History Film / Dumbo2019

In this retelling of the story, a former circus star named Holt Farrier has returned from his service in the war and has been hired by circus owner Max Medici to take care of the baby elephant Dumbo, whose oversized ears have made him the laughingstock of the circus. Holt and his two children, Milly and Joe Farrier, befriend the little elephant, and when they discover that he can fly, they decide to make him use his talent so that Medici's circus can make a big comeback. This also draws the attention of one V.A. Vandemere, an entrepreneur who acquires Max's circus to make it part of his new theme park, Dreamland.

* AdaptationalNonsapience: None of the circus animals, the stork who visits Mrs. Jumbo, or Casey Junior possess communicative abilities beyond simple animal noises/whistling. Casey Junior doesn’t even seem to be animate. The circus engine also serves as the current image for the trope.

* AdaptationalNonsapience: None of the circus animals, the stork who visits Mrs. Jumbo, or Casey Junior possess communicative abilities beyond simple animal noises/whistling. Casey Junior doesn’t even seem to be animate.

* SettingUpdate: Inverted; this film is set in 1919, while the original film was set when it was made, 1941.

* SettingUpdate: Inverted; this film is set in 1919, while the original film was presumably set when it was made, 1941.

* MoodyTrailerCoverSong: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=calHOKucYMw "Baby Mine"]] has been [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mTU_FBSdb8 covered]] ethereally by Music/{{AURORA}} for the first trailer.

* AdaptationalNiceGuy: While the original Ringmaster wasn't shown as outright villanous or evil (not counting ''Disney Villains Revenge''), he certainly did have a bit more of a temper going for him and lots of arrogance and callousness, and mistreated and humiliated Dumbo (albeit with [[JerkassHasAPoint some kind of "justification"]]). Max Medici, being a DecompositeCharacter of him, lacks most of the negative traits of the original, instead being a pretty personable guy and a ReasonableAuthorityFigure. It helps that most of his negative traits went to V.A. Vandevere.

* AdaptedOut: Just about all of the TalkingAnimal characters from the original are absent, and the one who remains (Mrs. Jumbo) no longer speaks. The human children ''do'' have a pet mouse wearing a circus uniform as a MythologyGag to Timothy Q. Mouse, whose role as Dumbo's faithful friend is taken up by the kids. There is some (kinda) "justification" for this, as the only other talking animals who were kind to Dumbo -- Dandy Crow and his flock -- are considered caricatures of African-Americans and, according to CEO Bob Iger, could not be included in a remake as is (the only nods to the crows are a black feather and a brief instrumental piece of the iconic song "When I See An Elephant Fly" in the end credits). A stork briefly appears at the beginning to represent the stork character, two elephants part of Medici’s troupe act hostile to Dumbo during his debut appearance in lieu of the antagonistic elephants in the original, and Casey Junior is featured as a non-sentient steam locomotive still in charge of pulling the circus train.

* DisneyAcidSequence: The "Pink Elephants on Parade" sequence returns instead as a quasi-magical part of the Dreamland performance, where the pink elephants are conjured up with pink bubbles. This, however, doesn't make sense considering the origins and the context of the phrase "SeeingPinkElephants" and adapted in the animated classic.

* MagicFeather: As in the original (which became the TropeNamer), Dumbo gets one. While in the original movie the crows introduced this pretty much out of nowhere (considering the audience already knew he had flown without one the night before), here it's used as a FalseCause - the first few times Dumbo propels himself into the air, it's the result of him sneezing from a black feather he had sucked up his trunk, which leads Milly to conclude that he cannot fly without it. [[spoiler:But at some point Holt realises this isn't the case, outright telling her in the climax that he doesn't need the feather.]]

