Even the biggest phenomenons come to an end. Is Kevin Feige on the wrong side of Bob Chapek as writers implicate Feige in She-Hulk messiness?
Across the vast landscape that is The Walt Disney Company, public and private sources are beginning to show that the company is, indeed, moderating ever-so-slightly towards the middle. It has been a rough year for domestic Disney productions. Whereas the parks, the ships, the merchandise, all of it has been great, the studios have not. Pixar flopped hard with its first attempt at a theatrical release in years. Lucasfilm hasn’t had a theatrical release in years and was trounced in the ratings by Stranger Things. The once juggernaut Marvel has more flops in the last two years than successes… and the successes have been mild at best. No Marvel streaming show on Disney+ has performed as well as Loki did last year, and that was with far fewer subscribers.
If you want to know why Disney’s businesses all did phenomenal except domestic Disney+ and box office numbers, look no further than the radicalization of politics for the studios.
Quietly things are beginning to change. But one area where CEO Bob Chapek has a much harder problem is with Marvel Entertainment and their big boss, Kevin Feige. Chapek and Feige have been at odds publicly in the past — it was well-known that Mr. Feige did not care in the least for the way Mr. Chapek handled the Black Widow streaming situation and subsequent lawsuit. In Chapek’s mind, Feige had pulled a Peter Rice. As much as you might push back against Chapek privately, it’s a huge no-no to do so in the public’s eye.
But surely Feige and his unrivaled track record of billion-dollar mega blockbusters is too big to fail? Think again.
Within Disney, many of the more business-minded executives are looking at the situation and beginning to wonder out loud: how much of Marvel’s success over the years came from Jon Favreau’s blueprint, from oddity successes like James Gunn, and how badly is Feige fumbling now that it’s all him?
Kevin Feige made the #DoctorStrange2 crew watch #WhatIf E4 before they started production
"[He] was like, 'You guys better watch out, cause this shit’s good'"
(via @DEADLINE) pic.twitter.com/RVYzyJIQLk
— ScreenTime (@screentime) August 18, 2022
Note that we haven’t seen any announcement out of Disney bragging about She-Hulk ratings this go-around. In the past months, Disney has been quick to release some highly-tailored spiel about how a show broke record viewership, all while hiding very specific details in the fine print that make the announcement far less exciting. But with She-Hulk, we’ve heard nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch.
Seeing nothing on that front out of Disney makes quotes like the following a little more remarkable:
“There were so many points where I thought I have to kind of stay within the boundaries or what I imagine the boundaries were for Marvel. And he [Kevin Feige] would tell me, “No, no, no, go further. Push it further. Why don’t we try this? Why don’t we go out outside the box?’”
And:
According to Gao, she was given carte blanche essentially from the jump and told that no matter how outlandish an idea might be, chances were likely that Feige would be into it if it was a genuinely good one. More than simply liking the idea, though, Gao said Feige himself approved it and the details Bruce tells Jen about how Steve lost his virginity on a USO tour.
“These are the things that real people want answers to,” Gao said. “We want to know if Steve Rogers gets out there — if he’s out in these streets — because that man is way too attractive to have gone through life, and served his country, and not have gotten some.”
— Charles Pulliam-Moore, The Verge
If you want to know why business execs are getting cold feet when it comes to Kevin Feige, look no farther than the MCU leader being directly in charge of a show questioning Captain America’s virginity. In case you’re wonder, that doesn’t sell toys. In case you’re wondering, that doesn’t drive theme park reservations. And lest you wonder, it sure doesn’t quell the claims that Disney is obsessed with weird sex issues in programming that is at least ostensibly intended for some younger viewers to watch.
So watch out, Kevin Feige. Nobody lasts forever in Hollywood. And although you’ve done well beyond anyone else in all of the franchise businesses out there, this town is a “what have you done for me lately” kind of place. When it comes to the Phase Four Marvel releases, you’re just creating one headache after another for the big boss. And nobody is too big to fail anymore.
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Say what you will about Joss Whedon and his public contempt of traditional values, but he at least understood those values well enough to write from that perspective. They started to stumble around around Civil War but didn’t actually hit the ground until the middle of Endgame. After that it’s been so weird and disconnected.
You make good points — very few people discuss Whedon’s contributions anymore. Even less consider that almost a decade of Marvel was essentially built off of Favreau’s formula.
Do u live under a rock people always talk about whedons impact on the franchise ?
How did they stumble around civil war ?
They clipped off Captain America’s arc in his own movies that had themes centered around him (“man out of time,” “duty over self,” “America today v. WW2 America”) and transferred his story over to the Avengers arc. The movie became about the spectacle of the airport fight, Tony Stark’s emotional arc, and tearing the Avengers apart in preparation for Avenger’s Infinity War. His remaining appearances were a gag in Spider-Man, voting “present” in Infinity War, and becoming a tarnished, more self-serving, more indulgent version of himself in Endgame.
So u forget caps arc about him bevoming afugitive , giving up his shield not agreeing to the sokovia accords. Also how does him deviding to have a life for himself == self serving for your years all he has done is willing to give his life for others and now he deciding something for himself knowing there will be other heroes to protect the earth.
