Disney (and others) at the Box Office - Current State of Affairs

Disney Irish

Disney Irish

Premium Member
Mr. Sullivan said:
I don’t know that these decisions are as popular as you’re implying. They’re capitulations to attitudes that the majority of people (according to data anyway) do not hold.
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Call it what you want, but editing out content for the sake of the overall business has been something that many studios including Disney has done for many decades. I understand it’s not an artistic decision but sometimes one must do what’s best for the business overall in order to continue to produce content longer term.
 
Dranth

Dranth

Well-Known Member
CinematicFusion said:
Disney spent a record $290.9 million last year to make ANDOR Season 2, which makes it the highest-ever annual spend for a Star Wars production

This takes the total budget of ANDOR Seasons 1 and 2 to $645 million

Universal spent $350 million on both Wicked movies combined (Marketing cost not included)


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Kind of apples and oranges here.

This is comparing roughly 19 hours worth of runtime for a premium TV show to around 5 hours of theatrical releases. Per minute, Wicked costs twice as much as Andor.
 
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Casper Gutman

Casper Gutman

Well-Known Member
Disney Irish said:
Call it what you want, but editing out content for the sake of the overall business has been something that many studios including Disney has done for many decades. I understand it’s not an artistic decision but sometimes one must do what’s best for the business overall in order to continue to produce content longer term.
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Had this position been applied in the 60s and 70s, African-American representation in films would never have increased. Groundbreaking films like Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner would never have been made.

What we are seeing right now is unprecedented in American history and antithetical to the country’s ideals. Even those individuals uncomfortable with LGBTQ content should be outraged by the circumstances surrounding its removal.
 
Disney Irish

Disney Irish

Premium Member
Casper Gutman said:
Had this position been applied in the 60s and 70s, African-American representation in films would never have increased. Groundbreaking films like Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner would never have been made.

What we are seeing right now is unprecedented in American history and antithetical to the country’s ideals. Even those individuals uncomfortable with LGBTQ content should be outraged by the circumstances surrounding its removal.
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This isn’t industry wide and certainly isn’t in all content so I disagree.
 
DisneyWarrior27

DisneyWarrior27

Well-Known Member
CinematicFusion said:
Not the same… Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was created for an adult audience, explicitly designed to challenge societal norms and foster meaningful dialogue on racial equality. Comparing it to the recent removal of a transgender storyline from a children’s show like Win or Lose ignores the vastly different audience and purpose.

Disney’s decision was not about removing LGBTQ representation. The company has stood firmly behind inclusivity, as evidenced by Strange World, which features an openly gay lead character—unchanged and fully intact on Disney+.

However, Disney has chosen to respect parental preferences, acknowledging that many families prefer to address complex topics, such as gender identity, on their own timeline.

What’s happening now is not unprecedented nor antithetical to the country’s ideals. It’s a nuanced approach to representation that balances inclusivity with the developmental needs of young audiences. Representation remains a priority, but context and audience matter just as much.
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Is it really gonna matter if censoring art will soon hurt the quality of the movie?
 
MagicMouseFan

MagicMouseFan

Well-Known Member
DisneyWarrior27 said:
Is it really gonna matter if censoring art will soon hurt the quality of the movie?
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I don’t think it’s about ‘censoring art’ so much as it is about ensuring that content is fit for the audience it is targeted at. In the past, Disney has aimed its stories at families and if it decides to alter content to make it consistent with that goal, then it is simply maintaining the company’s image. It doesn’t have to be a bad thing if the storytelling is done properly and with a lot of thought. Spokespeople for Disney and Freeform have explained that altering content for younger audiences isn’t about censorship, but rather helping parents feel comfortable discussing certain topics with their kids. This seems almost tailor-made for Disney+ to implement a function that would enable parents to enable or disable certain elements of a show, thereby allowing Disney to continue to tell complex stories and give parents the power to decide what their kids watch. So, everyone wins: art will not be censored, and families will be able to determine what is best for their family.
 
