Disney goes goth for 'Alice'

Article..

Take note, parents of Disney-obsessed preteens: Your daughter might soon be trading in her pinks for blacks.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Disney is planning to license "an extensive line of clothing and accessories" to Hot Topic in the weeks leading up to the March 5 release of Tim Burton's "Alice in Wonderland." (That includes a soundtrack featuring music by The Cure's Robert Smith.)

As the Journal points out, this is a definite change for the company, which has made big bucks by selling a princess image to young girls. (They'll still probably bring in the green by targeting goth girls, though -- some of the goods being sold are high-priced items designed by the likes of Stella McCartney and Tom Binns!)

And while I'm glad to see Disney offer up a marketing strategy that doesn't force young girls to idealize a life full of fluffy dresses and Prince Charmings, it's still a bit of a bummer to think that girls might conform purely to match the company's commercial interests.

That being said, I might have to stop by a Hot Topic nearby in the coming weeks, just to see this goth spectacle. (Even if the sudden "Twilight"-inspired resurgence of the mall shop still baffles me, since you could only buy mesh and black cuffs there when I was a teen.) I am a Tim Burton lover, after all.

What do you think, PopWatchers? Would you be tempted to buy an Alice-inspired accessory for your young one?

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They've already done it. There are loads of Alice jewelry and shirts at Hot Topic. But honestly, it's still better than Twilight.

Great, another thing I like, being made into a shinny-marketable-glossy-disgusting shell of itself meant for consumer-based production on a massive scale. The movie looks f*cking terrible, so and I'm sure it will be really popular like Twilight. And now every mall-obsessed-emo-mawth is going to have a "Drink Me" pin on their skinny pants. Hair. Pull. Out.

^^ As much as I hate to see kids just going for whatever's being sold to them, I'd much rather see them with Alice paraphernalia than being obedient little Barbie and Ken dolls listening to diluted country-pop music.

But yeah, it's a shame that many of them are/will be adopting a faux-individuality between Twilight stuff and Alice stuff. That whirring sound is Dodgson spinning in his grave... but that's another topic altogether.