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

[TP2000]

Again, if it follows in the footsteps of its predecessor, it should hold at 800 and then expand after Oscar nominations. Or is that packed 1Q release schedule coming for its screens?

The first pass at box office numbers are out for this weekend, the last official weekend of the holiday season (in the West at least, schools reopen tomorrow after a 3 week break).

And this is where it gets weird... Poor Things lost 50 theaters this weekend?!? It's now down to 750 theaters nationwide. And in about 4 hours a very, very tiny sliver of Americans will be tuning in to the Golden Globes ceremony to see all the nominations that Poor Things got. And so the theater chains celebrated that by taking away theaters from Poor Things? That wasn't supposed to happen, was it?

Also, Wish has now been humiliated at the box office by trolls, and then a quirky chocolate salesman, and now even ducks.

 

[BrianLo]

For the record;

• Disney lost $1.248 Billion at the box office in 2023.
• I have never called for shuttering all the studios. I don't think anyone here has, have they?
• I have said repeatedly though that keeping Pixar up in Emeryville in the 21st century no longer makes sense. It's duplicative and wasteful, especially when neither WDAS or Pixar has had a film break even at the box office since before Covid.
• In addition, they need to do another round of layoffs at the Burbank studio campus. Slashing their budgets by half in order to have a better shot at merely breaking even will require tough decisions, slashing perks and benefits, and real layoffs.

The company did not ‘lose’ anything at the box office. They don’t pay exhibitors to be part of it. They failed to pay off their production and marketing costs from that single revenue source. As we’ve been over, that’s a single revenue source, sometimes less than half for poorly performing films in that venue. Disney, the company, still lost money this year. Thanks mostly to the terrible back half (Indy, Haunted Mansion, Marvels, Wish). But to the tune of several hundred million. Not a billion.

And you’ll note Pixar did not contribute to those loses.

I know you want Pixar to close and in your very honest defense you’ve been pretty down on them for at least the last decade. But it’s the only studio of their five majors where they didn’t have a film declared a failure this year by the company. They had one true miss (Lightyear) las year - and even that pales compared to WDAS’ two most recent efforts.

It’s a long storied studio now. With an enviable laundry list of massive hits, financially, critically and with audiences. Advocating for its closure is frankly heresy. From a business standpoint it would just as soon make more sense to close WDAS (which is equally preposterous). Massive tech conglomerates would sooner sweep Pixar up than Disney quietly closing it… for what gain? You tell me. You just really dislike that studio, I think from a Northern California cultural lens? Maybe because it has invaded the parks for you a bit too much (fair) and I assume you’ve never really watched any of their movies?

If we’re going to close Pixar, Universal might as well close Dreamworks, which has struggled to find really anything that’s culturally struck for a while now. Some mild Modest hits aside.

 

[TsWade2]

Yoo hoo! https://x.com/luiz_fernando_j/status/1744027842680082709?s=46&t=wmJezcc4cD3jdTKNnLTGAQ Disney Wish finally cross the $200 million mark globally. Not domestically, but globally. It’s not necessary a success…..yet, but it’s no longer a flop.

 

[crispy]

Yoo hoo! https://x.com/luiz_fernando_j/status/1744027842680082709?s=46&t=wmJezcc4cD3jdTKNnLTGAQ Disney Wish finally cross the $200 million mark globally. Not domestically, but globally. It’s not necessary a success…..yet, but it’s no longer a flop.

It's still a flop.

 

[TsWade2]

The company did not ‘lose’ anything at the box office. They don’t pay exhibitors to be part of it. They failed to pay off their production and marketing costs from that single revenue source. As we’ve been over, that’s a single revenue source, sometimes less than half for poorly performing films in that venue. Disney, the company, still lost money this year. Thanks mostly to the terrible back half (Indy, Haunted Mansion, Marvels, Wish). But to the tune of several hundred million. Not a billion.

And you’ll note Pixar did not contribute to those loses.

I know you want Pixar to close and in your very honest defense you’ve been pretty down on them for at least the last decade. But it’s the only studio of their five majors where they didn’t have a film declared a failure this year by the company. They had one true miss (Lightyear) las year - and even that pales compared to WDAS’ two most recent efforts.

