Is Going Woke Killing Disney... we ran the maths

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Go Woke Go Broke. It's the mantra of many conservatives, arguing that 'woke' movies and tv shows are killing companies like Disney. It might rhyme, but is it true? We ran the data, surveying thousands of TLDR viewers to see if going woke is killing Disney
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00:00 Introduction
02:11 The Context
04:10 Go Woke...
07:51 Go Broke?
11:29 What's Really Happening?

[@TLDRbusiness]

To clarify, the box office data is the profit/loss already. I don't think I made that sufficiently clear in the video, but it does say it on the y-axis and some movies are shown to lose money, so hopefully it's reasonably obvious - Jack

[@thalyasylos2745]

Wait, can you explain it a bit further on how the calculation was done? Did you guys do box-office minus movie budget minus market budget?

[@JM-gg8ko]

Disney was always woke and nobody cared. You should chart from the start of their battle with Florida policies which made them appear to take a political side. Taking a political side is always suicidal.

[@ApolloT-vp5dn]

​@thalyasylos2745 no they didn't.

[@thelibraryninja]

While I can get behind Disney being a little woke, I cannot get behind Disney when it focuses too much on the wokeness part and not the story.

[@quinaIMF]

Box office data profit should be measure as % of investment + marketing as well rather than absolute amount here. Investing 100M for a movie and make 20M profit is not the same as investing 500M movie and make 20M profit

[@damian880]

I think bad writing and poor use of legacy material is what's hurting disney.

[@foodini666]

just curious if you wear clown costume/wig 24 hours a day bro?

[@ivangordienko8081]

​@@foodini666why so angry, bro 😂

[@damian880]

​@@foodini666care to elaborate on why you think Disney isn't doing well?

[@Observer-O]

​@@foodini666Weird fetish but alright.

[@jas-c3610]

And Nimona that was declined by Disney and saved on Netflix is evidence of that statement. It woke af but still good and entertaining.

[@haroldb1856]

Disney makes bad movies, then uses wokeness to deflect criticism. Disney's performative progressivism is as offensive as its disregard for entertainment quality.

[@marhawkman303]

Yeah this is the real problem, black-washing is bad not just for changing beloved characters, but... it usually goes hand-in-hand with terrible story re-writes.

[@goldenvulture6818]

The label "progressive" reeks of elitism and dishonesty

[@Bustermachine]

@@marhawkman303 Yeah, remember that time that Super Woke Progressive LGBTq Feminist Disney put all their backing behind their first openly LGBTq heroine and . . . wait no they didn't do that . . . they canceled her show early despite positive reviews/word of mouth, and then fan backlash got them to give the staff three special hour long episodes to wrap the story up. Yes, I'm still salty about the Owl House.

[@marhawkman303]

@@Bustermachine Yeah, it's weird, they're taking half-measures and making crap because they can't even make a bad plan and run with it....

[@sew_gal7340]

Ironically Disney lacks diversity and this was what the original Disney had in spades...not diversity of skin tones (which is ultimately shallow) but diversity of IDEAS, perspectives, opinions. He knew in the 1950s that conservatives weren't creative, he hired liberals who were also artistic, and were good story tellers...along with being from different cultural background, political ideologies etc. the films were multifaceted and represented the best of humanity and the lessons that it has to teach us.

[@andybrice2711]

I think there's something this misses… It's not _discussion_ of these themes which makes a movie annoyingly "woke". It's the approach and the tone. A great writer might weave political ideas into their story with nuance and subtlety. But there has been a trend whereby good storytelling is sacrificed to prioritize political point-scoring. For instance by lecturing the audience in a heavy-handed and condescending manner. And dismissing any criticism as bigotry.

[@Lowebotz]

Hit the nail on the head.

[@SordidusFellatio]

This is why you don’t make woman as the writer, specifically woke femlnazls half black half mexican blind crippled transgender they/them kind of “woman”

[@Lofi.z34]

All of the LGBT bllsht is bad and shouldn't be in any media. Being gay is NOT okay and parents are dropping Disney because of it.

[@dominicgalloway4481]

I know this is a show, but she hulk is the perfect example of this. That show is absolutely awful. 😂

[@Ben31337l]

The Mary sue has been used a few times too often as well.

[@bleachissweet1]

It's not "So called" race swapping. When you swap races it is race swapping.

[@TheStarBot]

Scientifically race, is a social contract, and these characters are not real beings

[@ravenwhiteduck3158]

​cool make black panther white then, no big deal just a social construct

[@TheStarBot]

@@ravenwhiteduck3158 There actually been one white Black Panther (or 2 if technically count Becky in some alternate universes / stories)

[@ncedovilakazi1985]

Disney is just making bad movies and remakes. It's Lazy.

[@Shuizid]

Weirdly enough, this "lazy" propably costs them more money than making original movies.

[@edwardcullen1739]

But _why_ are they bad?

[@danielebowman]

Many of them certainly are. Or mostly "meh" forgettable.@@edwardcullen1739

[@227060]

But a lot of why they are bad is due to a woke ideology. They hired people based upon identity politics, not because they were the best people for the job.

[@zwojack7285]

@@edwardcullen1739 obv not because of "woke" content as the video shows.

[@kocokan]

No, being boring did

[@eufrozinak9461]

worker exploitation too

[@SASMADBRUV7]

​@@eufrozinak9461 what do you mean?

