Media Essays: The Story of Runaway Brain

When you're a fan of something, you never know what you'll come across. You think you know everything there is to know about something, but then you find out the rabbit hole runs deeper than you could've possibly imagined. Disney is no exception to this. Sure a lot of Disney properties are pop-culture icons that everybody knows about. But then you get some Disney media that's more obscure and not quite as well-known. Either it's because they weren't that popular at the time or they're pieces of content Disney would rather bury and lock away forever than let people know of its existence. This post is about one such piece of media. As the title suggests, I am talking about one of Mickey Mouse's most infamous cartoons ever created. That cartoon...is Runaway Brain.

What Is Runaway Brain?

Runaway Brain was a Mickey Mouse short released in 1995 and was directed by Chris Bailey, an animator and director best known for his works on Kim Possible, the live-action Garfield and Alvin and the Chipmunks movies, several movies from the Disney Renaissance and the It's Tough To Be A Bug! attraction at Walt Disney World Resort's Animal Kingdom park. Also, famed animator Andreas Deja, best known for animating many iconic Disney villains such as Jafar from Aladdin, worked on the short too. The short focuses on Mickey Mouse as he tries to get some money in order to pay for a Hawaiian holiday as a last minute anniversary gift for his beloved Minnie Mouse. Unfortunately, things take a twisted turn when he ends up swapping brains with a monster and he has to save Minnie before the monster in his body can claim her for himself...

The short was first screened out of competition at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival. When the short was released in North America, it was attached to A Kid In King Arthur's Court. Yes really. Talk about the worst possible movie to attach a short to. I bet anyone who saw the movie considered Runaway Brain the only worthwhile thing about it. Thankfully, the short was given better representation when it was attached to international showings of A Goofy Movie in 1996 and was attached to Australian viewings of The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Yeah, I think international viewers got the better end of the deal here, getting a cool short and an awesome movie all at once. XD In 1997, it was also attached to viewings of George of the Jungle.

Ever since the short was released, it ended up becoming rare and hard to find and Disney have been rather uneasy about acknowledging its existence. It's not quite to the levels of Song of the South as they ARE still willing to at least acknowledge it exists, but it's still one of those Disney medias where you really have to look for it. So let's talk about...

Why It Was Controversial

I could just show you THIS image and let that speak for itself, but let's go into more detail.

Runaway Brain is as infamous as it is because compared to what you'd expect from a Mickey Mouse short, it was surprisingly dark and frightening at times thanks to the concept of the short and the scary image of a monstrous looking Mickey Mouse. Chances are you may have seen this image or just images of that scary looking Mickey floating around the internet and wondered where it came from. Well, here's your answer. After Mickey's brain is swapped with the monster's, we get this decidedly unfriendly looking Mickey Mouse where he acts like a feral animal, has crazy looking eyes and sharp teeth. I imagine many people who saw the short back in the day were just unnerved at seeing Mickey look so...un-Mickey. Also the short gives us a pretty dark death in how the scientist responsible this disintegrates into nothing, so that was likely pretty shocking. Seeing this kind of imagery in a Mickey Mouse short is probably why it stood out so much. We're not used to seeing Mickey in these kinds of situations and because everybody was so used to seeing Mickey be all nice and friendly and all, it was shocking to see him look and act like this regardless of context. But hey...

We've had worse in recent years...

...much worse. X(

And if you think that's crazy, wait until you hear the original pitch! Apparently, when Chris Bailey pitched the short, it was called "Tourist Trap" and would be about Mickey and Donald going on holiday together...with Donald trying to kill Mickey. No, I'm not making this up! That was seriously the original pitch for the short! What the hell Chris? How did you think this was a good idea? Donald Duck would never try to kill Mickey! The short went over badly during test screenings and thus Chris was forced to come up with this idea instead. Needless to say, I think this was the better end of the deal as I think the original Tourist Trap idea would've gone over even worse with audiences than this did!

But yeah, the short being surprisingly dark and giving us a scary depiction of Mickey Mouse was why the short is so infamous and why Disney got cold feet about it afterwards. But contrary to what people think, they did NOT ban the short. I'll cover more on that later when I talk about the short's current status. But first...

Minnie Review (Pun Intended)

Like many Disney fans today, I'm only aware of this short thanks to finding out about it on the internet. I was born in 1994, so I was obviously too young to have gone to the cinema to see it and I never owned any home media releases of the short (for obvious reasons), so I didn't see this until much later in life. And when I say much later, I mean that I literally did not see the short until THIS YEAR. So what do I think about it now that I've seen it? Eh...I think the internet's kinda overhyped it a bit.

