright over the earliest versions of the characters. Underground cartoonists, filmmakers, novelists, songwriters — whoever — will be free to do what they want with them.

Mickey Mouse has long been a symbol in the copyright wars. Beyond the practical impact, the expiration — 95 years after his debut in the short film “Steamboat Willie” — is also a major symbolic milestone.

“This is a big one,” said Jennifer Jenkins, director of the Duke Center for the Study of the Public Domain. “It’s generating so much excitement in the copyright community — it’s finally happening.”

Every Jan. 1, Jenkins celebrates Public Domain Day, publishing a long list of works that are now free for artists to remix and reimagine. This year’s list includes Tigger, who, like Mickey Mouse, made his first appearance in 1928. Other 1928 works include “Lady Chatterley’s Lover,” “All Quiet on the Western Front” and Buster Keaton’s “The Cameraman.”

The celebrations are relatively recent. After Congress extended copyright terms in 1998, 20 years went by when nothing entered the public domain. Works began to lose copyright protection again in 2019, and since then, it’s been open season on “The Great Gatsby,” “Rhapsody in Blue” and Winnie the Pooh.

The recent adaptations of those works could offer a preview of what awaits Mickey Mouse.

“‘Just add zombies’ appears to be a popular thing to do,” Jenkins said.

“The Great Gatsby Undead” popped up on Amazon on Jan. 2, 2021, followed by “The Great Gatsby and the Zombies.”

There is also, of course, “Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey,” the slasher film that made several critics’ lists of the worst films of 2023. Released in the U.S. in February through distributor Fathom Events, the film commanded a fair amount of media attention for its shock value but to date has grossed only $5 million worldwide.

“A lot of people do lots of things,” said Lawrence Lessig, a Harvard law professor who has written and advocated extensively on copyright issues. “This is the thing that people in Hollywood are not focused on. There’s an extraordinary range of people who create just for the love of creativity.”