[@thealchemist5653]

Both

[@Theobserver6897]

@@SASMADBRUV7they do not have good track record with writers

[@SASMADBRUV7]

@@Theobserver6897 but how does that lead to lower box office numbers

[@EmpiricalPragmatist]

A couple of things that could be improved in your statistical analysis: 1. Include the cost of marketing each movie in their profitability rankings, as this figure is not included in the "budget" per se. I lot more of them would fall below that zero profit line if you included this, and not all marketing efforts are created equal. 2. Measure profit margin, not profit. Without this, you do not control for the relative size of each movie. You want to measure _profitability_ , not overall profit. I was very happy when you sliced the RT reviews between critics and audiences btw. That is exactly what I was mentally begging for. I would have added an interesting dimension to your analysis if you had got some more data about your respondents too, so you could slice the data in other ways.

[@DrivingCr00ner]

Agree. Should also look at historical trending. Looking at “type A vs. type B” movies is one way to slice; but many may argue that a “sinking tide lowers all boats” when it comes to reputational issues. This would imply that Disney films have decreased in profitability overall as their production of more progressive films has increased over time.

[@NinjaFlibble]

I agree it was good for him to not just talk about critic scores from rotten tomatoes. Especially with the recent reveal that some of those reviewers were paid to give a good review. I know that's not something rotten tomatoes can necessarily control, but it still calls the legitimacy of their scores into question.

[@scottysgarage4393]

@@NinjaFlibble The only thing from RT of value are the audience scores. Critics have become irrelevant, if not genuinely opposite of reality.

[@danielyouth]

I think the whole analysis is flawed since "Woke" has become such a subjective hard-to-define term that is mostly vibes-based. Is just a rethorical tool, not an actual thing.

[@MRAROCKERDUDE]

It's not just about box office profit/loss TLDR, it's about how well a movie over or under-performed based on expectation. One movie that makes $50 million dollars might be seen as a success. Another that makes $100 million might be seen as a failure.

[@arathaemaxus5250]

Not when they are $300 million to make lol

[@cerickNY]

No calculation of film success is going to be accurate without analyzing the marketing budget and counting it against box office.

[@cencent2189]

They don't always release that information, so it shouldn't be factored in as a variable. The test is also not very scientific in general but it could point towards there being nothing to the popular saying or checked towards yes there is something

[@protostar8]

The entire analysis the guy does is flawed b/c he uses the "reported" budgets which Disney has had producers mention are fake. The actual budgets are on average $100 million more than reported and that's before you factor in the marketing costs. It's much easier to just look at the trend of the company (Disney) and how much money they've lost since starting this woke initiative. That's a clear, definitive trend.

[@ljeans531]

​@protostar8 Then my your estimates it's impossible. So why bother. Just continuing believing your narrative, cause from that survey I can already tell conservatives are just BSing "43% said Discussion of Female issues" is woke. How is that woke?

[@riccardomariani4660]

​@@protostar8correlation doesn't mean causation, it is the first thing you learn in any statistics class

[@protostar8]

@@riccardomariani4660 Incorrect. The first thing you learn in any good stats class is that stats are HIGHLY manipulatable. While correlation doesn't equal causation ignoring the correlation in this scenario when the company has literally pivoted their entire programming approach towards the "cause" is a bit naive.

[@odw32]

Going Lazy kills Disney. A significant part of their content consists of remakes, sequels and spinoffs. The series "Arcane" on Netflix (to name a counter example) was a success in terms of views & reviews. It had a diverse cast with strong female leads, LGBT romance, etc. It did well, because it featured a compelling story, difficult choices, ambiguous moralities, and character growth through trauma and struggle. Disney right now just slaps the "You are perfect the way you are" and "you can do anything if you believe in yourself" tropes on their IPs and calls it a day. Most people don't hate diversity, they hate the garbage plot that so often comes with it.

[@aaronjjacques]

it also used the British/foreign head writer/ guest writer system instead of the writer room concept (which WGA is pushing for). Without the writing by committee crap the story came first.

[@garlic9763]

indeed, its almost like instead of woke themes that make it bad, its just that writers who are woke suck at story telling. like they cant think outside of a pre-programmed box and use creativity to tell a good story. theres ways to have those themes in a movie and still be good, put some of your soul into the movie!

[@virtualalias]

The Last of Us had an entire gay romance episode and I wouldn't call it "woke" simply because it's inclusive... I wouldn't call it woke at all because it's not a moralizing intersectional feminism lecture dressed up as entertainment. Woke goes wrong in the same ways Christian films go "wrong" in that "the message" is overt rather than conveyed via themes, consequences, and allegory.

[@zenmastermtl]

Very well said.

[@jimkillerx]

@@virtualaliasThat episode was definitely woke. It was nothing but a filler episode to show two gays for no reason. It added nothing to the story. It was weird and odd to include it. Besides, if it was a straight couple instead of a gay one, the episode wouldn't even have existed in the first place since there was no reason for it anyway.

[@casey339]

I think it's worth noting that just because the most woke and least woke movies made similar amounts of money, that doesn't mean the perceived wokeness didn't have a large affect. Consider: When comparing movies like Lightyear and Cocaine Bear, by all estimates Lightyear should have multiple times the amount of money Cocaine Bear did. If they made similar amounts of money, that's a BIG loss for Lightyear and a big win for Cocaine Bear. The same is true for many other comparisons like The Little Mermaid vs Puss n Boots 2.

[@oerthling]

The main difference is that it wasn't Cocaine Bear 2 or 5. There's just too many sequels and remakes. Perhaps the problem with yet another mermaid movie isn't the skin pigmentation of the Mermaid, but that it is yet another Mermaid movie. How many mermaid movies (plus series) does the world need? We can't know whether a more "white" Mermaid would have done better worse. Indiana Jones movies suffer from being late, Harrison Ford is simply too old for the role and that they try to introduce a fresh "Indiana Jones" incarnation, just like with Crystal Skull. And it's yet another umpteenth sequel. And it wasn't based on a great script idea, but just to try to squeeze more money out of the "IP". (The script was decent though, the movie is fine, just a couple decades too late and unoriginal). I don't want Terminator 11 or Alien 13 or Matrix 7. I want a new movies that's cool. Not a rehash of a past cool movie. Disney bought a lot of already successful IP and milked them. Squeezing out ever more money of stuff that was originally original. But now it's squeezed empty. How it rates on any wokeness meter is next to irrelevant. If anything getting conservatives into rage-mode provides solid free marketing. The Catholic Church got wise after Life of Brian and Last Temptation of Jesus Christ and stopped calling for boycotts. They just provided free ads. Kevin Smith famously joined protestors against Dogma. Having fun while getting free ads.

