Report: Disney lost over $600 million from just 4 movies in 2023 after year of epic flops



A stunning report detailed the expenses on Disney films and found that the totals of just four of its big-budget projects lost the company more than half a billion in 2023.

Disney films showed up repeatedly on a list of the biggest bombs of the year, and the amount of money the mouse brand is willing to shell out only for the movies to end up deeply in the red is truly mesmerizing.

The report by Deadline is a real eye opener in terms of the volume of cash that can be evaporated by a studio — even outside of the actual production budget — when a film doesn't live up to expectations.

The outlet reported that typically Disney pumps out the majority of the top 10 most-profitable films in a year due to its Marvel movies, but those figures have largely unraveled due to the losses of Disney+. However, it should be noted that Disney and Marvel movies have suffered from insufferable wokeness and diversity-driven casting, which of course CEO Bob Iger denies.

Topping the list of flops was "The Marvels," a project that checked a lot of boxes for the film studio as a diverse, female-led and directed superhero movie. Unfortunately, the movie's $218 million in revenues was overshadowed by a $270 million production budget along with over $100 million in advertising. It crossed the finish line with an estimated $237 million loss.

Disney was rated the worst movie studio of 2023 by Variety, and it's no wonder given that for the entire year moviegoers were perplexed that the studio seemed unwilling to change its ideological path.

"Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny" was yet another heartache for both the studio and fans of the franchise. With reports of rewrites and reshoots after leaked storylines angered fans, it was hard to imagine the film could turn around the negative hype.

Add on a reported $80 million in post-production costs to de-age Harrison Ford, and it's no surprise the film made the list.

The expenses totaled $300 million in production, $120 million in ads, and another $96 million in residuals, distribution, and overhead. The film lost about $143 million according to Deadline, meaning even showing Indiana Jones with his true face for the film's entirety couldn't have saved it.

Disney's "Wish" suffered terrible reviews and went relatively unnoticed even to Disney's most critical observers.

$300 million in production and advertising easily dwarfed its box office and streaming numbers, leaving the studio with -$131 million.

The animated film about the production company's own legacy wasn't the biggest hit with young girls who likely expected a better storyline for a Disney princess. The report described the movie as reeking of corporate product with nothing magical about it.

Keeping in line with strange movie ideas, Disney's "Haunted Mansion" is the studio's second foray into making a movie based around its theme-park attraction of the same name. While the Eddie Murphy-led 2003 iteration seemingly performed very poorly, it still outshined the 2023 film.

The 2003 flick saw a global box office of $182 million, but 20 years later, the new version could only make $117 million. Against a $150 million production budget, the totals were again not on Disney's side with $117 million in losses.

In total, that left Disney with an estimated $628 million in losses from just four movies. How the company fairs in 2024 is anyone's guess, but it's hard to imagine Mickey can lose that much money without some big-name budgets suffering severe flops in theaters.

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Disney’s Latest Box Office Flop Signals More Of The Mouse’s Self-Inflicted Demise

[rebelmouse-proxy-image https://thefederalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screenshot-2023-11-30-at-6.18.57 AM-1200x675.png crop_info="%7B%22image%22%3A%20%22https%3A//thefederalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Screenshot-2023-11-30-at-6.18.57%5Cu202fAM-1200x675.png%22%7D" expand=1]Why have American and global audiences abandoned what used to be the go-to for wholesome, family entertainment?

Disney releases another box office bomb; 'Wish' cursed with some of the worst reviews the House of Mouse has ever received



The Walt Disney Company marked its 100th anniversary with yet another box office bomb. "Wish," which reportedly cost between $175 million and $200 million to produce, drew a paltry $19.5 million domestically over the weekend.

Box office analysts figured the film would bring in at least $45 million in its first five days, but it failed to crack $32 million, reported CNBC.

By way of contrast, "Frozen 2" brought in over $125 million over the same five-day period in 2019.

As of Monday, "Wish" had earned a worldwide total of $48.9 million.

The animated picture's abysmal opening week bookends a year of similar flops, including "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny," "The Little Mermaid" remake, "The Marvels," and "Haunted Mansion."

While continuing the trend of ostensibly cursed releases, "Wish" nevertheless managed to outperform Disney's last November flop, "Strange World" — a work of climate alarmist agitprop featuring the studio's first openly gay on-screen teen. "Strange World," which only brought in $11.9 million over a post-pandemic Thanksgiving weekend, reportedly amounted to a loss for Disney of $197.4 million.

