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

Casper Gutman

Well-Known Member
I assure you I don’t.

At least about the parks.

We’ve been over the movies 1000% times. For some reason…and it’s surely multiple factors…the mass demand is dropping or not developing at all. It’s a few things at a minimum

Perhaps the “quality” is there…but Disney - in particular - isn’t in the quality game. They’re in group sales

They want stitches…not elementals.
Of course they want Stitches. The audience REWARDS Stitches! Stitches succeed, quality doesn’t! That’s the point!

If audiences were rejecting Disney because of past flops (and ascribing that kind of memory or logic to mass audiences is VASTLY overrating them), all Disney films would have shown some impact in their box office. They haven’t. Stitch, a live action remake of an animated classic, followed the big stinky Snow White bomb - but despite the proximity, suffered no adverse effects.

Disney is producing hits. The problem is that the hits are bad and the flops are very good. Audiences don’t want stories or cinemas, they want familiar memes.

Let’s be blunt - there is a trend here that is not limited to films. Traditional markers of quality are being rejected, cultural gatekeepers like critics are detested. Mindless unquestioned nostalgia rules. Audiences are getting dumber.
 

DKampy

Well-Known Member
Very bad box office year…for sure

I however will not blame the customers here. The studios have to deliver product and they are not.

Unlike the degradation of wdw…which is about 90% on bad or uniformed customers
This year is full of quality product…. But no one wants to watch quality original films…, it is not just Disney all the studios is floundering.unless it has a steady dose of Member berries…, in fact I saw an excellent film this weekend…. The Life of Chuck… but how many other people did
 

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
This year is full of quality product…. But no one wants to watch quality original films…, it is not just Disney all the studios is floundering.unless it has a steady dose of Member berries…, in fact I saw an excellent film this weekend…. The Life of Chuck… but how many other people did
It’s possible…but it’s also a results based business

It’s hard to argue that movies art “art” and the audience is too stupid to get it.

But to each their own
 

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
The big difference between now and then is that previously it was a few in the industry that said it, now a majority of the theater owners themselves are saying it. At a certain point it no longer becomes just a few crying about some technology changes and rather its an industry wide change that is upending the norm, so maybe its time to actually listen.
And they are likely right

…which is unfortunate but all things do close eventually.


It would be a monumental blow to entertainment in the end. Because it becomes a race to the bottom to pump out volume as cheaply as possible and flood the delivering zone.
 

Tha Realest

Well-Known Member
Want something less Artful…. Check out Novacane… a fun action comedy which no one was interested in… would of been a hit 15 years ago
Yeah, I don’t buy the idea that films (or other media meant for mass consumption) are worse and getting worser. Look, I loved the 90’s - it was a great time to come of age. But revisiting films I loved back then can be painful.

Television is leaps and bounds better than 90’s counterparts. Same with video games. I don’t know that novels are better per se, but wonder how much of that has to do with the breakdown of the conventional publishing houses.
 

Casper Gutman

Well-Known Member
It’s possible…but it’s also a results based business

It’s hard to argue that movies art “art” and the audience is too stupid to get it.

But to each their own
Movies are "art." So are comics and theme parks and video games.

And audiences have always been stupid (although individual members may be brilliant in other areas). But traditional guardrails that guided people - gatekeepers, shame, etc. - have fallen away.
 

Sirwalterraleigh

Premium Member
Movies are "art." So are comics and theme parks and video games.

And audiences have always been stupid (although individual members may be brilliant in other areas). But traditional guardrails that guided people - gatekeepers, shame, etc. - have fallen away.
Oh…you missed the part where money became the motivating force? In other news: Dorothy just landed in munchkin land 😎
 

Disney Irish

Premium Member
I believe box office this year is, in fact, greater than 2022 at the same point. It's certainly greater then 2024, which is what "box office is up" means.
Greater than 2024? Doubt it’ll be when the final numbers for the year come in. That is what I look at not for a specific point in time, the whole year. Because that is all that matters.

