Course one big issue is why they bought Marvel and Star Wars in the first place…..Disney already owned the girl demographic but not so much the boy demographic….

So they buy up two mega franchises to market to the boy demographic and what did they do……switch it to cater to a girl demographic cause they thought they could bring in both and make even more monies….

jokershady said:

---

Course one big issue is why they bought Marvel and Star Wars in the first place…..Disney already owned the girl demographic but not so much the boy demographic….

So they buy up two mega franchises to market to the boy demographic and what did they do……switch it to cater to a girl demographic cause they thought they could bring in both and make even more monies….

---

I think Marvel is fundamentally different than Star Wars. Marvel is multiple mega-franchises. Carol Danvers has been a character since 1968. So, she isn't new and has been a strong character in the comic books. So making a Carol Danvers movie wasn't a bad idea. Black Widow was popular as well. Now, the execution may not be great, but Marvel did what Marvel was suppose to do, provide an existing character with a plethora of IP.

The Star Wars IP has a very limited set of characters to provide, therefore, they had to create new characters that the audience didn't care about, because the audience doesn't know them. But when it mines the IP it has better success. Mon Momtha's story in Andor is very compelling (seeing how she becomes the leader of the rebellion). Admiral Holdo (purple hair) is not compelling because we have no idea who she is.

I think the issue with Marvel is execution and with Star Wars, it was a lack of existing characters. Especially when Disney decided to exclude the EU characters. I wonder how much better Rey would have been received if she was named Mara Jade instead of Rey.

Star Wars had a ton of stories, if they'd just been willing to riff on the EU and treat it like Marvel treats the comics.

Legal Custodian said:

---

Streaming for Disney+ made sense (and for others too) when they put their older IP on it and charged $4.99/month.

If they just ran everything else like they had been doing and put anything older than 2-3+ years on Disney+, it would be a cash cow. When they start making exclusive content and purchasing other IP it ends up costing way too much. Literally just put your old IP (Pixar and Disney movies, and Disney Channel & Disney Junior shows) on it like how it started and it was (outside of server hosting and IT costs) free money.

But take Dr. Who for example, they're paying (some reported) $3-5 million an episode when there's no way the uptick in subscriptions can pay for that IP, it would just hemorrhage money. And that's coming from a big Dr. Who fan.

Take the low end, if it costs them $3mil an episode of Dr. Who, that would be $36mil for 12 episodes in costs which means they'd have to increase subscriptions at $10.99/month by 3.25mil subscribers just to break even. And there's no way Dr. Who alone will increase subscriptions by that much.

And that's just one decision to go along with countless others.

---

Been saying this for a long time. Streaming companies cannot really be in the business of making big budget movies or shows because they have effectively fixed revenues from subscribers. They need new content to keep subscribers, but they can't spend the tens or hundreds of millions on individual pieces of content like a studio because they don't get box office revenues to offset production costs like a studio.

Studios can't really be in the streaming business because those big budget movies won't be big box office draws if they go to streaming in 3 months. They're cutting themselves off at the knees trying to be something they're not.

Ultimately they need to learn to work together, and studios need to license their libraries for free money while streamers need to be the place you go for all of the content you know and love. There's a reason we had video and DVD rental places that rented every studio's content and studios didn't try to open their own chains. They need to relearn that.

The Porkchop Express said:

---

Would it be so terrible for all the streaming services to just merge into one thing with a Google-esque search engine that you use to find what you want and watch it?

I'm sure that's naive on me on about 300 levels with anti-trust and monopoly stuff

---

I have an amazing idea. We will have a centralized source that is broadcast regionally. It will have all of the content from every service plus network stations. You pay a flat fee monthly. We will call it.. cable.

Redstone said:

---

Let's please stay on topic and not get political - we already have a board for that

---

The thread is about whether Disney is in trouble.

A number of people feel that their politics and/or social influences have had a negative impact on their bottom line.

It's a legit topic for this thread.

Maybe go be the internet police on another thread, Ronald McDonald.

I'm grateful, especially as the father of a 7 year old Star Wars fan, that we have Finn, Rose Tico, Rey, a wonderfully Diverse cast of characters in High Republic, strong female warriors in Ashoka, Reva Sevander and the Sisters, and so much more … he's learning that his lived experience is limited, and the word is a big and interesting place.

Both Bob Iger and Bob Chapac have been disasters for Disney. Choosing Kathleen Kennedy to ruin the most popular movie franchises in the world is a fireable offense. Choosing to make movies catering to less than 5% of the population is another fireable catastrophe.

