A trailer for a slasher film, featuring a masked killer dressed as Mickey Mouse, was released on 1 January, the day that Disney's copyright on the earliest versions of the cartoon character expired in the US.

"We wanted the polar opposite of what exists," the movie's producer said.

A new Mickey-inspired horror game, showing the rodent covered with blood stains, also dropped on the same day.

Steamboat Willie, a 1928 short film featuring early non-speaking versions of Mickey and Minnie, entered the public domain in the US on New Year's Day.

It means cartoonists, novelists and filmmakers can now rework and use the earliest versions of Mickey and Minnie.

In fact, anyone can use those versions without permission or cost.

Creatives have been quick to take advantage of the new rules, with a trailer (contains violent scenes) for a Mickey horror film dropping on the same day.

In the horror comedy thriller, called Mickey's Mouse Trap, a young woman is thrown a surprise birthday party in an amusement arcade - but things quickly take a turn for the worse when she and her friends encounter a knife-wielding murderer in a Mickey costume.

"A place for fun, a place for friends, a place for hunting. The mouse is out," the trailer screams in red text.

"People need to not take it too seriously, we made a ridiculously fun movie," said Simon Phillips, who wrote and produce the film and plays the man behind the Mickey mask.

Mr Phillips told the BBC that "if you put Mickey into a family movie, you don't cover new ground".

"In order to flip the coin, you have to come up with something that's the polar opposite of what already exists," he said.

The film itself does not have a confirmed release date but is expected to be out this March.