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

[Willmark]

There has been a lot of commentary directed at those that have pointed out the problems and how their solutions are unworkable or some version thereof.

With that in mind and if one is if the mindset that what Disney is doing is correct, how should they fix their box office woes if anything?

 

[celluloid]

If the answer is that Marvel movies have to stay the same in order to be well received then yeah, they were doomed to run their course eventually anyway.

Most things are when oversaturated. Phases of Hollywood have proven this as well. Gangster era, Westerns, slashers. The good ones won't do as great, and the secondary character ones will meh out.

Every decade or so has a ten year span of the genre being the main fare. 2009-2019 was superhero saturation.
Note this is saturation, it is different from the genre always being there.

Saturation is a major aspect, but only one.

Not a great thing when your biggest draw of your streaming service was that and the other property you have been oversaturating with multiple big budget series.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

It is not even remotely possible to create a film that “resonates with die hard, core fans.” This is not a singular, reliably pleasable group.

So what you did there is state you didn’t live through the 1970s-80s-90s blockbusters without specifically stating it.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

There has been a lot of commentary directed at those that have pointed out the problems and how their solutions are unworkable or some version thereof.

With that in mind and if one is if the mindset that what Disney is doing is correct, how should they fix their box office woes if anything?

That’s the one nobody will answer

Because if the belief is “Disney knows best…” then that isn’t gonna bail them out.

And they can’t continue to tank their IP…and their crappy stream isn’t gonna make a dent either.

Movies are to drive people to parks and stores to make high profits off product…it’s just that simple

 

[celluloid]

Movies are to drive people to parks and stores to make high profits off product…it’s just that simple

And it is particularly wild to me that people think 2024 and beyond will somehow bring great profits to Disney Plus when what they will have coming is Wish and Captain Marvel and series where viewership is sparse and declining.

 

[Tha Realest]

It is not even remotely possible to create a film that “resonates with die hard, core fans.” This is not a singular, reliably pleasable group.

Yet it was done with Rogue One and TFA.

 

[_caleb]

So what you did there is state you didn’t live through the 1970s-80s-90s blockbusters without specifically stating it.

You don’t honestly think audiences today are the same as back then?

You think any of those blockbusters from the good old days would perform as well today?

 

[_caleb]

Yet it was done with Rogue One and TFA.

You think audiences haven’t changed since then?

 

[_caleb]

And it is particularly wild to me that people think 2024 and beyond will somehow bring great profits to Disney Plus when what they will have coming is Wish and Captain Marvel and series where viewership is sparse and declining.

Who’s saying “great profits?” It’s going to be a long, slow transition into the streaming era. Just like what happened with the music industry.

And you don’t think Wish and The Marvels were greenlit to fill needs in the DTC offerings? The money is in the subscriptions:

Disney+ has 156.8M subscribers. Currently, the cost is $7.99 w/ads, $13.99 Premium, which averages out to be $10.99 if everyone paid full price (many subscriptions are discounted right now).

Let’s say Disney can get to $10/mo. per sub. That would be (I’m terrible at math) eighteen billion nine hundred thirty-six million dollars per year.

And that’s before they really get into in-app purchases, premium second screen content, and other new streams that leverage the technology.

Of course there is going to be churn and they’re going to have to continue to add content, but how many box office flops do you think even half this number would cover?

 

[celluloid]

You don’t honestly think audiences today are the same as back then?

You think any of those blockbusters from the good old days would perform as well today?

Something as well done, yes.

Barbie, Mario and Oppenheimer were all original in their theatrical format as were many of the best 80s hits at one time.

Speaking in terms of franchise.(checks Ghostbusters Afterlife compared to releases around it)

Yes, absolutely yes. It was MAYA model. Most Advanced Yet Accessible. It brought back the fan service and built on the world with a new atmosphere that was not in the originals. It also had an uphill battle of an unsuccessful reboot attempt about five years prior.

Also, while it is always a gamble, certainly not likely to perform worse than Wish, Strange World or Captain Marvel.

 

[CinematicFusion]

You don’t honestly think audiences today are the same as back then?

You think any of those blockbusters from the good old days would perform as well today?

Raiders of the lost ark, back to the future, goonies, Jaws, Die Hard?
Yes… they would excel even today. God help Hollywood if execs are running away from these types of movies.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

You don’t honestly think audiences today are the same as back then?

You think any of those blockbusters from the good old days would perform as well today?

I think audiences today are exactly the same as they were back then.

The demographics have changed a bit but people like good movies regardless of their age, race, gender, sexuality, etc.

It’s odd to me you think modern audiences wouldn’t love Jaws, Back to the Future, Jurassic Park, etc. Why wouldn’t they?

As for how to fix Disney, they need a few hits to change opinions, I wrote in the Indy 5 thread that I thought Disney is suffering from its own failure, Indy 5 was much better than its box office indicates but after how horrible Indy 4 was I think people were hesitant to go.

Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me. I think that applies to Star Wars, Marvel, and now even Pixar and Disney Animation, people aren’t going because Disneys been putting out subpar movies for a few years and we don’t want to be fools again.