Don't get me wrong, the short is awesome! The animation is incredibly smooth, dynamic and exciting, there's a lot of great comedy here, the voice-acting is spot on, especially from Kelsey Grammer as Dr. Frankenollie for what little screentime he had, evil Mickey's honestly pretty cool to watch and it's the kind of cartoon short where it's just insane in the best way possible. But reading about it and hearing that it's this "dark and scary Mickey Mouse cartoon that Disney doesn't want you to see"...it really wasn't that dark or scary to me. Maybe it's because I'm watching it as an adult rather than a kid, but I really didn't see what the fuss was about and why Disney is so shy about showing this. They've done much darker and scarier stuff than what this short gives us. Hell, I think the bear fight from The Fox and the Hound is scarier than this entire short! Now some might say "But we have an actual character death in a Mickey Mouse short! That's pretty dark!" Yeah, and Disney have had plenty of character deaths in other media too, so this is hardly anything special. Besides, Dr. Frankenollie's death was played for comedy (black comedy perhaps, but still) so it didn't feel all that shocking. And while yes evil Mickey can look frightening to some, I just thought he looked pretty cool and crazy rather than scary. The fact the short is so fast paced so we're not lingering on him for too long is probably another reason why. Speaking of, the fast pacing of the short is the only thing I have to criticize about it as it really does feel like it's just over and done with in the blink of an eye.

Now the fast pace could be explained by the fact the short had some scenes that were cut, so I won't hold it too much against it. While we're talking about behind-the-scenes stuff, apparently they had to tone down a couple of bits like the Mickey monster drooling and the ending was changed from Julius (the monster Mickey swapped brains with) being lured by an effigy of Minnie made from pillows to a photo from Mickey's wallet. Not sure why that last one was changed, but I can understand them getting rid of the drooling from Mickey monster.

So yeah, I do feel the internet overhyped this short a bit so while I think it's an awesome short, it did feel a tad underwhelming because I expected it to be more extreme like what the internet made it out like. Still, I enjoyed it and I'd easily consider it among Mickey's best shorts. For me, the highlights include the incredible animation that is practically feature length quality and a lot of the comedy. This bit with Minnie especially makes me giggle:

"Oh my. (giggles) What would Mickey think?"

Why Minnie, it's so unlike you to have your head in the gutter like that! And that's why it's so funny to me, seeing this side of what's usually a very innocent character. That impish grin on her face is the icing on the cake for me. XD

There's a lot of other in-jokes in the short too, be it Mickey playing on a Mortal Kombat style game with the characters of Snow White, Zazu from The Lion King making a couple of cameos, a little jab at Jeffery Katzenberg and Mickey's wallet containing a picture of himself from his iconic Steamboat Willie short. So yeah, the short may not be this "dark and scary Mickey cartoon" that it's been hyped up to be, but it does have a lot to enjoy about it and a lot of funny moments be they big in-your-face comedic moments or subtle in-jokes you have to look for. Thankfully, the short is available to watch in its entirety on YouTube, so give it a look at if you're interested:

Runaway Brain HD FULL Short Film 1995 - YouTube

Current Status of the Short

So where are we now with Runaway Brain? Is Disney still trying to hide it or are they more willing to acknowledge its existence now? The answer to that is yes...and no.

While the short isn't available on Disney+ as I'm writing this post, it IS available on the "Disney Movies Anywhere" version of the "Walt Disney Animation Studios Short Films Collection" as a digital download exclusive, and is probably the closest we're going to get to getting this short on streaming. It was available on the Disney Treasures set Mickey Mouse in Living Color Vol. 2 DVD, which may be out of print but is surprisingly cheap to buy on places like Amazon. While it's not a whole lot of availability, it does show that the short was released and that Disney didn't "ban" it like so many clickbait YouTube videos would mislead you to believe. Contrary to what those videos would say, the short IS available in some compacity and Disney isn't trying to bury it completely. Heck, the short's available to watch on YouTube and Disney isn't trying to get rid of it, so they're clearly fine with us knowing it exists.

Also, Disney has been fine with at least referencing the short on occasion. Heck, in the image above, you can see that Julius actually appears as a boss fight in one of the Kingdom Hearts games. Also, there's a Funko Pop figure of Mickey as a gamer, which is a clear reference to how at the start of the short he's playing a video-game.

As of now, the short remains a cult favourite amongst Disney fans for its surprisingly dark tone and how it's one of Mickey Mouse's most unique and memorable shorts. And while Disney may not be willing to acknowledge it as much as their other works, they are still at least willing to acknowledge its existence and the short remains available to watch to this day on YouTube or as a digital download exclusive on the website Movies Anywhere. It may have been a little infamous at the time, but nowadays it's considered one of Mickey's best shorts and is a cult classic for many. Having seen it myself, I see why...

And that's all I got for this essay. I hope you enjoyed this little history essay and mini-review of Runaway Brain. Feel free to share your thoughts down below. Do you have an interest in checking this short out? Was it interesting to read about its history? Do tell me.

Next week, I'll be counting down my Top 10 Favourite Disney Soundtracks. See you then media fans!

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