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<p>In recent years, multiple icons of children’s literature such as Winnie the Pooh and Steamboat Willie have entered public domain following the expiration of their respective copyrights. Accompanying their entry to public domain, horror retellings of these characters and stories have proliferated at an accelerated pace. These films, such as Rhys Frake-Waterfield's Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, (2023) and Steven LaMorte's Screamboat (2025), have consistently released to negative reviews. I compare these films to Kevin S. Tenney’s Pinocchio’s Revenge (1996), an earlier horror version of Pinocchio that succeeds where these films fail: it is a film that engages productively with its inspiring text. I study these texts through the prism of transformative adaptation, augmenting Luetkenhaus &amp; Weinstein’s (Austentatious: The Evolving World of Jane Austen Fans / Holly Luetkenhaus &amp; Zoe Weinstein, University of Iowa Press, Iowa City, 2019) theories of transformative fanfiction to articulate a new approach to what I term public domain intellectual property horror (PD/IP). As more characters are set to enter public domain in the coming years, the article sets out a tentative approach for navigating this emergent field.</p>

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Toward a Transformational Adaptation in Horror Adaptations of Public Domain Children’s Literature: Kevin S. Tenney’s ‘Pinocchio’s Revenge’ as a Framework

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2025年12月22日

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  • Thomas Caffrey

摘要

In recent years, multiple icons of children’s literature such as Winnie the Pooh and Steamboat Willie have entered public domain following the expiration of their respective copyrights. Accompanying their entry to public domain, horror retellings of these characters and stories have proliferated at an accelerated pace. These films, such as Rhys Frake-Waterfield's Winnie-the-Pooh: Blood and Honey, (2023) and Steven LaMorte's Screamboat (2025), have consistently released to negative reviews. I compare these films to Kevin S. Tenney’s Pinocchio’s Revenge (1996), an earlier horror version of Pinocchio that succeeds where these films fail: it is a film that engages productively with its inspiring text. I study these texts through the prism of transformative adaptation, augmenting Luetkenhaus & Weinstein’s (Austentatious: The Evolving World of Jane Austen Fans / Holly Luetkenhaus & Zoe Weinstein, University of Iowa Press, Iowa City, 2019) theories of transformative fanfiction to articulate a new approach to what I term public domain intellectual property horror (PD/IP). As more characters are set to enter public domain in the coming years, the article sets out a tentative approach for navigating this emergent field.