[@casey339]

@@oerthling I mostly agree. I think squeezing IP for every dollar they can get is definitely the biggest problem. Like you, I'm very tired of getting remake after remake and sequel after sequel. I think most people want original ideas instead of recycled content. That being said, I do think perceived "wokeness" can and does hurt ticket sales. I don't think it's the biggest reason Disney movies are failing, but I do think it makes a difference.

[@oerthling]

@@casey339 I really don't think it has much to do with "wokeness". A "lesbian" kiss in Lightyear makes some conservatives go nuts. For a counter-example it's easy to point at Barbie. Right-wing KZbinrs actively tried to sabotage Barbie and yet it takes in money. We have a young Rey with super powers in A Force Awakens and still it was massively successful, regardless of how much some people cry about Mary Sue (while nobody ever whined about Superman being super in a zillion ways and needs Kryptonite so we get any tension at all). Those conservatives are easily balanced by people who don't care and those who like to see some more representation. There's plenty of people whining about the "woke" episode 3 Last of Us. And yet both the season and especially this episode is a widely acclimaimed success. I'm not at all convinced that a Mermaid with any other skin pigmentation would have been a bigger success. Yet another Mermaid movie is simply unoriginal, regardless of whether it triggers racists (and anybody who thinks that the skin pigmentation of a fictional Mermaid is important really has issues and should take a hard look why s/he reacts this way). It's not that movies are too woke - if anything the headlines might easily have boosted ticket sales - it's just mediocre scripts. Episode 3 of Last of Us is just well written, acted and directed. It hit people in the feelings because it was well done. Fury Road is well liked, even though the titular character is a blood bank at the start of the movie and then an ally to the main hero of the story. Make a good original movies and it will be successful - regardless of how pink it is. See Barbie. Try to sell us the yet another umpteenth Terminator and it won't help to have a guy full of testosterone and 0 "woke" factor - I don't see that being a great success. I don't want yet another Alien movie. With the same jump scare and humans are greedy and need to get destroyed by Aliens story. Was fun the first 2 times - but it's treading water for decades now. Disney (et ql) want to sell us the same story again and again. Monsters Inc was great. Doesn't mean the world needs Monsters Inc 6. Toy Story was great. And it had a couple of good sequences, but stop already. Jurassic Park was good for 1 movie. Since then we got it resold again and again. We can disagree about 1 or 2 sequels/prequels/remakes here and there, but overall there's just too much of the same stuff we've seen before. Is Mission Impossible 99 Part 1 bad? No, cool action etc... but they have run out of ideas and now are back into fighting on fast trains. Heck, we got train fights in almost parallel with Indiana Jones Dial of Destiny. At least they should make a Matrix were the humans didn't fight machines by darkening the sky and kill all life, while the machines use humans for batteries - that at kest would improve on that mind-boggling stupidity. Disney could tell stories in the Star Wars universe - outside the main saga. Andor proves that can be watchable. I hear there's a new Pirates of the Caribbean in the works - sigh. Weren't the last 2 not disappointing enough. And they are wasting James Gunns talent on yet another Superman movie. Let's get the Kryptonite ready.

[@PsychicWars]

@@oerthling As far as I'm aware, Lightyear wasn't even really considered "woke" in the US, it was just a few Middle Eastern countries that banned it from showing. What hurt it more than anything was that nobody was interested in a Buzz Lightyear spinoff 4 films and 20+ years after the fact.

[@Gamer2k4]

​@@oerthling There's nothing wrong with sequels if they're done well. Puss in Boots 2, for example, received widespread praise - more so than the original. Spiderman: No Way Home was more highly rated than the two before it as well. If a movie is done well, no one cares that it's a remake or sequel. In fact, it should probably do better, because you're giving audiences more of what they already like. The problem is when "let's do another one of those" is the end of the creative process, or worse, "let's do that again, but change everything about it." That's what audiences push back against, not the fact that a movie isn't a 100% original concept.

[@albevanhanoy]

Let's be honest, Disney going "woke" is mainly a smokescreen to hide their lack of new ideas. They've been through a long period of sequels, reboots, and remakes, with very little in the way of actual new things.

[@thecartooncynic]

This! ^^^

[@LayingThePipe]

You nailed it.

[@andyabel3072]

lol smokescreen by who and what purpose does it serve?

[@LayingThePipe]

@@andyabel3072 Vorlons: "Who are you?" ; Shadows: "What do you want?"

[@albevanhanoy]

@@andyabel3072 The answer is in the comment you are replying to.

[@ppunion]

Bad writing, poor marketing and treading on people's fond memories of their movies in remakes are what is really hurting them. It is also possible that the market is getting more and more saturated with movies.

[@Celebrian13]

There is also I think problem of, let’s call it „poor woke writing”, when companies try to bring more progresive audience to theatre sits by including in movies themes they are interested in, but doing it so shallow and poorly it ends up loosing audience on both sides of political spectrum. And Disney seem to master art od it in last few years…

[@dnichl]

exactly. it's not only shallow. it's overly concerned with being politically correct and 'safe'; the mary sue issue. protagonists rarely have flaws, internal conflicts aren't explored, character and story development all happens externally. it's just not objectively interesting or engaging. i think what really irks me the most, is when people rightly criticize these issues, the studios are very dismissive and label these commentors as "misogynist/alt right/far right/women haters" etc. to the praise and approval of the 'woke mob'. it doesn't make the writing any better. it is still objectively bad. the ad hominem arguments deflect the blame and incompetence. it's been going on for years. I'm glad this reckoning for Disney is finally happening.

