A Walt Disney Animated Studios movie is doing the impossible. On a holiday week, Strange World is tracking to potentially make less than $20 million. That means the media narrative is in overdrive.
Let’s get this out of the way first: Wakanda Forever is on the way to a decent third weekend at the box office considering there’s almost no competition and its a holiday. The film is looking to hit somewhere between $50m and $60m in this domestic box office week. That’s far less than the original Black Panther did on a third non-holiday week when it brought in $66m with ticket prices substantially lower. But Disney will take a win where it can get one and it looks like Black Panther 2 is now on track to at least break even with a likely target of $750m – $800m. At just over $600m in total worldwide box office grosses, Black Panther’s sequel now only needs about $150m to reach where it needs to be. That’s very achievable going into the Christmas season.
However, that is still not a great Thanksgiving Week top box office number. The reason that a third-week film is sitting at number one is because another movie, Strange World, itself a Disney animated film, is bombing in a way that is unimaginable. As I said recently on a livestream, it is on the way towards a Bob’s Burgers Movie sort of opening… except that Bob had Top Gun Maverick and Doctor Strange to contend with, plus it had a non-existent budget. Strange World has a $180m budget. And no, there’s no way that Wakanda Forever is the reason Strange World is flopping so badly. If that was the case, you’d be seeing the superhero flick gobbling up north of $100m for the weekend. What’s happening instead is that a decent number of people are going to see Black Panther 2, and then everyone else is basically staying home.
How bad is it for Strange World?
Well, it’s bad enough that it’s the first Disney animated movie to debut with less than one-million in box office revenues in many, many decades. We’re not sure that it’s ever happened… but it’s at least decades. And on top of that, although Thanksgiving isn’t a great day for moviegoing, the film barely managed two-million on Turkey Day. That’s so abysmal that it simply has to be the case that families are actively choosing not to go see a cartoon with Disney on the poster. There’s just no other way to explain it…
… unless you’re the media.
And in that case, it’s time to begin the spin. Let’s turn to Deadline:
All movies on Thanksgiving, which is traditionally a slow moviegoing day, grossed an estimated $16.5M, and are expected to rally $32.2M on today, Black Friday, however, that isn’t expected to make a great difference for Disney’s new animated film, Strange Worldwhich did $2.5M yesterday, -40% from its previews and opening Wednesday, for what is looking at a $20M-$23M for the 5-day if not worse per some rivals who have it below $20M. If Strange World, on a Friday, Saturday and Sunday daily percentile basis plays like Encanto, it will land at $18M.Don’t blame family audiences reluctant to head to movies in the post-pandemic; they’re too busy buying tickets to Black Panther Wakanda Foreverwhich made $8.1M on Thanksgiving, -19% for what looks to be a $55M-$60M Wednesday through Thursday take.
— Anthony D’Alessandro
ScreenRant must see the writing on the wall, though. They’re not making any bones about it: audiences do not like Strange World.
#StrangeWorld breaks a 31-year Disney streak by becoming the first film to earn a CinemaScore less than an A-.
With its B exit rating, Strange World is the first Disney animated movie since the founding of CinemaScore to survey in the B range. https://t.co/bNfvHRIPoX pic.twitter.com/2tWZ6a7kn8
— Screen Rant (@screenrant) November 25, 2022
A number of sites out there are arguing that animated films just can’t make it on the big screen in a post-pandemic world. They say that Minions: Rise of Gru is an exception to the rule now. But that’s just spin and they know it. Studios are greenlighting animated films because they know they make money. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 is practically an animated film and it did better than fine. The Mario movie coming out will probably do great too. The truth is that something else is collapsing Strange World’s reception — and the leaders at Disney had better be hoping it’s limited to the movie rather than the brand at large.
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Did you hear about Disney trying to pin accounting tricks to Chapek AFTER he was fired without cause? How sad and ridiculous. The CFO wasn’t fired apparently and she started the palace coup.
I dont see the deadline article as a spin because clearly more people are going to see Black Panther 2 and in the article they do bring up the audience score on rotten tomatoes being low.
In addition until animated films in post pandemic era make the money Minions rise of gru it will be seen as the exception. Studios greenlight films thinking they will make money and sometimes they dont. Oddly ur trying to spin it by saying sonic 2 was kind of an animated film. The mario film isnt out yet so we dont know how well it will do.
We can no longer trust Disney to put out family friendly content. Their not at all secret gay agenda has completely collapsed their brand image.