Walt Disney built a company for American families and loved by American families. Now families protect their children from Disney content because they find it evil. And on an other level, 100 pound women beating up muscled up men is ridiculous and it makes their movies even less believable.

Finally, Disney's theme parks are still overwhelmingly popular and really cool and fantastic! Made during a time when the world's population was half of what it is today, they are all just too damn crowded and need to be expanded. And I'm old and everything seems expensive to me, but a Disney vacation for the whole family is quite expensive.

Dekker_Lentz said:

---

Ornithopter said:

---

Star Wars had a ton of stories, if they'd just been willing to riff on the EU and treat it like Marvel treats the comics.

---

I someone what agree. But when I sat down and really thought about it. How many of those EU stories are just Luke, Han, Leia, Lando, and Vader stories? A lot of those stories are hard to use in Episode 7 without recasting the actors. Also 7-9 are poorly executed.

---

Im not gonna say 7 was a masterpiece but if they had a cohesive story pre-written for the entire sequel trilogy then 7 would've been much better….

I can remember so many discussions with most of them being excitement and anticipation regarding who Rey was….who Snoke was….who the Knights of Ren were….how the lightsaber showed up….what Obiwans voice meant in the visions Rey saw…..

So many interesting points to BUILD ON!!!!! And then Johnson dropped a massive bantha poodoo all over it…..

Getting this mad at a Redstone post while in the same breath admitting that you're familiar with his posting history doesn't compute. How can you take the bait, simultaneously knowing he's clearly just f/cking around?

Aggie_Journalist said:

---

I don't know how all these studios are going to get themselves out of the holes they dug with their unprofitable streaming platforms.

Investors were telling them for years, develop streaming! That's what we want to invest in. So they did, even though they didn't have good business cases for it.

And now the investors are realizing, oh wait, that's not profitable? Never mind. We don't want to invest in it anymore.

And as those investment funds dry up, the studios are left with these streaming platforms that bleed money.

---

Some of this was a function of the time. When this was all happening, revenue and growth were king. Profitability was an afterthought.

Post-covid there has been a shift by corporate America to focus on profitability again. As if it's some kind of newfound thing they've all just discovered.

I lived through this myself at my old corporate job. Revenue was our primary KPI; profitability wasn't considered at all. Absolutely f'ing absurd and every time I brought it up, I was ignored.

jokershady said:

---

Dekker_Lentz said:

---

Ornithopter said:

---

Star Wars had a ton of stories, if they'd just been willing to riff on the EU and treat it like Marvel treats the comics.

---

I someone what agree. But when I sat down and really thought about it. How many of those EU stories are just Luke, Han, Leia, Lando, and Vader stories? A lot of those stories are hard to use in Episode 7 without recasting the actors. Also 7-9 are poorly executed.

---

Im not gonna say 7 was a masterpiece but if they had a cohesive story pre-written for the entire sequel trilogy then 7 would've been much better….

I can remember so many discussions with most of them being excitement and anticipation regarding who Rey was….who Snoke was….who the Knights of Ren were….how the lightsaber showed up….what Obiwans voice meant in the visions Rey saw…..

So many interesting points to BUILD ON!!!!! And then Johnson dropped a massive bantha poodoo all over it…..

---

I don't want to defend TLJ, still to date the only SW movie I have only seen once. But I have come to realize the mystery boxes set up in TFA are almost as bad.

You have pointed out all of the big mystery boxes and I am no longer sure there are any good answers that don't come back to some variation of Luke was a bad teacher and Leia and Han were bad parents. Which ultimately isn't a story I care about.

pfo said:

---

Both Bob Iger and Bob Chapac have been disasters for Disney.

---

I think it's tough to argue Iger has been a disaster for Disney. Iger bought Pixar back in 2006. They had a decade of massive financial success (Wall-E, Toy Story 3/4, etc.). Iger also put Jon Lassiter in charge of Disney Animation after they bought Disney, and he was able to turn Disney Animation completely around (Frozen, Wreck It Ralph, etc.). Iger bought Marvel in 2009, which was before the first Avengers had come out. Tough to say that was a bad deal. I'll give you Star Wars, though. They haven't figured that one out. Iger ran Disney from 2005-2020, which covers probably their most successful decade stretch. I think it's too early to cast judgement on his second run. He has only been at the helm for a year. Most movies are multi year productions, and you've got to factor in a writers and actor strike. The stuff you are seeing from Disney right now is mostly Chapek's work

I will agree with you on Chapek. He was awful.