It’s a long storied studio now. With an enviable laundry list of massive hits, financially, critically and with audiences. Advocating for its closure is frankly heresy. From a business standpoint it would just as soon make more sense to close WDAS (which is equally preposterous). Massive tech conglomerates would sooner sweep Pixar up than Disney quietly closing it… for what gain? You tell me. You just really dislike that studio, I think from a Northern California cultural lens? Maybe because it has invaded the parks for you a bit too much (fair) and I assume you’ve never really watched any of their movies?

If we’re going to close Pixar, Universal might as well close Dreamworks, which has struggled to find really anything that’s culturally struck for a while now. Some mild Modest hits aside.

Pay no mind to TP2000, he’s just being a doom and gloomier.

 

[TsWade2]

It's still a flop.

Until it reaches to DisneyPlus. And it’s a hit to me! And it will be a hit on DisneyPlus! Deal with it!

 

[BuddyThomas]

It's still a flop.

Can you let the guy be happy it has crossed the 200 Million mark for five minutes before adding the usual dose of negativity? Sheesh.

 

[LittleBuford]

Until it reaches to DisneyPlus. And it’s a hit to me! And it will be a hit on DisneyPlus! Deal with it!

I enjoyed Wish too, but unfortunately it did not do at all well at the box office. That’s OK! It’s disappointing, yes, but it’s not important in the grand scheme of things. I wouldn’t worry about it or let others bring you down.

 

[TsWade2]

I enjoyed Wish too, but unfortunately it did not do at all well at the box office. That’s OK! It’s disappointing, yes, but it’s not important in the grand scheme of things. I wouldn’t worry about it or let others bring you down.

Like I said, it will be a hit on DisneyPlus. Think of this as a comeback like Sleeping Beauty.

 

[celluloid]

Universal wins again, investments show steady.(Migration and Night Swim)

Aquaman 2 surprises many of its hold. Performance oversaturation overall down but holding under those circumstances rather well considering all the negativity that came with the movie.

Wonka is about to surpass Dial of Destiny's numbers in the next coming weeks including MLK weekend play.

I never would have guessed that to happen. Internationally, it has those old worldwide numbers of a hit film and has smashed what others have done when performing well overseas. It was a crowd pleaser across the board.

 

[TP2000]

It’s a long storied studio now. With an enviable laundry list of massive hits, financially, critically and with audiences. Advocating for its closure is frankly heresy.

Pixar's origin story and early success is really quite impressive. And I would have agreed with you on keeping Pixar in Emeryville in 2015. But now? It's movies are fairly indistinguishable from WDAS, so why the need for two separate lavishly funded studios that both make the same type of movies that both fail to break even at the box office?

Even after making fun of it on this forum for most of the past year, I still sometimes forget that Strange World was not a Pixar movie; it looked like Pixar, acted like Pixar, and was non-musical like Pixar. I have to remind myself it was WDAS.

So why in the 2020's would you need two separate studios 400 miles apart making nearly the same products; far enough away from each other to not share most resources, but close enough to seem wasteful???

TP2000 Plan For Animation Success: Merge Pixar into WDAS, shut down the Emeryville studio and sell the land to the homeless industrial complex for Druggy Tiny Homes, lay off a lot of duplicative staff and administration at both properties, and set the new organization up in the lavish Disney Animation studios complex in Burbank. Princessy, musical, fantasy based animation gets branded "Walt Disney", and contemporary, SciFi and non-musical animation gets branded "Pixar". They'd save a lot of money and future heartache by just getting that over with and merging the two studios.

The shareholders can thank me later.

 

[Andrew C]

Pixar's origin story and early success is really quite impressive. And I would have agreed with you on keeping Pixar in Emeryville in 2015. But now? It's movies are fairly indistinguishable from WDAS, so why the need for two separate lavishly funded studios that both make the same type of movies that both fail to break even at the box office?

Even after making fun of it on this forum for most of the past year, I still sometimes forget that Strange World was not a Pixar movie; it looked like Pixar, acted like Pixar, and was non-musical like Pixar. I have to remind myself it was WDAS.

So why in the 2020's would you need two separate studios 400 miles apart making nearly the same products; far enough away from each other to not share most resources, but close enough to seem wasteful???

