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Winnie, Mickey, and what we’re learning about public domain and remix culture

More beloved characters are becoming free for unfettered use, what will that mean?
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FILE - Ariana Grande, left, and Cynthia Erivo, cast members in the upcoming film “Wicked,” discuss the film onstage at CinemaCon 2024, Wednesday, April 10, 2024, in Las Vegas. The forthcoming “Wicked,” starring Grande and Erivo, will be yet another attempt at using the public-domain work of author Frank Baum’s Oz — filtered through a hit novel and Broadway show — to try to draft off the classic status of the 1939 “Wizard of Oz” film. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello, File)

The giant stuffed bear, its face a twisted smile, lumbers across the screen. Menacing music swells. Shadows mask unknown threats. Christopher Robin begs for his life. And is that a sledgehammer about to pulverize a minor character’s head?

Thus unfolds the trailer for the 2023 movie “Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey,” a slasher-film riff on A.A. Milne’s beloved characters, brought to you by … the expiration of copyright and the arrival of the classic children’s novel into the American public domain.

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