2023 has not been kind to Disney. Constantly one film after another, Disney’s box office has been dented with either negative audience reviews or a bad plotline. Disney has always been a titan when it comes to film and entertainment, releasing fan-favorite animated and live-action movies that are often critical and commercial successes, but this year something went wrong.
Despite owning the MCU, ‘Avatar’, ‘Star Wars’, and massive iconic classics, Disney has struggled to keep its stability throughout the summer of 2023. The company lost an estimated $900 million across several underperforming movies. Among many releases, these three films notably caused Dinsey to lose $250 Million.
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1. Indiana Jones And The Dial of Destiny
‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’ directed by James Mangold was set to be the biggest hit of the year as the film was part of the well-established franchise along with a tremendous marketing campaign.
Despite this ‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’ was a massive failure, only making $356 million despite a budget of $300 million. When the Harrison Ford starer movie was finally released, Rotten Tomatoes rated it as fresh, but the critical reception of the Dial of Destiny wasn’t sumptuous.
Not to be forgotten, the movie also strumbled with major box office competition. The Indiana Jones movie struggled with ‘Insidious: The Red Door’ which was released the following week, following ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1’ the week after that.
2. Haunted Mansion
The only thing more frightening than the ghosts in ‘Haunted Mansion’ is its failure at the box office against a budget of $150 million. One of the major reasons is that it was in competition with several highly anticipated movies like ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part 1’, ‘Barbie’, and ‘Oppenheimer’.
Unlike ‘Barbie’, ‘Haunted Mansion’ never went through a massive promotional strategy. For a horror movie, ‘Haunted Mansion’ lacked the horror elements, except for maybe a couple of jump scares from Constance Hatchaway and the Hatbox Ghost.
In case you missed: ‘Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny’: Harrison Ford-Starrer Action-Adventure Film Ropes In A Lukewarm $60 Million Box Office Collection
3. Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania
Despite being the opening project of the MCU’s Phase 5 and the second of the Multiverse Saga, ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’ only made around $473 million worldwide. The film introduced Jonathan Majors as Kang the Conqueror, who is set to become the next major MCU villain after Thanos.
One of the major reasons behind the failure of ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania’ is primarily because of the superhero fatigue. Adding to the superhero fatigue, the film’s poor critical reaction also impacted the box office.
In comparison to the first two Ant-Man films, ‘Ant-Man 3’ was much less positively reviewed. The first ‘Ant-Man’ currently holds a Rotten Tomatoes score of 83%, with the sequel – ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’ – rated at 87%. Whereas ‘Quantumania’ has a critical rating of 47%.
Why Disney Had So Many Box Office Failures In 2023?
Disney is known for its magical element and aesthetically pleasing graphics contributing to a massive box office collection. However, 2023, has been disastrous for Disney witnessing many box office failures. According to ScreenRant, one of the primary reasons for these failures is over-inflated budgets. All of the mentioned movies have incredibly high budgets, meaning that they have to get close to making $1 billion to be successful.
On top of that, these IPs just aren’t reliable anymore. Viewers have soured on live-action remakes, Pixar’s Disney+ releases have degraded the brand, including ‘Indiana Jones’ and ‘The Haunted Mansion’ which haven’t had entries since 2008 and 2003 respectively.
Throughout Disney’s box office failures, the company has only had one real success in the summer of 2023: ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3′. ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3’ has been one of the biggest triumphs of the year so far, grossing $844.9 million. The film’s budget was $250 million which means that the movie was actually profitable, with its commercial success matching its critical success.
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