[@thelittleowl8399]

dead on. there's plenty of woke media that's been insanely successful (arcane and TLOU have very diverse casts and made over a bil each just to name some). as soon as characters become little more than diversity check boxes, you're story's already dead.

[@Celebrian13]

@@thelittleowl8399 well, Barbie movie soon will be the biggest financial success in WB history. Movie claimed as second on „woke list”. It seem reality is not as easy, as some ppl want it to be…

[@thelittleowl8399]

@@Celebrian13 wym? barbie movies diversity/themes makes sense in the context of the dolls and their history?

[@Celebrian13]

@@thelittleowl8399 I mean that Barbie is perfect example of movie being diverse and progressive in genuine and smart way. It is believeble, feels honest, earned and know exactly it’s audience. And this work both artisticaly and finantialy.

[@KnucklestheEcidna]

We have gotten a FULL DECADE worth of movie FLOPS. If that doesn't send them a clear enough message then they are beyond redemption.

[@Brycevtr250]

What you are missing is that the bad story telling is happening because disney is carelessly dumping all these woke topics into their movies for what they think is an easy win while simultaneously wrecking the original story.

[@1and3ll]

Did you actually watch this video? The whole point was woke isn’t hurting the film, bad story telling is.

[@hasnaindev]

@@1and3ll I think you missed the point too. The stories are bad, especially in Disney's case BECAUSE their focus is pushing gender and woke politics.

[@_Dibbler_]

@@hasnaindev You see woke things everywhere because you want to see woke things. For you a James Bond from the 50s would be woke if it was from Disney

[@hasnaindev]

@@_Dibbler_ My boy giving me a free psychoanalysis? Wokeness is largely a western problem, not mine. If I pay for a ticket to watch a movie, I don't want blue haired individuals pushing their liberal ideologies onto us instead of producing an actual entertaining movie with a story :)

[@edtoomuchfun957]

Youve hit the nail on the head! Disney is a brand where you used to be able to rely on a certain amount of quality in their films. The last 10 or so years that quality of story telling has gotten progressively worse each time they attempt to shoe-horn in another woke moment or ideology just for the sake of doing it. The wokeness itself kinda sucks, but in order to get it into their stories they are sacrificing more and more actual quality story. Take the little mermaid, they swapped races - for what reason other than just because... then instead of following the story they changed the emotional attachment by making it so that there was no pay-off at the end.

[@MovieRiotHD]

The problem is executives thinking they know what people want instead of letting talented filmmakers (like Nolan) just do their thing!

[@ivansanchez143]

Nolan, a talanted film maker. As a director he is good, not really good but still his use of physical effects instead of CGi is awesome. As a writer he is really bad. Characters need to explain you everything like in a videogame tutorial instead of having visual narrative. they just won't shut up

[@Lukas-Trnka]

​@@ivansanchez143 Nolan is also a good writer. But his style is very specific and not for wide audience, I would say. For example his movie Tenet is a proof he can write well. Tenet has such complicated, multiconected story that not much writers could write something like that correctly. But at the same time, because it is so overly complicated, most people won't appreciate it.

[@ibnyahud]

You have the same problem in the restaurant industry... You get these rich dinguses with money that think they can run a restaurant with no experience because they've gone out to eat...meanwhile, there's a reason why chefs train for years and GMs need years of experience working with typically transient service industry workers.

[@robinthrush9672]

Rian Johnson seems to be the only exception other than huge names like Nolan and Cameron.

[@user-oh6eg4ny3h]

Nolan doesn’t get pressured to make what people tell him to make. He makes his own movies that he wants without any forced agenda.

[@kcknows1884]

The problem is ESG focus is given as an excuse for bad writing or at least mediocre content. Don’t have a good idea woke up the characters then blame fans for not liking your bad script or character development. They just need to make good products

[@giovlms]

This is literally the one, main technical reason. Everything else is accessory.

[@ashroskell]

