The process of connecting the things we perceive with concepts and their meanings is representation. Throughout its century-long history, the Walt Disney Company has established a dominant presence in the global cultural market, not only through audiovisual productions centered on iconic character series such as “princesses” and “superheroes”, but also through its widely acclaimed animal-themed films, which have resonated with audiences across generations. However, the research on Disney’s animal-themed movies and their global dissemination has rarely drawn the attention of Chinese communication scholars. This paper sorts out the diachronic evolution process of animal images and the representation of views on animals in Disney’s animated films over the past century, and explores the value tools through which Disney’s cultural products achieve global dissemination. The study finds that Disney has produced animal-themed movies with global influence in different historical periods. The representation of its views on animals has echoed the historical development of the global ecological trend of thought, which has become main reason for its cultural products to possess global cultural influence. Nevertheless, since entering the 21st century, as a representative of the capitalist cultural industry, Disney no longer closely follows the more internationalist ecological trends of thought like environmental justice, and relies excessively on digital technological means. Its animal-themed movies have fallen into a double trap of representation. The malfunction of the ecological ideological value tool has caused Disney’s animal-themed movies to lose their leading impetus in global dissemination in the 21st century.