-
Welcome to the WDWMAGIC.COM Forums!
Please take a look around, and feel free to sign up and join the community.
'Strange World' Disney's 2022 Animated Film
- Thread starter NateD1226
- Start date
crispy
Well-Known Member
Super weird, but yes, I have seen a ton of ads in the last month. I don't usually go ad-free for anything so maybe that's why I have seen them. I haven't seen anything for Puss in Boots although the soft opening yesterday seemed to generate a lot of buzz around how good it was.
Animaniac93-98
Well-Known Member
We've seen this cycle repeat time and again. Disney animation has a string of hits, then a string of duds...and then more success. We've been in the dud phase for a while now. The movies after Moana have not been so great, despite the financial success of some.
That's why Pixar having a near flawless record for 15 years or so (1995-2010ish) was so remarkable.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
It's official now. Strange World bombed at the box office. It will cost Burbank around $150 Million dollars. That's $150 Million flushed down the toilet right at the time of corporate crisis and financial strain in Burbank. Yikes. 
It had a modest goal of getting $35 Million over its five day Thanksgiving weekend debut. By Saturday the goal was downgraded by Variety to a hopeful $26 Million weekend haul. This afternoon, Strange World only got $18.6 Million.
Variety and other media sources report that Strange World had a production budget of $180 Million.
deadline.com
It had a modest goal of getting $35 Million over its five day Thanksgiving weekend debut. By Saturday the goal was downgraded by Variety to a hopeful $26 Million weekend haul. This afternoon, Strange World only got $18.6 Million.
Variety and other media sources report that Strange World had a production budget of $180 Million.
‘Strange World’ To Lose $147M: Why Theatrical Was Best Decision For Doomed Toon –Not Disney+– As Bob Iger Takes Over CEO From Bob Chapek
Death, taxes, and films that bomb at the box office. Such is life in Hollywood, and at the end of the day, the estimated $147M loss which is expected for Disney Animation’s Strange World isn&…
deadline.com
Everything you can expect from me on this matter is right here: https://forums.wdwmagic.com/threads/strange-world-disneys-2022-animated-film.974594/post-10451870
The fact is the media wanted the movie to fail, kept saying it would fail, the public absorbed "it'll fail," and the press effectively got it to fail after rigging the game.
Maybe the rule should be now that studios don't put out projections and the press don't make predictions anymore, the studio just gives out the numbers. And on Wall Street too. No more earnings guidance, no more projection targets by analysts, just the company announcing the quarterly results.
If that rule had been out in 2002, for example, Treasure Planet wouldn't have failed so spectacularly, and people would've just enjoyed the movie on its own merits back then.
The fact is the media wanted the movie to fail, kept saying it would fail, the public absorbed "it'll fail," and the press effectively got it to fail after rigging the game.
Maybe the rule should be now that studios don't put out projections and the press don't make predictions anymore, the studio just gives out the numbers. And on Wall Street too. No more earnings guidance, no more projection targets by analysts, just the company announcing the quarterly results.
If that rule had been out in 2002, for example, Treasure Planet wouldn't have failed so spectacularly, and people would've just enjoyed the movie on its own merits back then.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
Strange World debuted in all major foreign markets last Wednesday and Thursday, and only pulled in $9.2 Million over that four to five day period. The original goal for Strange World in 43 foreign markets was $25 Million for that five day period.
So Strange World underperformed in foreign markets even worse than it did in the USA...
"Before we look more closely at the hold on Wakanda Forever, however, attention turns to Disney’ new entry this session, the animated Strange World which arrived with a thud at $9.2M in 43 overseas markets and $27.8M globally, including the domestic five-day holiday.
Strange World is original animated IP that, as we came into the weekend, was eyeing a $25M offshore start and ended up worlds away from that. Ultimately, Strange World was consistent in that it just didn’t click anywhere. The top market was the UK at $1M, followed by Spain, Mexico and Italy with $700K apiece and Germany at $600K."
uk.sports.yahoo.com
So Strange World underperformed in foreign markets even worse than it did in the USA...
"Before we look more closely at the hold on Wakanda Forever, however, attention turns to Disney’ new entry this session, the animated Strange World which arrived with a thud at $9.2M in 43 overseas markets and $27.8M globally, including the domestic five-day holiday.
Strange World is original animated IP that, as we came into the weekend, was eyeing a $25M offshore start and ended up worlds away from that. Ultimately, Strange World was consistent in that it just didn’t click anywhere. The top market was the UK at $1M, followed by Spain, Mexico and Italy with $700K apiece and Germany at $600K."
‘Black Panther: Wakanda Forever’ Leaps To $676M WW; ‘Strange World’ Inanimate – International Box Office
In its third weekend, Disney/Marvel’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever continued to reign at the global and international box office. With a $32.1M offshore frame (-53%), the sequel has an overseas total of $308M for $675.6M worldwide through Sunday. Before we look more closely at the hold on...
Last edited by a moderator:
TP2000
Well-Known Member
Really? I don't think the public even knew this was a movie until a week or so ago.
It had little marketing, until a short burst at the end from Disney's own in-house marketing channels on Disney+, ESPN, Hulu, etc. They didn't even release official media reviews on it until two days before it opened, and those reviews from industry sources were modestly positive.
Heck, even talking about it for the past two weeks on this forum, I hadn't even heard the kid in it was gay until just a couple days before the release. And I only learned about that via this forum, not the commercials for the movie.
There was no real media chatter or social media buzz on this movie at all. Which seemed to be the problem.