What’s ESG? You are right, I think. When I saw the cast of a movie that openly violates the history of an African tribe, and tells us they were warrior heroes, when they were degenerate slavers and just as low, if not lower than the people who bought ship loads of slaves from them, telling us that WE are, “racists,” if we don’t like their movie!? Well, that’s intellectually baron, egregiously stupid and flatly insulting. To see them BETRAY their own history like that and be criticised for having a problem with it, merely because of the colour of my skin, literally made it CRAWL off my body and ask me where the hypocrisy bucket was, so it could go and PUKE in it! That was the biggest recent example: Warrior Queen, I think it was called? But, yeah, Snow White thinks the Prince in the original movie gave off, “stalker vibes,” which begs the question WHY TF are you doing this story in the first place? Instead of butchering its carcass for the very few bits you want to use, so as to leave the wasted rest of it to moulder on the plains like the remains of a buffalo, strewn among the carcasses of all the other Wisney IP’s you’ve recently KILLED for no good reason, WHY NOT just make a DIFFERENT MOVIE that tells the story you WANT to preach at us? Oh, wait. Because, the IP, right? People will take their families to see Snow White, but they wouldn’t give a toss about a one and a half hour lecture on how white, middle class men are to, “blame,” for everything. If that isn’t cynical exploitation, what is? We saw Luke Skywalker, not as the Jedi Master, learned in the ways of the Force, experienced and powerful, capable of facing down the universe’s greatest threats, whilst taking the next generation under his wing, to teach them moral lessons and challenge their fears, but as a broken down old loser, waiting for Mary Sue to rescue him from . . . himself, or something . . . We got Indiana Jones, being out-Indiana’d by his Mary Sue and obvious heir apparent, broken, filled with a Luke Skywalker’s worth of regret, cynicism and world weary bollox. And the writers couldn’t see that by so disrespecting the characters and source material, they were flatly insulting the audience. All they had to do was make him, “Indiana Jones,” and the audience would have gladly done the heavy psychological lifting of seeing an 80 year old guy defeating the Nazis one last time, and then they would have taken his sidekick to their hearts. But no, we had to receive some sort of message about how his time was over, he’s a bit crap anyway, and wouldn’t you prefer this new, improved, feminised model? Frankly, NO! “Woke,” has NOTHING to do with any of this debate. Not unless you’re a far right, “hacktivist,” who loves to hijack any topic to make it all about YOU and your effeminate, “grievances.” When people accuse these movies of, “being woke,” as the reason they failed, I just role my eyes and tune TF out. Yes, some, “woke,” idiots have ruined franchises. But that’s not the concern of art lovers. All you have to do is love the world that you are entering, respect the characters that the literal WORLD has named, “beloved,” and get GOOD WRITERS to make their choices PLAUSIBLE. I am fine with a lesbian Princess Leia, IF and ONLY IF, the story demands it and it’s done in a RESPECTFUL way that is not shoehorned in to a place it just don’t fit! The Witcher has gone down the tubes because writers openly mocked the source material and didn’t even LIKE IT! WHY TF HIRE these idiots??? Because Netflix has more money than sense? I honestly don’t know, but I do know that people love IP’s and DON’T want to see Geralt of Rivea EXCLUDED from his own friggen’ story! Sorry, I know I’m ranting. But I care about art, movies, TV, video games and especially GOOD WRITING! Or, I should say, “Good Story Telling.” It’s really very simple, to me: By respecting the SOURCE material, you are respecting your audience. Disrespect the source material; worse still, hijack it to tell a story that is not appropriate to that material, change the characters that people love for the purposes of bigging up some new insert character, and you are INSULTING the intelligence of the fans. Lately, fans have been a lot smarter than script writers, and that’s why their IP’s are starting to crash and burn. And, personally, I’m glad of it. I want good writers, not the hacks we get all the time these days. If you read all of this, WOW! You are patient! Thank you. ✌️

[@mikelord93]

bad writing is the result of diversity hiring. It all comes full circle

[@zjpdarkblaze]

they built the writing and material around the "woke" premise instead of the other way around. good writing and not disrespecting the material should be the foundation and then wrap the "wokeness" around it.

[@Afri_Pandora_Archieve]

No the issue is that conservative critics focuss their attention on supposed "wokeness" of films instead of their actual flaws

[@bubasmollett8610]

Since the theaters take about a 50% cut, the little mermaid lost money, and that's before you factor in advertising.

[@benadkins2801]

Theaters take Way less of a split. Closer to 10 percent.

[@willboa5365]

@@benadkins2801 No its 50% in US markets ... its a fact in Europe theatres take 45% ..

[@Mlg700]

You forgot that 50% of the Box Office goes to the cinemas 😅

[@thevonya3977]

For clarity though, "Go Woke Go Broke" is not just to do with a film or series 'going woke', but more that a studio would emphasise on this point before trying to actually make a good story or likable character. People want to see good story and characters that are relatable and fallible, it is why characters that follow "the hero's journey" are some of the most loved because it follows the formulaic fall and rise of what makes a film hero great. To top this off, yes the point of Disney rehashing their IPs into live action is now both stale and uninspired. It worked for the first few movies because people were not expecting it, so it had that 'wow' factor... now it is just showing its true a colours: Disney trying to cash-cow older movies to milk whatever is left of them (and to justify reselling old merch with high cash values)

[@sfp2290]

I agree. Hence why stories with "strong female leads" have been popular before (The Terminator, Tomb Raider, Alien). But that was because the stories were the points of the movies. The fact that the "hero of the story" was in fact "heroine of the story", was not the important part. Which is where the new movies are going wrong. As the point of the movie is, that it is a strong and independant woman, which is in the lead, and then there is a story around that.

[@aaronjjacques]

The classic point of failure can be identified by removing the woke component when done correctly the story still stands. But in the case of those stories with a woke agenda the story collapses.

[@user-mc8xt1iq7c]

disney was always this bad. theyre on site child trafficking scandals have been consisten since before me and you were born. further... go rewatch pinocchio... literally about a pedophile and drugging kids. go re watch pocahontas, her song about the white man is pure CRT. disney hasnt changed, you just started noticing.. they didnt "go woke"

[@ngking3796]

As an aspiring filmmaker, I think the lack of good storytelling and rushed production are the main reasons for Disneys underperformance. Please consider the fact that Disney executives have the final say on the movie when it’s edited. Many filmmakers don’t fully control the artistic vision on the movie, which is what makes it unique and attract audiences. GotG and Black Panther made money because their directors were allowed most control of the final product. You can see this artistic freedom in the other studios, especially WB. Joker and The Batman are pure cinema experiences compared to Disneys factory style movies and tv shows

[@user-kj5sl2gx7k]

Stars and writers are also constantly attacking fans which pushes them away. People are happy to see people who hate them fail.

[@PMickeyDee]

​@@user-kj5sl2gx7kwhat stars are attacking fans?

[@emsnewssupkis6453]

Poor leftists! Reduced to making excuses for very expensive 'woke' movies losing money, why, that isn't happening at all! HAHAHA. Nope, Disney is going bankrupt rapidly due to...um...whatever! Yup, they didn't alienate more than 50% of their audience! They simply did...oh, they did really well! Yes, that is the new storyline. There is no bankruptcy looming. People are not boycotting Disney! See you all in bankruptcy courts.

