Hollywood is patting itself on the back for achieving a so-called milestone in “gender equality,” as more than half of the top 100 movies in 2024 featured a female lead or co-lead. However, a closer look at the box office numbers tells a different story—one that suggests audiences are becoming increasingly disengaged from the industry’s forced representation efforts.
Daisy Ridley as Rey in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019), Lucasfilm
Despite more movies being released in 2024 than in 2023, the total box office declined, raising serious questions about the actual impact of Hollywood’s identity-driven agenda.
The Box Office Continues to Struggle
Before the pandemic, Hollywood was consistently pulling in over $11 billion per year. Now, post-2020, the industry struggles to break past $8.5 billion, with 2024’s total box office revenue declining from 2023.
Despite releasing more films in 2024, the industry made less money.
That’s not a sign of success—it’s a glaring red flag that studios are failing to connect with audiences.
(L-R): Kingo (Kumail Nanjiani), Makkari (Lauren Ridloff), Gilgamesh (Don Lee), Thena (Angelina Jolie), Ikaris (Richard Madden), Ajak (Salma Hayek), Sersi (Gemma Chan), Sprite (Lia McHugh), Phastos (Brian Tyree Henry) and Druig (Barry Keoghan) in Marvel Studios‘ ETERNALS. Photo courtesy of Marvel Studios. ©Marvel Studios 2021. All Rights Reserved.
Here’s the breakdown:
– 2019 (Pre-Covid): $11.3 billion box office revenue
– 2023 (Post Covid): $8.9 billion (a significant drop from pre-2020 levels)
– 2024: $8.5 billion (a further decline from 2023)
What makes this even more damning is that as the years go by, movie prices get more expensive. So what can already be perceived as a downturn in business is actually even worse.
In 2019, movie tickets cost an average of $9.16. In 2024, those same tickets cost an average of $10.78.
The numbers don’t lie—Hollywood is making more “inclusive” movies, but fewer people are showing up to watch them. If representation alone were enough to drive box office success, the industry wouldn’t be facing a downward trend in revenue.
More Representation, But Still Not Enough?
Despite the increase in female-led films, the diversity advocates aren’t fully celebrating just yet. The USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative report highlights that leads and co-leads from “underrepresented racial and ethnic groups” declined in 2024, sparking fresh complaints that Hollywood isn’t doing enough. Only 25 of the top 100 films featured a lead of color in 2024, a significant drop from 37 in 2023.
Rachel Zegler singing the original song “Waiting on a Wish” from Disney‘s Snow White live action remake – YouTube, Disney
READ: EXCLUSIVE: U.S. Government Paid Over $14 Million of Taxpayer Funds to Suspected Disney Subsidiary
So what’s the response from activists? Instead of acknowledging that audiences simply prefer well-crafted stories over identity politics, the reaction is to demand even more DEI-driven casting and storytelling. No matter how much Hollywood bends over backward to meet these expectations, it will never be enough.
The Audience-Hollwood Disconnect
The biggest post-COVID hits—Top Gun: Maverick, Spider-Man: No Way Home—succeeded because they focused on entertainment first. They weren’t movies built around gender equality narratives, diversity quotas, or checking representation boxes. In contrast, many of Hollywood’s most identity-focused projects have struggled to find traction, proving that audiences want compelling characters and great stories, not agenda-driven filmmaking.
JOY AND ANXIETY — Disney and Pixar’s “Inside Out 2” returns to the mind of freshly minted teenager Riley just as a new Emotion shows up unexpectedly. Much to Joy’s surprise, Anxiety isn’t the type who will take a back seat either. Featuring the voices of Amy Poehler as Joy and Maya Hawke as Anxiety, “Inside Out 2” releases only in theaters Summer 2024.© 2023 Disney/Pixar. All Rights Reserved.
Consider the case of 2024’s top-grossing film, Inside Out 2. While featuring a female lead, the film’s success was due to its strong storytelling and franchise recognition—not because of gender representation. Meanwhile, movies that heavily marketed themselves around identity politics, like The Marvels, often struggled to connect with general audiences.
Hollywood executives and advocacy groups continue to claim that audiences demand more representation, yet the numbers suggest otherwise. If this approach were truly resonating, box office numbers would be soaring, not shrinking year after year.
Rather than forcing identity politics into every film, studios should take a step back and ask a simple question: Are these movies entertaining? Because, at the end of the day, audiences don’t care about diversity quotas—they care about good movies. Until Hollywood realizes this, expect the downward trend to continue.
Does gender equality play a role in what movies you see in theaters? Sound off in the comments and let us know.
Reminds me of the Five Year Plans of China. You can read into that yourself and see how many times the Marxists of that era tried something over and over again which just kept failing, and their belief was that they just needed to do more of it.
If you touch a hot stove and burn your finger, the solution is not to place your entire palm and hand down on the hot stove.
Learning requires intelligence.
Like we need more proof that wokeism is a cult ideology? “The world works the way we say it works, even the parts that don’t.”
Hollywoke refuses to accept that the rest of the world rejects their reality (“I reject your reality and substitute my own.” – Adam Savage, I had to say it) and just wants what it’s always wanted: attractive protagonists, good storytelling, and no politics shoved in our faces. So few people care about “gender equality in movies” that pandering to them is why Tinsel Town is dying.
Adam Savage was very clearly joking because he knew they had him dead to rights and just wanted to play it off as a joke. This is far, far worse.
I know, I was referring to it because I just couldn’t resist not saying it. The woke who keep trying to do exactly what Adam said are the real jokes here.
Yep. We used to say that someone who chose their own reality over objective reality was insane. Then they started calling themselves woke.
Even if you’re writing a character who’s not a straight white man, you should write heroes who have that level of responsibility.
You can’t have men who degrade women, so don’t be surprised if people don’t want women degrading men.
You can’t have white people degrading other races, so don’t have other races degrading white people.
If it’s meant to be children friendly, don’t have sexuality in it. We used to do this when we were pushing to get girls interested in marriage ASAP but times have changed.
Characters like Superman were written for everyone who can respect truth, justice, and the American way, which should be everyone. Having characters who degrade others shows that it’s not for the people being degraded.
Inside Out 2 was a success because normies are unaware of the propaganda unless it’s explicit. They shouldn’t take their kids to see Disney movies in the first place.
“Comrades, are we going far enough? Shouldn’t we demand that movie audience also be diverse enough? I say, let’s DEMAND that half of the audience be female, another half people of colour, third half disabled people, another half will be an amalgam of 300 obscure sexual minorities and finally the fifth half pre-approved movie critics and journalists. This many halves will quintuple our movie revenue – trust me, I got D in maths!”
Meanwhile in the real world, I kinda hope they will push even harder: the sooner Hollywood becomes completely irrelevant or extinct, the better. It has been a major global source of corruption and evil for a few decades now. Let them continue and let people learn to avoid this plague as they did in 14th century.
Hollywood has literally stopped making movies for male audiences….even Capes, action and science fiction movies revolve around women and gynocentric themes…hence why critics hated Deadpool 3 because it was actually about Deadpool and Wolverine..not some plucky young women lecturing about the Patriarchy. Yet despite the fact women literally have taken over every single genre while still having movies also made strictly for them (Wicked and Barbie) they still whine and cry its not enough. They want Hollywood to be completely dominated by the message.