Oswald the Lucky Rabbit time, Felix the Cat and Krazy Kat. Universal was given the right to name the rabbit and it selected a name out of a hat. The first Oswald cartoon, "Poor Papa", was rejected by the Universal studio heads for its poor production quality and the sloppiness and age of Oswald. Disney, together with Iwerks, decided to create a second cartoon titled "Trolley Troubles" featuring a much younger, neater Oswald. The short, released on September 5, 1927, officially launched the series and proved to be Disney's greatest success to date. The storyline for Poor Papa was reused in a Mickey Mouse
Oswald the Lucky Rabbit audience, Disney studied and scrutinized the shadow effects, cross-cutting and staging of action in films featuring Douglas Fairbanks and Lon Chaney. Walt Disney did not want for Oswald to simply be "a rabbit character animated and shown in the same light as the commonly known cat characters", as well as merely just a peg for gags. Instead, his stated intention was "to make Oswald peculiarly and typically OSWALD." In 1927, because of cost and technical restrictions, Disney and his chief animator Ub Iwerks decided to end their work on the Alice Comedies series in search of new creative opportunities. Coincidentally,