[@user-kj5sl2gx7k]

​@PMickeyDee Rachel Zeigler is now and o er the years tons of movies have said if you don't see this film you're a racist or sexist etc. Saying that there are no valid criticisms of a movie only failings morally of the viewers as a person is off putting

[@tenfootgoatman2285]

@@PMickeyDee Recently Rachal Zegler attacked fans suggesting those opposed her casting were racists , before that we had similar from Halle Baily over the Little Mermaid , before that we had Moses Ingam the actress who played Reva Sevander in Obi Wan Kenobi , the whole team behind the She Hulk including star Tatiana Maslany were open about their disdain for fans , much of the cast of Rings of Power attacked fans over the controversy surround some of the castings and the showrunners actually went as far as to call such fans "evil" . The list goes on and on . If you haven't noticed it then you either haven't been paying attention , turned a blind eye to it or agree with the "stars" .

[@kellyevans3254]

The biggest problem with the way the data was handled in this video is that it appears that the cost of the movie wasn’t taken into consideration, and advertising costs weren’t touched in the final analysis. I think that if the cost:profit ratio was included in the final data analysis movies like Star Wars the last jedi would have their position on the graph moved to low profit or even into net losses. While wokeness within movies/Hollywood isn’t the only or even the biggest factor affecting the profitability of the movie it does seem to have a net negative impact. Overall your data collection, sorting, and analysis were quite impressive.

[@quasibrodo923]

What people often forget about box office performance is that the theater (and other parties) keep part of the ticket price. It's all very complicated, every movie is different, but as a rule of thumb, the studio only keeps about half the ticket price. So if you release a movie with a $100 million budget and $50 million in marketing, and it makes $300 in theaters, that movie didn't make $150 million in profit. That movie broke even.

[@arladicey]

I have said before that Disney's biggest problem is lack of fresh new stories.

[@Red-Magic]

Same. Way back in in my junior year back in like 2015 I remember first reading about Disney trying to make a live action remake of Jungle Book, Mulan, Mermaid, Lion King....I was already saying that it was a bad idea lol. The original movies were PERFECT as they were they didn't need to be trampled on

[@sogerc1]

That is true however I would've gone to the movies for the Little Mermaid for sentimental reasons, I used to love it as a child, but when I saw the black chick in the trailer I said: no thanks. And I roll my eyes every time they force a gay couple into a movie.

[@joshanonline]

Yeah, it's not as simple as 'go woke' then do poorly. Lot of factors influence or converge to turn down audiences. This video perspective is too 'investigative to disprove wokeness damage' and sees things too superficially with numbers. Reminds me how game companies make patches based on numbers and turns out people hate the patches lol

[@JM-gg8ko]

People used to gobble anything Disney regardless of how bad the story or over played. Disney stories were always woke but Nobody cared as it was traditional to watch anything Disney. I know too many people that are avoiding Disney during their battle with Florida policies. Now supporting Disney means supporting a political agenda. It was a totally avoidable bridge to cross but they did and a side was taken. Never take a political side.

[@begelston]

They don't write first, but instead push an agenda. The story comes second or third, and it shows.

[@SkedroTheGreatMade_a_Savage]

I think the movie industry as a whole is just not as profitable as it used to be. I think more and more people are entertaining themselves in other ways rather than watching a movie.

[@Tumeq]

Basically, yes. There are much more entertainment sources and many of those you don't even have to pay for (if you pay for the internet already).

[@Shuizid]

Movies todays are packed with CGI, fall victim to studio interference, rewrites and reshoots plus the occasional celebrity name attached that their cost simply explodes. Add the add-money and movies have to make just an absolutly absurd amount of money to break even. Ofcourse movies are not "profitable" if they need to make like a billion$ just to offset the cost.

[@Hatrimn]

Yea...that's what you do when movies aren't good - you find other entertainment. But some movies still occasionally make over a billion, which means it is still profitable if you make something people want to see.

[@meilinchan7314]

Correct.

[@lucbloom]

Too many players because tech made it feasible to tell a story compellingly with less budget. Avatar is the opposite of that of course, but still. There’s so much to watch, it’s not that special anymore to go all the way to the city to go see a movie with overpriced popcorn etc etc.

[@FinalGurr]

I think it would be interesting to see if there is any correlation of JUST Disney studios films over the past 20 years, instead of only recently, as looking at only the past 2-3 years, doesn't provide a whole lot of context or big picture information.

[@trololkhil9868]

even now the correlation is bad. R2 that is not going up = bad for business...you have to understand that people's salaries are going up, inflation etc. Any trend that is now going upwards or maintaining a high level of engagement is seen as a failure. Especially since the untapped population/market is always increasing. I think the data suggests what is likely happening: i.e. the industry is stagnating despite the enormous efforts to be inclusive and increase market share through that instead of better movies lol.

[@LeeRCGaS]

this would definitely change the r2 number

[@wisperingiron3646]

Just wanted to note that r^2 does not determine significance. It describes how much of the variation can be explained by the variable. You can have r^2=1 with weak significance and a r^2=0 with strong

[@cgt3704]

I think what is really Disney's problem is that they have become too reliant on nostalgia bait and are willing to recycle old ideas hoping that the consumers will give them more money. But eventually you will run out of old ideas and you cant recycle a movie for a second time. As a result the company started to become less creative which in turn makes bad writing more frequent. But the company will not give a poop as long as it gives them triple digits.

[@lorenrb80]

"you cant recycle a movie for a second time" How many Spidermans we got now?

