Mickey Mouse - Disney's 75 year-old corporate symbol - has, as a result of being that symbol, been drained of personality, personal history, context, anything specific enough to narrow his generic appeal. Disney, which moved legislative mountains to retain the copyright over its mascot until at least 2023, is conflicted on what to do with Mickey:

"Boring," "embalmed," "neglected," "irrelevant," "deracinated" and, perhaps most damning, "over" are some of the adjectives that cropped up in recent interviews with people in the cartoon, movie and marketing businesses. And strangely for such a well-known figure, Mickey doesn't even have a back story: no clearly defined relations, no hometown, no goals, no weaknesses. According to David Smith, director of the Disney archives, the company maintains no "biography" of the character; he is who he is.

But Mickey is not just another property that Disney owns: he's the hallmark, the frontman, the ambassador for its theme parks, the logo on its business cards. A significant portion of the Disney empire is built around this strange creature. And yet, at a time when the company is already facing an almost cartoonishly daunting litany of travails - a hostile takeover bid, the loss of its highly successful partnership with the animation studio Pixar, mass layoffs at its own animation studio, the very public campaign by Roy E. Disney, nephew of Walt, to dethrone the C.E.O., Michael Eisner - his appeal is apparently starting to slip.

Publicly, the company maintains an optimistic stance. "In my world," said Andy Mooney, chairman of the consumer products division, "a character that generates $4.5 billion a year in retail revenue and is at least four times larger than any other character in the world except Winnie the Pooh" - which Disney also controls - "doesn't need refurbishing." According to Mr. Mooney, Mickey has "98 percent unaided awareness for children 3 to 11 worldwide," and has started to appear again as a "real favorite" among girls 8 to 12 and, surprisingly, boys 13 to 17.

The company acknowledges that revenue from Mickey merchandise, measured as a portion of all consumer products, has shrunk significantly since 1997. What Disney doesn't acknowledge is that Mickey's reputation, measured in conversations with industry watchers, is shrinking even more. Still, signals of the Mouse's distress have lately begun to seep out, almost unconsciously, from the soul of Disney's business: its storytelling. In a video game called "Kingdom Hearts" - which has sold more than 4 million units since its release in 2002 and is frequently cited as evidence of Mickey's continuing relevance - the mouse barely appears. Instead, he is relegated to a subplot that seems eerily allegorical. According to the game's Web site, evil marauding aliens known as the Heartless are threatening the Kingdom. (Roy Disney has called the company under Mr. Eisner's leadership rapacious and soulless.) "There's turmoil in Disney Castle," it says. "King Mickey is missing."

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