So we’ll see. But the trend right now doesn’t look good, not enough movies have “popped” so far. And after just seeing a sneak preview showing of Jurassic Rebirth I’m beginning to doubt it’ll perform either, it fell flat for my theater. If Superman and F4 don’t hit either we may go almost the entire year until Avatar without a $1B movie (assuming Stitch doesn’t get pushed over). That is not good…
 

Willmark

Well-Known Member
Hollywood is certainly in a tough spot, some of their own making, some not. I’m not going to go into all of them, we all know them well by now, whether people want to believe them or disagree, that’s up to them but the reasons why Hollywood is having issues are there.

The point I will focus on is the fans or maybe the movie going/TV public in general. There have been movies or TV shows over the last ten years where the marketing was to deliberately antagonize the fans. Now sure, there are vocal trolls the studios were responding too, but is that the majority?

Reasonable people see the messaging of “this movie isn’t for you” shrug, take it at face value and move on. I know I did. Did the same things with comic books, a fairly famous writer said “if you don’t like my (reason) don’t buy my book.”

And people did just that.

For a lot of folks there are far more choices in media, entertainment what have you than ever before. Add to this a tremendous backlog of media. One could be entertained easily without seeing any current wares.

It should come as no surprise when you tell people something like that and they turn around say “Oh, OK. Good luck” and depart.

I avoid using the word never, but I think it’s unlikely that the folks needed are ever coming back in large enough numbers to reverse the trend. Sure there will be hits along the way but will it be enough to reverse the trend?

I don’t claim to have any insight other than a hunch. The movies need people watching to survive. The reverse is not true. We’ll see what continues to unfold but it doesn’t look good.
 
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Casper Gutman

Well-Known Member
Hollywood is certainly in a tough spot, some of their own making, some not. I’m not going to go into all of them, we all know them well known by now, whether people want to believe them or disagree, that up to them but the reasons why Hollywood is having issues are there.

The point I will focus on is the fans or maybe the movie going/TV public in general. There have been movies or TV shows over the last ten years where the marketing was to deliberately antagonize the fans. Now sure, there are vocal trolls the studios were responding too, but is that the majority?

Reasonable people see the messaging of “this movie isn’t for you” shrug, take it at face value and move on. I know I did. Did the same things with comic books, a fairly famous writer said “if you don’t like my (reason) don’t by my book.”

And people did just that.

For a lot of folks there are far more choices in media, entertainment what have you than ever before. Add to this a tremendous backlog of media. One could be entertained easily without seeing any current wares.

It should come as no surprise when you tell people something like that and they turn around say “Oh, OK. Good luck” and depart.

I avoid using the word never, but I think it’s unlikely that the folks needed are ever coming back in large enough numbers to reverse the trend. Sure there will be hits along the way but will it be enough to reverse the trend?

I don’t claim to have any insight other than a hunch. The movies need people watching to survive. The reverse is not true. We’ll see what continues to unfold but it doesn’t look good.
It’s amazing. I hear things like this and it’s just totally alien to me. I have NEVER felt that a piece of media was made to “deliberately antagonize fans.” Heck, anyone who has read my posts on these boards knows I spend a lot of time complaining about the direction of WDW. I think management is stupid, greedy, trapped in an echo chamber, badly educated - but not antagonistic. Not even when they closed Muppets. Because that idea is silly.

Now what I HAVE seen are a lot of powerful, dishonest people screaming on social and mass media - and from even bullier pulpits - that bad people hate them and everyone who follows them and that their audience should do exactly what they say because those other people are such big meanies. And I’ve seen a lot of people follow because the anger and sense of belonging feel good. But those complaints are self-evidently bad faith.

Now historically, there HAVE been certain groups that most of the media rejects and ignores. But I suspect that that very real, very documented phenomenon is not what most of the “fans” mentioned above are worried about.
 

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