What if Apple buys Pixar?

We all know that Steve Jobs bought Pixar in 1986 from Lucasfilm. In 1997, he returned to Apple, since the latter bought NeXT (another company owned by Jobs), but for some reason they did not buy Pixar. In 2006, Jobs sold Pixar to Disney for $ 7 billion. But what if back in 1997 Apple decided to buy Pixar along with NeXT, thus entering the film industry?

First, you need to answer: how would Disney change without Pixar?

Before Disney bought Pixar, Disney was in crisis. Their own cartoons rarely paid off, and the company itself was a mess. It was so terrible that Disney CEO Michael Eisner was forced out of the company and replaced by Bob Iger. As Disney's new CEO, the Pixar acquisition was Iger's first big move. The success of the Disney-Pixar acquisition helped a lot in later acquisitions: Marvel, Lucasfilm and 21st Century Fox. In addition, when Disney acquired Pixar, Pixar CEO John Lasseter became CEO of Walt Disney Animation Studios (that is, at the same time as Pixar CEO). Lasseter not only continued Pixar's winning streak, but also ushered in a period of Disney renaissance, with Disney creating CGI-animated hits such as Frozen, Zootopia & Wreck-it Ralph. Without the Disney-Pixar acquisition, we probably wouldn't have had the Disney we know today. Disney wouldn't buy Marvel, Lucasfilm and Fox. The company still has Disney studio itself (and all its divisions), ABC and the Muppets. Most likely, Marvel would have bought Sony, and Lucasfilm, perhaps George Lucas would have also sold Apple, since, firstly, they had big finances at that time (and in this reality, even more than now), and secondly, he would like to reunite his studio with the former division. Fox would have retained its independence. Hulu would not buy Disney, and the service would be owned jointly by 21st Century Fox and Comcast. Disney + would exist, but there would be less content at launch than in reality. We would not have seen remakes, and those remakes that can be called sequels rather than completely carbon copies of the original (for example, Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland or 2014's Malificent) would have come out, but in the form of cartoons. Touchstone Pictures would still be around today. The studio will continue to make more original cartoons than they actually do. Overall, Disney would be in a worse shape than reality. Pixar helped them move to the next level, reviving their leadership among the animation studios in Hollywood.

How would Pixar have changed under Apple?

Pixar was in a great position prior to the Disney-Pixar acquisition. It pioneered the fashion for CGI-animated hits and outstripped its biggest rival Dreamworks. Each Hollywood studio wanted its own CGI animation division, and one of them would probably buy or partner with Pixar. In this reality, it is Apple. The Pixar acquisition was not only great for Disney because it brought Hollywood's most successful and famous animation studio to the House of Mouse forever, but also because it gave John Lasseter and Ed Catmull control of feature-length animation at Disney as well as Pixar. In this reality, all this would not exist. Since Disney has spent much of the decade since its 2006 acquisition making Pixar sequels, there may be more original Pixar cartoons out there in 2018 than there actually are. Newt would not have been canceled, but Inside Out would have been released anyway. Epic would have come from Pixar, not Blue Sky Studios. The most important thing that happened as a result of the Disney Pixar acquisition, however, was not the subsequent Pixar films, but the use of that company's talent in non-Pixar Disney animated films. Franchises such as Frozen, Wreck-It Ralph, Tangled, and many others have been made with filmmakers affiliated with Pixar. This might not have happened if Pixar was not owned by Disney, but by Apple.

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How would other studios change?

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