As much as I don’t follow Marvel, but it seems to me Kevin Feige might get fired one day, Well, here’s hoping!
with how all the phase 4 films have been their best performing films in theaters compared to pixar and their other studios and how marvel is the only one with the successful shared universe while others have failed. They are gonna want to keep feige at disney for a long time.
Feige ended the Favreau Marvel Universe.
Look at Feige’s films before Ironman. Feige ruined Marvel prior to Ironman.
Feige executive produced the spider-man films , the x-men films , hulk , daredevil how they did they ruin marvel ?
Only if the budgets can decrease. Gotta make money. And gotta grow Disney+ domestically.
Man your really triggered by steve rogers virginity being questioned. Remember when u through the whole gods quotes for the thor trailers would offend religous people and then no backlash happened. Always trying to find something to complain ur no different than the sjws u criticise. Marvel is still the juggernaut in 2021 3 marvels movies were the highest grossing films domestically of the covid era Black Widow,Shang-Chi and NWH. Despite not being well known eternals and shang-chi still did better than the suicide sqaud and morbius which flopped abysmally in 2022 2 marvel movies had really big opening weekend one got close to a billion and the other has made over 700 million. Black widow had it not been on streaming at the same time it went to theaters would have done better which eternals and shang-chi proved that it would have with how they did theatrically with the knowledge pf them being obscure characters. Also i dont think politics is the issues thats would negatively affect marvel more like making so much content and them being rushed. I doubt most peoples issues with marvel is there too political except to people like u guys.
Jon favreau was had input to marvel but to say he had a blueprint is disingenous considering with star wars people arent happy with boba fett which was favreau created. Feige pushed to not have to answer to ike perlmutter who wanted civil war to be different than it was and because they did civil war is universally beloved and was a success. Feige also pushed for black panther and captain marvel which perlmutter was against but when those came out they were very successful. Shang-Chi was another movie he pushed and because of how well that movie did sony moved venom 2 earlier and likely kept nwh at christmas instead of moving.
Even if disney announced something about she hulks ratings being amazing u wouldnt believe it anyway like what u guys did for obi wan.
You are the triggered one
The article is dead on.
Take your wokeness elsewhere.
It really isnt the fact u arent refuting any of my points proves it. Also u dont like it when people actually challenge these articles instead of taking their words as truth so u just want to exist in an echo chamber.?
Black Panther was a good idea and well cast. Shang Chi didn’t do well. Captain America is so disliked she can’t have a movie in her name. Favreau created Iron Man, Elf, and the Mandelorian among others. Nothing in Phase 4 has been a hit the tv shows are doing worse on every release. Being a one man show usually decreases quality. It was true of Lucas as well. In Feige’s case the business model is unviable. You are right every other division at Disney in movies and tv is worse.
Do you get payed to shill Marvel or is it a hobby?
So me presenting facts counter to an authors claims == being a shill. I see u just dont like being challenged.
You are right everything doesn’t point to a Feige collapse. He is better than Lucasfilm and Pixar. However Paramount is killing it on profit and most of your facts are demonstrably wrong. If I were to put my retirement savings somewhere right now it would be in WB as a risk and Paramount for current success.
Good Lord, man! Disney is making an eventual end on political and ideological agenda whether you like it or not. Let it go!
No you selectively picking facts and pretending all the other data that disproves your position doesn’t exist it what makes you a shill.
Im not leaving favts he is he ignores ike perlmutter , as well as the other good directors had like joss whedon , the russos, ryan coogler and waititi least with ragnarok with how successful the movies are.
Shang-chi made 432 million without china thats pretty good for an obscure character and he wasn never gonna do super big.
She is still the lead of that movie and marvel is in the name if they dint believe in her they would never have given her another movie.
The shows have been successful with loki being the most liked. Ms marvel was affected by coming out the same day as obi wan and because of the not so great marketing.
When lucas was in charge the prequels were successful depite the reception. Also yoir ignoring book of boba fett which people didnt love. Also the same uear jungle book came civil war made a billion and the lion king in 2019 endgame made 2.7 billion. They were succeses but to to say its superior to marvels is dumb
Funny I only remember a Marvels movie on the schedule. Check the title. Ms Marvel is likely more marketable than Captain Marvel at this point. So is Monica Rambo. Shang Chi lost money. Sure I can come up with five excuses for that too. I can also tell you the accountants don’t care. It doesn’t change the fact that Feige / Marvel’s performance is way down. Not as far as Pixar and Star Wars (except Mando). Eventually financial numbers catch up with you. Just look at all of the people denying inflation six months ago. Is it six months or six years? Who knows. Look at how long Kathleen Kennedy has lasted.
Btw there is plenty of stuff I liked that crashed in ratings. I expect it to disappear too because that is how paying for things works.
Yeah paramount is a sucess with maverick. So what even if MOM and Love amd thunder were beloved they wouldnt have done the numbers maverick did.
Thor is beloved and well known to Marvel fans. So is Hulk and She Hulk. Sustainability at the box office has everything to do with the current movie. Crashing also has to do with the current movie. Everything after the first weekend (possibly Friday in some cases) is word of mouth or repeat watching. Both depend on the current movie quality.