[@txrcher]

The problem with Disney is that they're banking on nostalgia while at the same time completely disrespecting the original and changing way too much of the story for it to actually be a true live action adaptation. They would have been better off just writing a new story after making so many changes. The Little Mermaid and the upcoming Snow White are prime examples.

[@bradavon]

Exactly.

[@AnymMusic]

@@lorenrb80 Spider-Man is Marvel being smart by using the multiverse to hide behind

[@2nerC9]

They are not recycling when they are making everything that’s great about that original movie to more “modernized” ideals.

[@brunnokamei9623]

What is breaking Disney is the fact they are pouring like, half a dozen 200M+ budget movies and expecting all of them to make a profit. Even if you liked Elemental, how the heck did this movie cost 200 millions to produce?

[@jimluebke3869]

They're Woke in their production as well -- they had to send stuff back for rework over and over again, because they weren't using the best people for the job.

[@carkawalakhatulistiwa]

This survey does not include income outside the United States. where if there are LGBT characters the film can immediately be banned in many countries

[@jimluebke3869]

@@carkawalakhatulistiwa It also doesn't include merchandising revenue, which is what made George Lucas a billionaire. No one wants to buy merch from Woke movies. Get Woke, Go Broke.

[@Random_dud31]

​@jimluebke3869 if wokeness was so important to you folks in the states, then ron desantis wouldn't be so low in the polls

[@archertwin22]

Most of the recent Pixar movies cost about that much. Computer animation at Pixar quality is expensive.

[@alistairgrey5089]

While quality storytelling is a big part of the problem I have noticed a different problem that may prove to be even more impactful. The fact is, many big media companies today are not understanding their target audience or they are trying to target the wrong audience with their product. A prime example of this was the Amazon show Rings of Power. Amazon didn't seem to realize that the LotR fandom is quite possibly the most rabid fandom in existence and to change a beloved character and story from the source material would awaken the rage of said fandom.

[@andrewmclaughlin2701]

Woke Boardroom hires woke writers and cast staff for woke purposes leads to most people not returning for a second view equals less money

[@TagusMan]

When you have Disney execs proudly admitting that they are promoting their "not at all secret gay agenda" in every movie and kids show possible, it tends to turn normal people off... The kind of people looking for family friendly entertainment to watch with their kids. This used to be Disney's target audience but no more. Woketivism is clearly far more important to corporate DEI merchants than good writing and good story telling. It's obvious in every woke Disney product, especially with Star Wars, MCU and Indiana Jones, and we the people are sick of the rubbish. I gladly cancelled my Disney+ subscription months ago. It felt so good, I wish I could cancel it again.

[@Mr.Gnomebody]

Part of the problem with this analysis is that it only evaluates each movie's individual revenue and doesn't account for other factors like the accumulated changes to Disney's reputation over time after multiple releases, or the differentes in potential draw of a specific movie (e.g any Star Wars release likely always draws big numbers compared to other films in the list).

[@wefinishthisnow3883]

Great point. Also add in the lost merch sales and devalued brands like Lucasfilm.

[@genisay]

If you would like to see a more specific break down of why Disney has been doing so bad lately, if you haven't, try looking up Film Theory's Disney is Dead. Matt Pat does a pretty comprehensive break down of the mistakes they have made and continue to make, the issues they are facing, and how they could actually fix their decline if they really wanted to.

[@wefinishthisnow3883]

@@genisay You don't need to break down the obvious - they've turned males off their brand by replacing all male-led franchises with females. Ironically it's turned females off the brand too.

[@llamasarus1]

Yeah, Box office revenue is only a short-term metric. Because A24's Beau Afraid, their most expensive movie, didn't make it's money back but it helped their reputation for how polarizing and discussion-worthy it was. I can't call that a failure. The new Star Wars movies made lots of money but didn't really help Disney's brand.

[@feanorgu]

agreed this is a very tendentious video clip, almost excusing them, not a fan of this reviews at all...

[@maciekr4641]

There is at least one major red flag in this video - saying that Rotten Tomatoes is a good metric. It's horrible in fact, they were caught red handed manipulating user reviews few times, like deleting 'bad' review bombs, but leaving 'good' ones. Also if movie is under performing, but handful of hardcore fans watch it and they like, while cinemas are almost empty - that will create Fresh on a bad movie. Rotten Tomatoes should never be trusted.

[@centuriongaming1866]

Yea

[@kamelkadri2843]

exactly

[@maxkrueger9980]

No you should just use Rotten Tomatoes with an understanding of what it is. Of the people who saw the movie what percentage would recommend it.

[@TheKraken5360]

When looking at online ratings generally, you have to account for the fact that the less people leave a rating, the less reliable the ratings are.

[@peterk2455]

"We asked a random sample of people, who were attending an all expenses paid promotional weekend retreat at a 5 star resort, if they liked the movie. The majority, without bias, said YES!"

[@matthewrodgers740]

The definition of woke is narcissism

[@kevinraper114]

I don't believe it's the wokeness itself that kills movies as woke writers think woke = good and don't worry about an entertaining story. "Barbie" is an example of a woke movie that was actually good and did very well in the box office. A lot of this started with "Ghostbusters" 2016 which was woke and very bad. After watching enough of these race swapping, gender swapping, men hating movies, you start to avoid them. They could be good but when you've been burned by these boring movies enough you don't want to see a movie that has these attributes.

[@stephenthomas1492]

Don't forget that Bud Light's marketing director calling it's customers 'fratty' and how they wanted to move away from that demographic. They got what they asked for.

[@moraldilemma1159]

But she didnt say she wanted to move away from that demographic, she said she wanted to move away from that kind of marketing. Her goal was inclusivity and bringing more customers (you know, capitalism) There is a huge difference there.

