Refusal is not innocence’
Spider-Man’s own character arc is fuelled by the death of his uncle Ben.
In Avengers: Infinity War, half of all life, including Ollie’s favourite superhero’s, is wiped out by the film’s villain, Thanos.
Away from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney’s beloved films are often marred by tragedy.
Its first ever animated feature Snow White had a pretty grisly end for The Evil Queen. Lightning strikes. She falls from a cliff. A boulder tumbles down after her and there are a pair of hungry vultures ready to take their pickings. A grim end for a 1930s children’s film.
It isn’t just villains that suffer either.
Bambi kept audiences weeping with the protagonist’s own mother getting shot by a hunter.
The years haven’t made Disney shy away from films depicting families torn apart by tragedy.
Finding Nemo opens with Nemo’s mother, and hundreds of her eggs, killed by a barracuda.
Up sees a couple grow old, suffer years of infertility before one of them dies.
Coco, released last year, follows a boy as he meets his dead relatives and watches his great grandmother cope with Alzheimer’s.
Frozen centres around two sisters without parents; Mary Poppins sees two children in the care of their widowed father; Tarzan is left orphaned; Cinderella is at the mercy of her evil step mother.
Spot a trend?
If you hope it’s coming to an end, don’t go and see the Lion King reboot, Mufasa’s death won’t be any easier in live action.
Disney’s statement on its refusal to the Jones family added: “We follow a policy that began with Walt Disney himself that does not permit the use of characters on headstones, cemetery or other memorial markers or funeral urns.”
Make of it what you will, but there’s an undeniable legal side to all of this.
Film critic Mike Shaw said: “This is all about protecting copyright.
“To play bureaucrats over something so emotive isn’t a good look for any company, especially one that claims to exist to bring light to the lives of children.”
The more pressure the better. Helen Whately, Faversham and Mid Kent MP, has asked Disney to reconsider.
The Kent Messenger demands it - as do 100,000 others.