Rolly Crump
FROM: Hullabaloo Published Every So Often
Review: Waking Walt
Waking Walt, by former Disneyland and Disney World Vice-President Larry Pontius, is a novel that explores what happens when frozen Walt is woken up. You know you've wondered! Is Larry's book warmed-over? Or is it a frozen treat?
You've all heard the rumor.
Walt Disney's head is frozen in a state-of-the-art cryogenic facility. When modern science discovers how to cure what killed him, and then surmounts the subsequent problem of how to defrost him without obliterating whatever is left of his brain cells, Walt will once more walk the earth.
Why wait?
If you're Larry Pontius, you don't wait.
In 2002, Larry wrote a book called Waking Walt. The plot is in the title. A few weeks ago, Larry released a Kindle version of the book. It's available now on Amazon for $4.99. (And you won't even need to defrost it!)
Big deal, you say? It's just some crackpot cashing in on a Disney ubran legend.
Well, normally, you'd be right, but Larry Pontius has a very interesting pedigree.
From 1976-1982, he was Vice-President of Marketing for Disneyland and Disney World. His rung on the corporate ladder was very, very close to the guy who keeps track of Walt's frozen head.
The point is: when someone formerly so high in the Disney hierarchy decides to write a novel about Walt Disney, it's an event.
In the universe of Waking Walt, The Disney Corporation is in trouble. Poor investments, bad decisions, and other blunders have drawn the attention of a corporate raider who hopes to mount a takeover of the Mouse and sell its treasured icons and assets to the highest bidders. Walt would never stand for it! But Walt isn't standing; he's floating in a tank.
Enter the Circle, a group of aging Walt loyalists. They've kept Walt's cryonic bath at just the right temperature since his death from lung cancer, and now an experimental cure for that disease is at hand. But others don't want Walt revived, and so the Circle must smuggle him from California to an abandoned guest house near Disney World.
It won't spoil the plot to tell you that Walt does indeed wake up. He teams with the Circle - and some of their much younger relatives - to fight the forces that imperil his creations. Is there enough magic left in the old master to prevail?
That, I won't say!
But I will say that Walt is rather pissed at the whole situation. Maybe the cryonics made him cranky. You won't find heart-warming passages of Walt spreading wisdom and patting youngsters on the head. All those images you have of kind ol' Uncle Walt? This ain't him.
Larry portrays Walt Disney as a human being, not as a deity holding hands with Mickey and pointing into the future.
For me, that's a much more interesting - and much more realistic - portrayal of Walt Disney. If you'd rather think of the statue, then maybe this isn't the book for you.
But for everyone else, Larry has written a plot-driven, action-oriented black satire. As such, it stands on its own, but with the addition of Walt Disney, the Disney Parks, Celebration, and lots of other Disneyana, Waking Walt is especially enjoyable for the Disney fans among us.
And in this crowd, that's everybody.
Waking Walt is available on Amazon in hardcover, paperback, and Kindle.
For further fantastic fun, check out:
- The Hullabaloo main page, where we keep our hullabaloo hot.
- Pontius on Park, Larry's bi-weekly column for DisneyDispatch.
