The version of Mickey Mouse that would become public domain in 2024 bears very little visual similarity to subsequent versions. Still recognizable, but definitely not the same. Only the initial works from that year will be public domain.

You won't be able to recreate Disneyland with this public domain entrance.

Works featuring Mickey will be public domain, but they'll still have the trademark so it's not like everyone will suddenly be able to sell your own Mickey Mouse merchandise.

I can't remember the source (maybe just a pet theory) but I believe Disney stopped using Mickey because there was so much contention over "Mickey would never do that" among fans so he just became a mascot instead of having him be a character in a story...probably in the 80s-90s.

Near the 2000s the recognizably of Mickey started dropping with young kids so they've put him in more stuff. He started "hosting" things like Mickey's Clubhouse, put him in games like Epic Mickey and Kingdom Hearts, they had a retro redesign about 10 years ago and have used him in a bunch of new stuff including a few theme park rides.

naa, the reason mickey is not as public as he was when he came out is because he became boring and he was overtaken by donald etc. I've followed the game devolopement of Epic Mickey where Warren Specter (producer/director, also of deus ex-fame) had a lot to say about the history of mickey and his take was that in the beginning Mickey was very mischievous but somehow that changed over the years and he basically became boring and all the interesting traits - in the sense of storytelling or character development - where found in other characters (and once mickey had found his boring persona, writers weren't quite allowed to give him back his mischievousness). Mickey became nothing more than an icon.