"Wish" will, however, still register as one of Disney's worst opening weekends in modern times.

Not only is "Wish" ostensibly a costly mistake but widely disliked.

The film ranks 64th out Disney's 73 animated theatrical movies according to Rotten Tomatoes, whereon "Wish" presently has a 49% rating.

Kevin Maher of the Times (U.K.) wrote, "Just like The Marvels, Wish is an emotionally inert and personality-free movie that appears to have been assembled from the outside in."

Maher appears to have been referencing "Wish" director Jennifer Lee's June suggestion to the Guardian that "[w]hen you manage characters from outside in, they don't resonate. And if it's not authentic, no one comes."

Wendy Ide of the Observer called the film a "grimly cynical marketing exercise wrapped in the sparkly cloak of an escapist animated fairytale."

Although critics have suggested the film is devoid of personality, sincerity and emotional stimuli, Deadline suggested the film's under-performance is actually the result of a poorly conceived trailer that failed to provide a clear sense of what the film was about, promising only another "plug-and-play princess movie" with an unclear narrative hook.

Blaze News previously reported that ahead of the film's release, the Walt Disney Company filed its annual financial report with the Securities and Exchange Commission, detailing both its woke bona fides and the price it has paid for its involvement in culture wars.

"We face risks relating to misalignment with public and consumer tastes and preferences for entertainment, travel and consumer products, which impact demand for our entertainment offerings and products and the profitability of any of our business," said the SEC filing. "Our businesses create entertainment, travel and consumer products whose success depends substantially on consumer tastes and preferences that change in often unpredictable ways."

The company indicated that this "misalignment" with customers has impacted its various products and services as well as its reputation.

CEO Bob Iger told investors in September that Disney would work to "quiet the noise" in the culture war, reported the New York Post. However, it appears the damage already done may be irreversible. After all, the company has both made its activist position on various sensitive issues extremely clear in recent years and demonstrated its contempt for the democratic will of the American people, throwing around its weight in hopes of undoing legislative efforts to protect children and shore up parental rights.

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If you DON’T want your child to think he can have everything he wants, then you might want to avoid THIS upcoming Disney movie …



Disney’s latest animated film, "Wish," will debut this coming November. It’s the tale of a magical kingdom ruled by a king who has the power to grant wishes, but he only chooses to grant some.

What an evil tyrant.

Along comes Asha, a 17-year-old apprentice, who makes a wish of her own that will threaten the king’s power to determine who gets their wishes granted and who does not.

If you can’t see where this is going, then allow Lauren Chen to explain in greater detail.

King Magnifico “actually doesn't grant everybody's wishes,” says Lauren. “He only grants wishes that would be good for the kingdom as a whole.”

“The horror!” she mocks.

“Doesn't that seem like the reasonable thing to do? There are people out there who would absolutely wish for, like, crazy stuff,” she continues. “A good king, a reasonable king should be able to tell people no – that's what being a responsible leader is all about; that's what actual stewardship means.”

To be fair, Lauren acknowledges that “we don't know how the plot is going to play out exactly.”

“Maybe the twist in this film is that King Magnifico actually isn't evil at all; he's just more mature and Asha needs to realize that being an adult actually means sometimes telling people no and not doing whatever you feel like all the time,” Lauren speculates.

But that would mean that Disney has some common sense, and based on the string of recent films the company has put out (most of which were giant flops), it’s probably unlikely that will be the theme.

Further, “the king is a white guy and Asha, the lead, is a diverse female character,” Lauren points out. Add to that the fact that he’s portrayed multiple times in the trailer as an evil tyrant, and it’s almost certain he will be the irredeemable villain.

Lauren isn’t the only one who’s skeptical of “Wish.”

People all over have called out the obvious “questionable moral lesson and identity politics,” but they’ve also expressed a general lack of interest in what they assume will be yet another typical Disney plotline.

One X user commented:

“A magician with immense power being challenged by a young girl with an animal sidekick? That’s just cut and paste Disney.”

“I remember a time not that long ago when Disney animated films were dependably good, where you could count on every single one essentially being a home run, an instant classic, but it seems like we've strayed so far from that,” says Lauren.


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