As a seasoned gamer and cinephile with a soft spot for Disney, I must say this revelation about the Absent-Minded Professor Cinematic Universe (AMPCU) has left me utterly astounded! It’s like stumbling upon an easter egg in my favorite video game, or finding a hidden door in a dungeon that leads to a treasure trove of forgotten classics.
Way back when Nick Fury made an appearance at the end of the initial Iron Man film and unveiled the Avengers Initiative, something truly remarkable came into being. Although the Marvel Cinematographic Universe (MCU) isn’t quite as popular as it was after Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, it remains the most significant movie franchise ever made. It pioneered the idea of a shared cinematic universe, which many other studios have tried to emulate since, but with limited success.
Interestingly enough, it seems that Disney had unknowingly established a “shared cinematic universe” way back when, linking three of their franchises together through shared settings and characters, decades before the concept became popular. This bit of trivia about Disney was certainly new to me!
The Absent-Minded Professor Has A “Cinematic Universe”
I was recently sent a copy of the new book Disney In-Beween by Stephen Anderson. The book is a chronicle of the period between the death of Walt Disney and just before the era known as the Disney Renaissance began. It was a period of significant upheaval, and questionable movie quality, at the storied studio. While reading it, I learned more than a little about some Disney films I’ve never seen, and even more about some I haven’t watched in decades.
Everything can be traced back to the 1961 film “The Absent-Minded Professor,” starring Fred MacMurray. This movie is about a college professor who creates a peculiar flying rubber substance that he names Flubber. The film was extremely successful in 1961, even leading to an unusual Disney sequel titled “Son of Flubber” which was released in 1963.
Six years following “Son of Flubber,” Disney introduced their first interconnected franchise with the release of “The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes.” In this movie, a young Kurt Russell played the role of a college student named Dexter Riley. After an electrical mishap while fixing a computer, Dexter developed a memory similar to that of a computer. Interestingly, Medfield College, where Dexter studied, was also the setting for Fred MacMurray’s character’s teaching position in “The Absent-Minded Professor.
Originally titled “The Computer Wears Tennis Shoes”, this film spawned two sequels: “Now You See Me, Now You Don’t” and “The Strongest Man in the World”. In the former, Dexter Riley invents an invisibility potion, while in the latter, he creates a cereal that temporarily enhances human strength. Thus, we now have a total of five films set within this shared universe.
Herbie The Love Bug Is Also Part Of The Same Universe
In the very same year that “The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes” graced the silver screen, Disney also unveiled an even more successful film. Known as “The Love Bug“, this movie introduced us to Herbie, a Volkswagen with sentience. This film was the second highest-earning movie of the year, but it wouldn’t directly connect to any other Disney films at that time. However, connections would be forged later, as characters from different films began to intersect, a hallmark of modern cinematic universes.
In 1974, Disney brought out the sequel to “Herbie Rides Again,” featuring the movie where we meet the villainous Alonzo Hawk, portrayed by Keenan Wynn. Interestingly, this same actor and character were also present in the two films based on “The Absent-Minded Professor.
Ever since both the 2005 film “Herbie: Fully Loaded” with Lindsay Lohan and the less remembered TV movie “The Love Bug” featuring Bruce Campbell (yes, that’s right), which are considered comedic sequels in the Herbie series, it can be concluded that all six Herbie movies belong to the same universe. This universe, also known as the AMPCU or Absent Minded Professor Cinematic Universe, contains at least 11 films when these two are included.
For many years, I’ve watched almost all of these films. However, it’s been quite some time since I last saw them, and I never realized the link between them before. Yet, it’s fascinating to think that Disney, whether by design or due to the convenience of reusing familiar titles, essentially constructed a cinematic universe in an unintentional way.
If these films were re-imagined today, it’s quite likely they’d end up as Disney+ original movies. In such remakes, intentional connections between the stories might be more overt. It’s intriguing to speculate that if this happens, Disney might take advantage of the opportunity and create a more direct crossover between the projects. Given the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, we know that interconnected narratives can indeed thrive.
If you’re curious to try out AMPCU, go ahead! Mostly, you can do so. If you’re a Disney+ subscriber, unfortunately, “Son of Flubber” and “Now You See Me, Now You Don’t” aren’t available in the U.S. at the moment – they’re just two more older Disney titles that haven’t made it to the streaming service yet. However, the rest of the movies I mentioned are accessible for your viewing pleasure! Enjoy!
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2024-10-13 16:37