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Animaniac93-98

Animaniac93-98

Well-Known Member
BrianLo said:
It needs to be comfortably 950+ million by next Sunday. Which is two weekends and a holiday week.
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If Moana 2 finishes with $450 million domestically, it would have made about 50% of that during its first 5 days of release

Disney animated movies tend to have much better holds than that. Frozen 2 made about 1/3 of its US gross during its 5-day opening weekend (also a record at the time).

That after such a massive opening we're not 100% sure it will hit a billion worldwide is indicative of less than amazing word of mouth. Moana is clearly popular, and there was demand to see a sequel, but this is what happens when you throw together a sequel at the last minute, and it will probably hurt the live-action remake an inevitable Moana 3.
 
Vegas Disney Fan

Vegas Disney Fan

Well-Known Member
The Disney box office is a bit of a head scratcher, the Lion King live action remake was surprisingly high, Mufasa seems surprisingly low, IO2 was surprisingly high, I wouldn’t say Moana2 is surprisingly low (at nearly a billion) but it’s definitely lower than I expected given IO2s shocking box office.

There’s got to be executives at Disney scratching their heads wondering how and why some movies blow up while very similar movies are struggling to meet expectations.

I’m sure they’re pleased overall with 2024 but there’s got to be a little confusion regarding it also.
 
Casper Gutman

Casper Gutman

Well-Known Member
CinematicFusion said:
Not the same… Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner was created for an adult audience, explicitly designed to challenge societal norms and foster meaningful dialogue on racial equality. Comparing it to the recent removal of a transgender storyline from a children’s show like Win or Lose ignores the vastly different audience and purpose.

Disney’s decision was not about removing LGBTQ representation. The company has stood firmly behind inclusivity, as evidenced by Strange World, which features an openly gay lead character—unchanged and fully intact on Disney+.

However, Disney has chosen to respect parental preferences, acknowledging that many families prefer to address complex topics, such as gender identity, on their own timeline.

What’s happening now is not unprecedented nor antithetical to the country’s ideals. It’s a nuanced approach to representation that balances inclusivity with the developmental needs of young audiences. Representation remains a priority, but context and audience matter just as much.
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So in the 60s and 70s it would have been alright if studios censored interracial relationships and friendships from media so long as that media might have been viewed by children? It would have been fine if that censorship was the result of direct governmental pressure?

You are being incredibly disingenuous here, pretending Disney “chose” to remove this content. They were pressured into it by an extremely high profile, multi-pronged campaign on the part of the state and federal government that included but was not limited to both legislative and legal action. That’s profoundly unprecedented and unconstitutional, no matter how inconvenient that fact is to your beliefs.

You are also trying to limit this to LGBTQ content. In fact, we now have reporting that Disney management is removing environmental themes from an upcoming Pixar film. Environmental messaging has been the safest, most banal type of content in children’s media for decades. Its removal is a demonstration of the extent of Disney’s capitulation and the complete irrelevance of the “parental oversight” talking point.

The idea that this isn’t “industry wide” is extremely naive. The point of these attacks on the most recognizable media company in the world and that media company’s total capitulation is to chill every other media company’s speech. That’s exactly what we’re seeing.

This is not something that can be handwaved away. This is not a fleeting news story. This is how countries change in ways that are nearly impossible to reverse. It’s a historical inflection point. On a more specific level, it will effect every story Disney and other studios tell.
 
TalkingHead

TalkingHead

Well-Known Member
Animaniac93-98 said:
That after such a massive opening we're not 100% sure it will hit a billion worldwide is indicative of less than amazing word of mouth. Moana is clearly popular, and there was demand to see a sequel, but this is what happens when you throw together a sequel at the last minute, and it will probably hurt the live-action remake an inevitable Moana 3.
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The inability of studios to launch new franchises and the diminishing returns on established franchises, combined with the growth of streaming, means big changes will happen in the next few years.

Think about it: 2024 had the highest grossing animated film in history and the highest grossing R-rated film in history (not to mention the highest grossing Broadway adaptation in history, and Moana 2), and the box office for the year is still going to be less for 2024 than it was in 2023.
 

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