Very well said.

Iger has made plenty of mistakes, but he isn't the primary problem, he's certainly not a disaster, and most pundits would actually argue he's a huge reason for Disney's massive successes over the past 20 years or so, before things got bad due to cord cutting, chasing the streaming phantom, etc.

Also, re: pfo's post, Iger didn't "choose" Kathleen Kennedy. George Lucas did. Kennedy being in charge of Lucasfilm was a stipulation of Lucas selling Lucasfilm to Disney. Should Iger have fired her by now? Probably so. The primary issue, though, was Iger's original Star Wars sin, which was forcing Episode VII to release in 2015, when it was clear Abrams & co needed another year, and pleaded as much. But Iger had promised shareholders a 2015 release, wouldn't budge from his word, and only agreed to push from May 2015 to December 2015. I really do think the entire Disney Star Wars experience would have been different - and potentially far better - had Iger allowed them the time to get it right, and to plan for the future. Instead, that single decision created a domino effect, Kennedy/Lucasfilm simply couldn't keep up, and the content suffered for it.

Post Walt, Disney worked best with Michael Eisner as the creative driver, Frank Wells as the wise and steady legal mind, and Jeffrey Katzenberg running animation.

It was Disney's second Golden Age -- producing massive resort/theme park expansions, titles like "Beauty and the Beast" and "The Little Mermaid," the move into cruise ships, television and sports, and on and on.

When Wells died in a helicopter crash, the balance was upended and eventually Eisner's ego got the better of him. But for a few years ...

IMO, Iger is more of a buyer than a builder. He will be remembered for acquisitions, not development.

Eisner/Katzenberg were creative types who bought into Walt's ethos and perfectionism. They understood storytelling, whether via architecture and design or animation and music.

Redstone said:

---

It's essential to have a respectful and informed dialogue when discussing the economics of streaming. There tends to be too much heat and too little light. We don't have evidence that "woke" has meaningfully impacted these models, and it's best to follow commonsensical curtsies that keep threads tightly, succinctly argued - for the benefit of posters and lurkers alike.

---

In mid-2024, using a ChatGPT response to troll this thread is lazy.

We took the kids to disney world for a week in May, so expect them to turn a profit in second quarter.

How much of Disney's problems are industry wide and not specific to Disney? The year before COVID (2019) you had nine billion dollar movies. In the three years since (2021-2023), there have been five. I don't think the problems are specific to Disney. It's across the industry.

Saying the issue is that Disney went woke is an easy scape goat, but really it's more about massive inflation in ticket prices and not really figuring out how that works with steaming. Before COVID, I could take my family off four to a movie for around $30. For that price, we went to see just about every movie (or at least every family movie). I think the last movie I saw in the theater was, "No Way Home." It cost us around $100 for four. At a hundred dollars, I am fine just waiting a month until the movie can be streamed.

I think to fix things, they need to lower the price of a ticket and delay how long before a movie ends up on streaming. Tickets don't need to go back to pre-pandemic prices, but a hundred dollars for a family of four is way too much. Also, I think having movies come out on streaming 30 days after streaming is too short from a business perspective. As a consumer, it's great, but it does cut into ticket sales. There have been a lot of movies where my wife and I think, yeah, I wouldn't mind seeing that. Then we check to see when it streams and it'll be in a week, so we just decide to wait (ex: The Fall Guy).

Al Bula said:

---

Redstone said:

---

It's essential to have a respectful and informed dialogue when discussing the economics of streaming. There tends to be too much heat and too little light. We don't have evidence that "woke" has meaningfully impacted these models, and it's best to follow commonsensical curtsies that keep threads tightly, succinctly argued - for the benefit of posters and lurkers alike.

---

In mid-2024, using a ChatGPT response to troll this thread is lazy.

---

Well, the jokes on you....ChatGPT was modeled after Redstone. ChatGPT is Redstone.

Aggie_Journalist said:

---

I sometimes wonder if generative AI will be the next investor bubble / mistake. Will it ever make more money than it cost to produce and maintain? When you ask Microsoft and others for the profitable use case, they seem to wave their hands in the air and say "it'll make a lot of money! The future is AI!"

---

We are getting off topic, but to me, AI right now is like the Internet Bubble back in the late 90s. AI will eventually be as transformative as the Internet, but we are farther away than companies are claiming. Nearly all the AI demos right now are staged, or highly controlled. Just like back in the 90s, everyone could see the Internet was going to change everything, it still took 15-20 years. It wasn't happening in the next year like dot coms were claiming.