Disney announced late last year that CEO Robert Iger will finally leave his post when his contract expires at the end of 2026, with his successor revealed sometime earlier than that next year.
We’ll see about that.
In the meantime Iger has started to at least go through the departure motions, with reminiscences, characterizations and claimed achievements that fully comport with his sizable ego and detachment from reality. The platform for his first nostalgic foray was a recent episode of “The Rest is History” podcast — because when you are a legend in your own mind, who else is better than to embellish and rewrite your story than you?
Helpfully recounting Iger’s deep thoughts were his entertainment industry stenographers at Deadline and the Hollywood Reporter. Some podcast excerpts, first from Deadline, which dutifully noted that “he recently reflected on his storied tenure at the media and entertainment giant:”
“I think because of the company’s place in the world, I think the person running the company has a special responsibility of sorts to maintain Disney’s position in the word as a beloved company, as an admired company, as a company that entertains really the world,” [Iger] said on The Rest Is History podcast. “Everyone of all ages and from all different walks of life. And I think more than anything else, I would want to be known as someone who was given the keys to this kingdom, so to speak, and quite a kingdom it is, and that I brought it to a place that even Walt would be proud of and what that means is more great storytelling to a larger audience, more innovation, more risk-taking, more really creation of of happiness.”
Iger continued, “It’s really that simple. At one point I thought, well, okay, you’re now running Disney. What’s the most you want out of it? Well, don’t screw it up, but it’s much more than that. I really have been mindful of the duty that I feel has been handed to me to make it even better than it’s ever been.”
Oof. Here’s the evidence:
- Polling by The Trafalgar Group in 2022 found that 68 percent of respondents were less likely to do business with Disney because of the Company’s content that exposes children to “sexual ideas.” A similar percentage said they were likely to support family-friendly alternatives to Disney.
- A Rasmussen Reports national survey in mid-2024 found that 71% of American adults agreed with the statement, “Disney should return to wholesome programming and allow parents to decide when their children are taught about sexuality,” including 53% who strongly agreed.
- Axios-Harris’s annual comprehensive poll that gauges (and ranks) the reputation of the most visible corporations and brands in America, placed Disney 76th in 2025. This ranked below other companies that in recent years have taken significant reputational hits including Nike, Starbucks, and Target. Disney ranked 5th overall in 2019 in the Axios poll, followed by a precipitous slide: 23rd in 2020, 37th in 2021, 65th in 2022, 77th in 2023, and 67th in 2024.
With evidence like this, there’s no point in me piling on rebuttals to Iger’s faulty podcast memories. But that’s not all the thoughts Iger had for the “History” record, per Deadline:
Preparing to release the reins once again, Iger hopes his successor will “be respectful of our past and well aware of the values that really created the value of the company in the first place and carry them forward.”
“But not let anything that’s been done in the past get in the way of bringing the company into the future,” he added. “And that’s really constant innovation, a constant exploration, you know, constant essentially desire to reinvent or to invent even. More than anything else, that’s what I’d want. But I think we do occupy a place in the world as great storytellers, perhaps maybe the greatest, and I would hope that that position would continue for years and years, decades ahead.”
Whereas many at the company have asked “what would Walt think” when it comes to decision-making, Iger said he’s “not really interested in turning to him for advice, per se, but I would be more interested in showing him what’s become of the great company that he founded. And I wouldn’t mind a bit of a report card, perhaps. It’s cocky of me to think that he would give me all A’s.”
As NLPC has pointed out over the years, under Iger’s stewardship Disney’s “values” have included (among many things) a pro-communist China coziness that downplays human rights concerns; incitement of a political war against the State of Florida over its parental rights in education law in 2022; and continuation of “gender transition” (i.e. child mutilation) treatments for dependent children of company employees. This in addition to the sexual-themed adult concepts delivered to what are supposed to be family audiences, hence the Rasmussen responses cited above.
As for “innovation,” “exploration,” and “bringing the company into the future,” Iger has presided over the stagnation of chronic sequelitis, unable to recruit or develop any fresh concepts that can be pointed to as box-office hits. He continually resorts to the same tired practice of live-action remakes from Disney’s classic animated features catalogue. Further, “woke” story ideas and characters have tarnished formerly beloved franchises including Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars and Indiana Jones.
And the current CEO has already demonstrated that he wouldn’t care what Walt Disney would think today of the company he founded. He allowed the board to commemorate his “historic” tenure with Disney’s new “Robert A. Iger building” in New York City. Meanwhile attendees at Disneyland’s 67th anniversary park celebration in 2022 noticed that Walt’s opening day speech from 1955, which had been played each year, was left out amid suggestions that his alleged anti-Semitism and racism. “Walt’s speech invokes ‘the ideals, the dreams and the hard facts that have created America,’ which one Twitter user called ‘taboo’ for Disney’s ‘woke’ agenda,” according to the New York Post.
Nonetheless the sycophantic podcast hosts continued to cast bouquets at Iger’s feet, per the Hollywood Reporter:
Iger was reflective about his tenure, and seemed conscious of his legacy, as well as the importance of building upon what Walt Disney himself created…
“You have more power than a lot of elected Prime Ministers, not necessarily over the day to day lives of people, but over people’s heads, people’s imaginations. Do you ever think about that?” he is asked at one point.
“I certainly don’t consider myself an emperor,” Iger joked in response. “I think about the power of a great story, of course, but I don’t think about us being powerful. I think about us having the luxury — that includes both the luxury of being involved with great artists and the luxury of having the resources to tell wonderful stories to the world — and hopefully through our storytelling, to have a positive influence on the world. Certainly in today’s world, just the ability to make really billions of people happy is an incredible luxury and something that I’m very mindful of, but I don’t think about it in terms of having power, except maybe the power to do good.”
Iger was so not-an-emperor that his megalomania forced a return to the CEO role after his many documented efforts to undermine would-be successor Bob Chapek.
Hence we have the revisionist Disney history as told by the one on the throne of the Magic Kingdom. His reign is supposed to end a year or so from now. Can the hopes and imaginations of the world survive without the one whose power exceeds that of so many Prime Ministers?
May we be bequeathed a worthy successor this time.
(Image above created via Grok AI)
