Why Disney has had box office duds in 2023

The Walt Disney Company is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year, but box office returns have not had the studio in a celebratory mood.

Of the nine major film releases by the studio this year, only four are estimated to have broken even, and only one of those films did so by a significant margin. The disappointing returns for the company mean it almost certainly will fail to have a film gross $1 billion worldwide for the first time since 2015, not counting 2020 and 2021, which were affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

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One of the reasons floated for the poor box office showings has been the quality of the films. Disney CEO Bob Iger has himself said the studio will refocus on what they’re making.

“We have entertained with values and with having a positive impact on the world in many different ways. Black Panther is a great example of that,” Iger said at the New York Times’s DealBook Summit last month. “I like being able to entertain if you can infuse it with positive messages and have a good impact on the world. Fantastic. But that should not be the objective. When I came back, what I have really tried to do is to return to our roots.”

(Disney via AP)

Another problem for Disney may be fatigue or damage to the brand. The House of Mouse dominated in the pre-pandemic world, with surging attendance at its theme parks, several box office smash-hits per year, and the launch of Disney+. In recent years, the company has relied on sequels and gotten involved in a political feud with Florida, hurting the company’s popularity, according to some polls.

Iger has acknowledged that they have made “too many” sequels, and he told investors in an analyst note that the company will “quiet the noise” around the culture wars.

“I don’t want to apologize for making sequels,” Iger said at the New York Times’s DealBook Summit. “Some of them have done extraordinarily well, and they’ve been good films too. I think there has to be a reason to make them; you have to have a good story. And often the story doesn’t hold up to — is not as strong as the original story. That can be a problem.”

The company is not alone in struggling at the cinema. Only two movies have made $1 billion worldwide this year, Warner Bros.’s Barbie and Universal Pictures’s The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and other studios have seen lower returns than before the pandemic. Some of it may be caused by the use of streaming while movie theaters were closed during the COVID-19 crisis.

“At the beginning of the pandemic, the industry embraced short-term thinking and threw itself into the streaming business without thinking about what that might do to moviegoing when the pandemic ended. The stock market rewarded it,” David A. Gross, head of movie consulting firm Franchise Entertainment Research, told Variety. “Audiences became comfortable, and the value of the big screen dropped. By the time Wall Street pulled the plug, the theatrical experience was damaged.”

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Another factor affecting box office returns is consumer spending, which has been hurt in some cases by persistent inflation. Disney’s theme parks in Florida and California have seen lower crowds this year, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal earlier this year.

Looking ahead to 2024, Disney’s release saw a shake-up due to the recent Hollywood writers and actors strikes, meaning some high-profile films, including the live-action Snow White film and Pixar’s Elio, were delayed to 2025. Early in 2024, the company will release three Pixar films theatrically that it released on Disney+ in 2020 and 2021 due to theater closures caused by the pandemic. Other high-profile films include Marvel’s Deadpool 3 and Pixar’s Inside Out 2.