* AdaptationalNiceGuy: While the original Ringmaster wasn't shown as outright villanous (not counting ''Disney Villains Revenge''), he certainly did have a bit more of a temper going for him, and mistreated Dumbo (albeit with [[JerkassHasAPoint some kind of "justification"]]). Max Medici, being a DecompositeCharacter of him, lacks most of the negative traits of the original, instead being a pretty personable guy and a ReasonableAuthorityFigure. It helps that most of his negative traits went to V.A. Vandermere.
* AdaptationalVillainy: However, there are reasons The reasons why the Ringmaster is generally considered a villain.
** He forced roustabouts and animals to work under terrible conditions, in their song the roustabouts also imply that the Ringmaster calls them with derogatory names and exploits them, and it's also implied by the same roustabouts and the clowns that he underpays his employees. He separated Dumbo from his mother to make sure Mrs. Jumbo didn't go berserk again and he locked Mrs. Jumbo up as "mad elephant" more for throwing him into a vat of water for the excessive whipping on her than for her going "mad". He also "punished" Dumbo for ruining his act (with, apparently, no reherseal) by forcing him to "perform" in dangerous, abusive and humiliating clownish acts at his expense (forcefully kicked off a high building on fire) and in the end Dumbo even literally risked his life with an even much more dangerous act and with no success guaranteed. If it wasn't for Timothy becoming Dumbo's manager probably things would have gotten even worse. Since the Ringmaster doesn't appear onscreen in the very final scene of the film after his public humiliation due to Dumbo and it's only seen Timothy becoming the new manager of Dumbo signing a Hollywood contract and implying a change of regime and management at the "Dumbo's Flying Circus", it's been easy to portray various adaptations of the Ringmaster as a character for successive adaptations of the film in other media, from being a neutral and antagonistic but still fair man in the end (like in various books and comic books) to an outright villanous and even resentful individual (like in the 1999 video game ''Disney Villains' Revenge'').
** There is concept art showing the Ringmaster mad at Dumbo for the failed act of the elephant pyramid before sending him to work with and be ridiculed by the clowns, but it was cut along with many other scenarios (like Timothy training Dumbo) due to the time and budget constraints and limited pace the film is famous for. When the injured elephants ask Catty concerned if the Ringmaster did beat Dumbo as punishment for the disaster at the circus after she said that they "fixed him good", this may be a nod to the deleted scenario. In some book adaptations, it can be read that the Ringmaster verbally scolded and humiliated Dumbo before sending him to work with the clowns after calling him a "bumbling, bungling clown". Like many other films of the Golden and Silver eras, many scenarios and character situations are implied and left to the viewers' deduction or interpretation.

* AdaptationalNiceGuy: While the original Ringmaster wasn't a bad person by any means (not counting ''Disney Villains Revenge''), he certainly did have a bit more of a temper going for him, and mistreated Dumbo (albeit with [[JerkassHasAPoint some justification]]). Max Medici, being a DecompositeCharacter of him, lacks most of the negative traits of the original, instead being a pretty personable guy and a ReasonableAuthorityFigure. It helps that most of his negative traits went to V.A. Vandermere.

* AdaptedOut: Just about all of the TalkingAnimal characters from the original are absent, and the one who remains (Mrs. Jumbo) no longer speaks. The human children ''do'' have a pet mouse wearing a circus uniform as a MythologyGag to Timothy Q. Mouse, whose role as Dumbo's faithful friend is taken up by the kids. There is some justification for this, as the only other talking animals who were kind to Dumbo -- Jim Crow and his flock -- are considered caricatures of African-Americans and could not be included in a remake as is. A stork briefly appears at the beginning to represent the stork character, two elephants part of Medici’s troupe act hostile to Dumbo during his debut appearance in lieu of the antagonistic elephants in the original, and Casey Junior is featured as a non-sentient steam locomotive still in charge of pulling the circus train.

* DisneyAcidSequence: The "Pink Elephants on Parade" sequence returns instead as a quasi-magical part of the Dreamland performance, where the pink elephants are conjured up with pink bubbles.

* MagicFeather: As in the original (which became the TropeNamer), Dumbo gets one. While in the original movie the crows introduced this pretty much out of nowhere (considering the audience already knew he had flown without one the night before), here it's used as a FalseCause - the first few times Dumbo propels himself into the air, it's the result of him sneezing from a feather he had sucked up his trunk, which leads Milly to conclude that he cannot fly without it. [[spoiler:But at some point Holt realises this isn't the case, outright telling her in the climax that he doesn't need the feather.]]

* ItsAllJunk: Milly Farrier tosses her deceased mother’s pendant into the flames of the ablaze Dreamland to get Dumbo to fly out of there.

* MythologyGag:

* InnocentBlueEyes: Dumbo has these to distinguish himself from the other elephants

* ExtyYearsFromNow: The film is set in 1919, exactly a hundred years before its 2019 release date.

* AdamWesting: [[Characters/WCWCommentators Michael Buffer]] appears as a ringmaster at Dreamland for the sole purpose of getting to shout "LET'S GET READY FOR DUMBOOOOO!!!"
** ''Twice. They do it '''twice.''''' - Creator/LindsayEllis

* EverythingsBetterWithMonkeys: A circus monkey appears in several scenes as comic relief.