Today I summerised my dissertation, here's my comment;
I actually wrote my University dissertation on Tinker Bell.
I'll try to summarize 5,000 words 😅
Tink was well received in 1953 in Peter Pan and when Walt Disney began advertising Disneyland before it opened he didn't want to associate Mickey Mouse with the park in case it was a complete failure.
So all the promotional material for Disneyland features Tinker Bell as a mascot.
This is worth mentioning as characters being merchandised outside of their film debut wouldn't become the norm for another 40 years!
The Disney princess franchise wasn't created until 2001 and it's target audience was girls from 3 to 9.
In the early 2000's Tinker Bell's merchandise was aimed at preteens as something edgier than the princesses; she'd be depicted on t-shirts and pencil cases pouting with attitude with tag lines such as 'Don't even Tink about it'.
throughout the years she maintained popularity despite not being in the princess club.
Which resulted in creating the Disney Fairies franchise in 2005, which began with the novel 'fairy dust and the quest for the egg' by Gail Carson Levine.
This book fleshed out Tinker Bell's fairy home in Neverland and was expanded upon in chapter books and a monthly magazine featuring a delightful comic.
The first Disney Toon Film was delayed (because it was made twice 😅) and the release date was pushed to 2008.
The film's ran till 2014.
The franchise expanded a beloved character and has been praised by feminist mothers as showing a hard working society where the female characters are genuinely friends.
