Three Strikes: Major Flaws Become Publicly Visible in Disney’s Success Strategy

Three very public failures for The Walt Disney Company are revealing that not all is well in the Magic Kingdom. Have we reached a breaking point?

With the recent news that She-Hulk may be the lowest performing Marvel live action show on Disney+, despite having the largest subscriber base to pull from, cracks are now beginning to form visibly so that the public can see what we’ve been saying for a year here. Disney is losing the trust and the interest of fans by appealing to a very small demographic of individuals who are not necessarily interested in quality of content. Instead, they want ideological content which is very different.

She-Hulk is ideological content. It has to be. We’ve reviewed each episode of the train wreck and it is mostly devoid of quality. It has consistently scored some of the lowest ratings we’ve ever given any property and one reviewer went so far as to say that it is the worst thing on all of Disney+. Don’t expect Disney to hit it with one of those warning placards they stick on their legacy content though.

To see just how bad the show is doing, we highly recommend reading John F Trent’s piece on Bounding Into Comics, “‘She-Hulk: Attorney At Law’ Premiere Ratings Fail To Break Into Nielsen Top 10, Another Failure For Victoria Alonso’s Business Strategy.”

Not only does the Nielsen data call into question Samba TV’s reporting, but it also calls into question Marvel Studios’ business model.

Marvel Studios executive Victoria Alonso detailed that business model during an appearance at Annecy International Animation Film Festival back in June 2021.

While answering a question if she ever gets tired of Marvel Studios’ movies topping the box office charts, Alonso said, “The reason we have that success consistently is because our audience is global. You cannot have a global audience and not somehow start to represent it… For us, it was really, really, really important to have that.”

But it isn’t just Victoria Alonso who has become obsessed with the idea of “representation” without any parameters for when it becomes excessive. It is Disney’s creative side as a whole. Another major crack in their armor is making their public struggle very real. While She-Hulk is coming in under any Top Ten on Nielsen’s ratings, The Little Mermaid remake is being ratioed on YouTube to such a degree that it is perhaps unprecedented. The teaser trailer release sits at an astounding 2.8 million dislikes.

To go beyond what some would like you to believe about The Little Mermaid and how it purportedly reveals raging racism throughout society, I find The Critical Drinker to have absolutely nailed what is really going on. Just note there’s some language in this one:

So what is the third strike in Disney’s very public failing right now? 

The middle of September may be a graveyard for the box office, but Disney wanted to capitalize on the dearth of movie media to launch excitement for all their upcoming projects. It’s their annual, pay-to-attend fan conference, D23. But following the conclusion of this year’s D23, people came away with less-than-stellar reviews of what Disney was “revealing”. From the parks to Disney+ to movies, either not much was shown or it was sub-par. In fact, other than the Indiana Jones 5 trailer shown behind closed doors, I can think of nothing that really wowed the crowd.

Splash Mountain’s replacement looks like a joke. Marvel gave us almost nothing new at all. Star Wars is limping worse than before… if that’s possible. And Disney Parks’ presentation with Josh D’Amaro turned out to be more like playing a “dream-along-with-me” session that had airy concept art of attractions and expansions unlikely to ever occur. They couldn’t even bother giving us expansion plans for locations that would permit such ideas. That would have been too strenuous a task.

What gives?

The Walt Disney Company is in a hard place right now and the public is about to be turned on to what is happening. They’ve badly misread the tea leaves in regard to the political and ideological mood of the country. The studios have gone full “woke” while Chapek and company try to steer the company back to the middle. We’ve argued in the past that Chapek was trying to do what we’ve all hoped — some of our sources have pushed back, clarifying to us that Chapek might want to go to the middle, but his middle isn’t where the middle of the country is. It’s hard to say who is right there, but one thing is certain: Disney is now facing financial headwinds that should result in corrective measures. They’ll never admit it, but they can’t do a full year of Lightyear fails over and over.

Before we conclude, one clarification is needed. We’ve heard from some readers that they have an anticipation that Disney will suddenly collapse or suddenly reverse course in a hard way. Neither of those are likely. Disney is a huge company with many moving parts, and moving the corporation takes time. Even if Disney management is realizing they have a huge problem on their hands (and they do), it’s unlikely they can alter their trajectory before 2025.

That means we’ll continue to have crazy stories about a company that is shooting itself in the mouse foot for years to come. But surely change, it is a comin’.

For all the latest news that should be fun, keep reading That Park Place. As always, drop a comment down below and let us know your thoughts.