TP2000 Plan For Animation Success: Merge Pixar into WDAS, shut down the Emeryville studio and sell the land to the homeless industrial complex for Druggy Tiny Homes, lay off a lot of duplicative staff and administration at both properties, and set the new organization up in the lavish Disney Animation studios complex in Burbank. Princessy, musical, fantasy based animation gets branded "Walt Disney", and contemporary, SciFi and non-musical animation gets branded "Pixar". They'd save a lot of money and future heartache by just getting that over with and merging the two studios.

The shareholders can thank me later.

Probably don’t want to lose the Northern California talent of animators.

 

[LittleBuford]

Even after making fun of it on this forum for most of the past year, I still sometimes forget that Strange World was not a Pixar movie; it looked like Pixar, acted like Pixar, and was non-musical like Pixar. I have to remind myself it was WDAS.

I’m not surprised you confuse the output of the two studios when, by your own admission, you haven’t watched any of their recent films to begin with. How could you possibly know anything about how Strange World “acted”?

 

[BrianLo]

The shareholders can thank me later.

I don’t think they would. The studio could probably be sold for at least 7-10 billion dollars. Especially in the era of massive tech conglomerates who’d want access to that brand label and talent for their service.

The obvious one would be Apple.

Coco, Turning red, Luca and yes Elemental are all recent (post 2015) success stories out of that studio. Inside Out if you want to count 2015. No one else is producing consistent brand starters like Pixar. Illumination was for a time, as much as I’m not really high on that studio. Though they got sequel heavy.

Disney wants two animation studios because they want to produce more than one animated film a year. In fact, if anything with streaming they are requesting more output than ever before from those studios. Pixar has a new series coming out this year for D+. Disney has their Tiana series as well. They don’t need less animated talent.

 

[crispy]

Can you let the guy be happy it has crossed the 200 Million mark for five minutes before adding the usual dose of negativity? Sheesh.

This is the box office thread. A movie that cost $200 million making $200 million after six weeks in the theater isn't a cause for celebration. It just isn't.

 

[DKampy]

Any of Disney's recent musicals, really. At least in my mind.

But that may be due to my generation. When I think "musical" I think two things; Walt Disney and/or Rodgers & Hammerstein.

EDIT: Except in summer, when Rodgers & Hammerstein is replaced with Frankie & Annette in my viewing list of musicals.

Well if you do love musicals… You should check out The Color Purple…it really is fantastic…as someone who never saw the show on broadway… I was worried about how the musical numbers would be integrated in the more dramatic parts of the story, but I was surprised about well done it was

 

[BuddyThomas]

This is the box office thread. A movie that cost $200 million making $200 million after six weeks in the theater isn't a cause for celebration. It just isn't.

It’s up to $209 Million

 

[BuddyThomas]

Time for the Golden Globes!

 

[Willmark]

I don’t think they would. The studio could probably be sold for at least 7-10 billion dollars. Especially in the era of massive tech conglomerates who’d want access to that brand label and talent for their service.

The obvious one would be Apple.

Coco, Turning red, Luca and yes Elemental are all recent (post 2015) success stories out of that studio. Inside Out if you want to count 2015. No one else is producing consistent brand starters like Pixar. Illumination was for a time, as much as I’m not really high on that studio. Though they got sequel heavy.

Disney wants two animation studios because they want to produce more than one animated film a year. In fact, if anything with streaming they are requesting more output than ever before from those studios. Pixar has a new series coming out this year for D+. Disney has their Tiana series as well. They don’t need less animated talent.

If Apple wanted to the don't need to buy just the studio(s). Apple could simply buy all of Disney if they wanted to.

 

[celluloid]

Coco, Turning red, Luca and yes Elemental are all recent (post 2015) success stories out of that studio. Inside Out if you want to count 2015. No one else is producing consistent brand starters like Pixar. Illumination was for a time, as much as I’m not really high on that studio. Though they got sequel heavy.

Interesting that you call Illumination Sequel heavy when they have had all of their sequels because all of their originals thus far have been hits.
Minions is a phenom for sure.
Illumination has had some Suess and Mario connected so you could say they have not had original characters as much but the recent situation with Pixar's sequels and spin offs are about the same.,
But let's not forget that after Ranft's passing, Pixar became almost entirely sequels and spin off. Toy Story 3, Toy Story 4. Cars 2, Cars 3. Cars 4. Lightyear. Inside Out 2.