 

[Disney Irish]

Yea, I Don't think we are on he same page here. We aren't talking about how long a film has to stay in theaters before streaming, but how many theaters it has to be in for what amount of time. And the percentage of the box office Disney gets. Yes the theaters wanted a longer guaranteed run before streaming, especially for tent pole films. Because Disney was killing the theaters. We all saw what pulling the movies early did to box office. Disney was taking, I think it was 65% of the first 2 or 3 weeks? After that the theater could drop the amount of theaters and they got a better percentage take. By pulling a film at 30 days, for D+, you all but killed the chance for legs on a film. Therefore making the chance for the theater to make money almost non-existent. So yea they wanted a longer guarantee.

What we don't know, is what's the revenue split percentage and theater counts Disney is requiring. So to tie it back to my original question, would the theaters try to get better leverage with Disneys slump at the box office? Any intelligent business would do that. Disney has a pretty well documented history of stiff arming theaters. And while we don't know the exact terms, it's been complained about by the owners. So we know it's well in Disneys favor. As it should have been, they had ALL of the leveraging power. That doesn't seem to be the case right now. So even if you are right that the contracts are better for the theaters, why wouldn't the theaters want to do the same thing to Disney that Disney did to them?

Its all part of the same contract is what I'm saying. That in order to have a minimum exclusive theatrical window that owners agree to a certain amount of screens for the first few weeks. Many of the studios made similar contracts with the theater owners in order to get the ability to stream their movies faster, in some cases day-and-date.

Notice that how even though Trolls 3 has been in theaters longer and is doing the same amount daily as Wish (or some days less than Wish), its only shed like 280 screens. Heck why is Napoleon still in 3500 screens when its not doing any better than Wish. So if Disney is strong arming so is Sony, Apple and Universal, and so is every other studio.

And yes maybe Disney doesn't get as favorable terms next time. It is a business after all. But I doubt it'll get to the point that theaters owners will pull a film on their own due to underperformance without the studio asking for it first.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

And it is particularly wild to me that people think 2024 and beyond will somehow bring great profits to Disney Plus when what they will have coming is Wish and Captain Marvel and series where viewership is sparse and declining.

and they said they need to slash product and “go cheap” to make ALL that stream money…

…what can (and is) go(ing) wrong?

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

You don’t honestly think audiences today are the same as back then?

You think any of those blockbusters from the good old days would perform as well today?

Generally more accepting?
…I’d say yes

Economically different? Not a whole lot at all…
And that’s a kicker we can’t really cover in depth here

 

[_caleb]

Something as well done, yes.

Barbie, Mario and Oppenheimer were all original in their theatrical format as were many of the best 80s hits at one time.

Speaking in terms of franchise.(checks Ghostbusters Afterlife compared to releases around it)

Yes, absolutely yes. It was MAYA model. Most Advanced Yet Accessible. It brought back the fan service and built on the world with a new atmosphere that was not in the originals. It also had an uphill battle of an unsuccessful reboot attempt about five years prior.

Also, while it is always a gamble, certainly not likely to perform worse than Wish, Strange World or Captain Marvel.

So straightforward! Why, do you suppose, why they don’t do more of those?

 

[celluloid]

Notice that how even though Trolls 3 has been in theaters longer and is doing the same amount daily as Wish (or some days less than Wish), its only shed like 280 screens. Heck why is Napoleon still in 3500 screens when its not doing any better than Wish. So if Disney is strong arming so is Sony, Apple and Universal, and so is every other studio.

If people want to see it they want to see it. Five Night's at Freddy's made 4 times its production budget domestically and premiered same day on Peacock. It was a hit there too.

Napoleon has more screens partly because it is a dang long running time and you have more screens to try and catch people who want to see it otherwise they wait an hour longer turnaround time than a 90 minute movie that you are comparing to.

At the end of the day know this, people will go see what they want to see, and they don't drop money on what they won't.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

So straightforward! Why, do you suppose, why they don’t do more of those?

Honestly…because they have managed to forget who drives the economic engine - still - in favor of what their analysts are telling them for the longterm

 

[celluloid]

So straightforward! Why, do you suppose, why they don’t do more of those?

Some studios are! Many made more money this year than they did in 2021 or 2022!

The same reason we have a Hatbox Ghost out of order and other random theme park resort choices. They don't care until it hurts them. This year, in the movies, it really hurt them. They have relied on it and now are at a full stop. This is why we have Hulu Original sequels now being pushed to theatrical release and them not sure what to do with their future remakes as Frozen, Zootopia and Pixar sequels are all we have until 2025 when a risk may be taken again.

 

[erasure fan1]

And yes maybe Disney doesn't get as favorable terms next time. It is a business after all.

And that was really the whole point when I brought it up in the first place. And as far as the strong arming goes, of course everyone does it. But from the reports, Disney was just a lot more demanding. And I also said they deserved to be in that spot as they were the king of the theaters at the time. Hence the reason I said what I said since they've, had a bit of a slump, as they say is the business.