Well, that part can be attributed to Kareem Daniel, for the most part, following in what he'd done for other theatrical films. If Iger's regime had stayed intact through 2020 until now, while that's no guarantee of these films being more successful, they would've at least stood more of a chance. Also, odds are the Pixar films would've stayed theatrical releases. Again, no guarantee of success, but more of a shot for them. Daniel's strategy really cut the legs out from under them.
But the press played their part, because they want Disney to fail. It's the tall poppy syndrome writ large. They've basically gotten sick of the position Disney has had since the Renaissance, they just want it to go away and live up to their preconceived notion of "No one could help the company find itself again without Walt."
The press definitely gave Treasure Planet this treatment, making it fail deliberately to spite Eisner, making the movie about him and his tenure rather than just accept the movie for what it was and letting it find its audience. After all, if there's any movie that should've been a masterpiece in that era, that's the one.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
That argument actually came up seriously from several people (I can't remember who exactly, but it was more than one) this past summer over in the Lightyear thread after it bombed at the theater.
I was baffled by that, since I don't see big DVD sections in stores any longer. I just couldn't imagine that DVD/BluRay sales were a big profit generator for bloated-budget films that bomb at the theater. But some folks assured me it was still a happy generator of major profits for Burbank.
Then, just now while looking at the Strange World numbers, I found that Hollywood industry sources do in fact track DVD/BluRay sales. And as I suspected, in the 2020's they are not a major profit center any longer. In fact, Minions outsold Lightyear DVD/BluRays quite easily, and even Minions DVD profits are just a tiny florette of icing on its huge profit cake.
DVD/BluRay sales reports are delayed by six weeks, since the sales numbers take time to tabulate officially from thousands of retail channels around the nation. But this latest tally is from October 9th, 2022...
The Numbers - Combined DVD and Blu-ray Most Recent Weekly Sales Chart
Top Selling Combined DVD and Blu-ray titles in the US for last week.
www.the-numbers.com
Last edited:
Dead2009
Horror Movie Guru
That movie had potential too if they didn't throw all the disasters in the first 45 minutes of the movie.
Joel
Well-Known Member
Who in the press not only wanted this movie to fail but also had enough pull to make it happen?
This is a conspiracy theory that's even less anchored in reality than lizard people.
KeithVH
Well-Known Member
I'm still trying to get over the fact that Ash is still kicking butt in 2022 at #11 . . .
I didn't say any one person did: I said the press, as a whole, wanted the movie to fail, kept saying it would fail, the public absorbed that message of "it'll fail," and it effectively primed the public to react the way the press hoped: to not buy tickets.
They want Disney's movies to fail because they prefer the idea of Disney being in never-ending crisis rather than finding its way.
Again, they did much the same thing to Treasure Planet back when it was released, making it all about Michael Eisner and his tenure rather than letting the movie exist on its own and find its audience on its own merits.
TP2000
Well-Known Member
I thought it was funny that after this summer, Top Gun from 1986 was outselling Lightyear.
I wondered if maybe Gen Z were buying the "Top Gun" BluRay by mistake and not realizing it was the old version their parents saw when they were dating in the 80's?
Joel
Well-Known Member
Where in "the press as a whole" was this message so widely disseminated that it was even a minor contributing factor to this movie failing? I would love to see proof that most people even knew it existed, let alone that they were swayed from seeing it by the supposedly omnipotent press (who lots of people ignore/distrust these days).
TP2000
Well-Known Member
I was just thinking about it... In the past 96 hours I have been to three different social events, and one Black Friday shopping excursion in an SUV with others. Two of those events were full of
Not once in the last 96 hours did Strange World come up in conversation.
Wakanda Forever was a movie topic for the kids at the table. But Strange World? No one talked about it.
Which I think is the problem.
Last edited by a moderator:
Consumer
Well-Known Member
The press predicted the failure of Strange World because Strange World looked like it would fail, and sure enough it did. I never read any articles about this movie’s financial predictions and I still knew it would fail (though I was surprised by how abysmally it failed).
Last edited by a moderator:
CaptainAmerica
Premium Member
Correct. Once upon a time, a movie could "break even" at the box office, and even once AMC takes their cut, there were the DVD sales and the checks from Netflix and the checks from HBO and the checks from TNT where you would still draw money after the fact. But all of that has been sacrificed at the altar of Disney+.That argument actually came up seriously from several people (I can't remember who exactly, but it was more than one) this past summer over in the Lightyear thread after it bombed at the theater.
I was baffled by that, since I don't see big DVD sections in stores any longer. I just couldn't imagine that DVD/BluRay sales were a big profit generator for bloated-budget films that bomb at the theater. But some folks assured me it was still a happy generator of major profits for Burbank.
Then, just now while looking at the Strange World numbers, I found that Hollywood industry sources do in fact track DVD/BluRay sales. And as I suspected, in the 2020's they are not a major profit center any longer. In fact, Minions outsold Lightyear DVD/BluRays quite easily, and even Minions DVD profits are just a tiny florette of icing on its huge profit cake.
DVD/BluRay sales reports are delayed by six weeks, since the sales numbers take time to tabulate officially from thousands of retail channels around the nation. But this latest tally is from October 9th, 2022...
View attachment 681368
The Numbers - Combined DVD and Blu-ray Most Recent Weekly Sales Chart
Top Selling Combined DVD and Blu-ray titles in the US for last week.
Joel
Well-Known Member
Here is the entirety of Strange World coverage on Variety's website. Most of it is post-release. Not only is Variety's review of the movie a positive one, but there's also an article explaining why its box office performance should not preclude it from Oscar consideration.
There was no push to destroy this film by the press. That isn't even how most people decide whether to see a movie in the year 2022 anyway.