[@oddish4352]

Problem is, the trans community is one of the most obnoxious in existence, forcing their way into women's sports and demanding that we let children make permanent modifications to their bodies. As a result, anyone who caters to them risks severe backlash.

[@Rakkasan11b]

@@moraldilemma1159 The biggest difference now is their revenue before the marketing scheme and after! lol Also, simply calling your largest customer base any name, was a PISS poor decision.

[@michaeladkins6]

@@Rakkasan11b She should have recognized the Trans hatred going on.

[@tonyd9834]

its alisa Heinershcnide fault, she is solely responsible for bringing bud light to its knees and it had nothing to do with dylan mulvaney. Attempting to get more people to buy your beer is one thing, Insulting the men that buy the beer (who btw are the majority of Bud lights customers), sticking your nose up believing you're better than them because your shit smells like roses is another. If it wasn't for the interview she gave no one would have gave a damn. people like that are very unlikable. then they tried to say the boycott was because of dylan mulvaney. yeah right I see right through that BS.

[@thalyasylos2745]

I would love to see a graph of wokeness on the X-axis and how much the movie made compared to its budget on the Y-axis (box office divided by budget)

[@raphaelj6885]

yes the video forgot that Disney use to top the box office all the time and now they are in the background. In business that means loosing market share to competition. Does not mean competition make more money, just that Disney is making less than they use to

[@vanbaguette7368]

How do you measure ''wokeness''? How do you quantify it?

[@adamik2271]

@@vanbaguette7368use the same metric they used within the video

[@ejtattersall156]

I keep thinking maybe bad, unoriginal scripts tend to rely more on woke gimmicks, and so they are underperforming because they are bad/unoriginal but they are more easily accused of underperforming because they are woke.

[@oriontigley5089]

​@@ejtattersall156I agree. I do think the correlation between wokeness and performance is more indirect, in that pandaring to a political side is just one of many factors that show Disney is focusing less and less on good storytelling and creativity.

[@juliancaraveo5700]

So basically rehashes , under advertising, and bad writing ruins a movie ? Makes sense. But sometimes over advertising can affect it too. The live action Lion King movie from 2019 was advertised like it was going to be this spectacle when it was really a lazy rehash of the animated classic.

[@jasongoodacre]

If Disney's goal is to lose money, they are doing an absolutely fantastic job.

[@NewerSwagger-gp3hj]

Elementary made a very good rebond. Disney brought a some Pixar jokes in the movie. The public loved it!!

[@EgoChip]

It's not about the money, and it hasn't been for some time. It's about the message and the agenda.

[@NewerSwagger-gp3hj]

@@EgoChip Disney is ALL ABOUT THE MONEY !!! YOU FOOL!!! Disney was anti jews, then anti black, pro slavery, pro nazi then anti nazi, sexist and now feminist BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT SELLS!!!!

[@jasongoodacre]

@@NewerSwagger-gp3hj I haven't seen the film yet. But it's only at the break-even point. I don't think that will satisfy Disney shareholders.

[@diamondrarakotomahefa4328]

@@NewerSwagger-gp3hj It is about the percent of public. They kept it so long in theaters...to just break even...

[@johnmoynihan5390]

With Disney the issue is not just wokeness, it's also the fact that it's all sequels and remakes

[@bloody4558]

But that is precisely why it's wokeness. Trying to use famous products to sell a political message is an integral part of the process used in Marxism, where Wokeness, intersectional Feminism, Critical Theory and Critical Race Theory all come from.

[@aaronthebest5519]

that’s literally what he said in the video

[@SappySadLoveShit]

they didn't watch the video lol. they say "nit just wokeness" as if it's a factor and the vid clearly proved its not a factor.

[@Kannabi420]

@@SappySadLoveShit The video clearly states that the data is rudimentary, it clearly proves nothing lol

[@TheBigBigSean]

That is literally the RESULT of wokeness. They're hiring unqualified and untalented people and making identity a priority

[@vanivanov9571]

What is this... You're using the ratings for a movie which most people didn't watch? That's like surveying the number of fans entirely inside a fanclub.

[@Chris-we3cp]

One thing I don’t think you took into account is when you approach making a movie with an agenda (in this case wokeness) quality will suffer. You cannot make a good movie when you’re too busy trying to check boxes. For instance picking a director and writer based on DEI rather than their talent. Nobody cares if either is gay, a person of color or whatever, however if they were chosen because they are gay rather than their talent, then you have a problem, because then you have a bad product.

[@baalzhamon8491]

It should be noted that taking a survey from one subscriber base might be quite biased, even with a big number of respondents. Best way to do a survey is contacting random individuals, not just putting up a survey like this

[@loowyatt6463]

But that would go against their narrative, so why would they do that

[@Nimish204]

They have budget constraints

[@tomlxyz]

​@@loowyatt6463you wouldn't have said that if the result came out differently

[@anthonyduong2601]

its more bad writing and no new ideas. Like they pointed out, Barbie made a ton of money with a bunch of woke themes, and movies series like arcane with lgbt are still quite successful even with these ideas. That being said if you're going against the politics of a group of your consumers it will definitely have an impact on your revenue.@@loowyatt6463

[@TheYgds]

@@loowyatt6463 I don't think they "have a narrative". One of the big reasons I listen to them is because they are pretty factual about everything. They don't even have a tone problem. The brevity of the reports lends itself really well to keeping information just to the facts, and it doesn't spin out of control with a bunch of filth being tossed between the political isles.

[@Deviouscoffee]

My friend and I recently went to see Oppenheimer (great movie, too long) and were both turned off by the trailers at the very beginning because almost everything presented was really just a rehash of old movies or a continuation of old franchises. Examples include a new Exorcist film, a new Conjuring/Nun film, and a handful of others that were honestly so forgetful that I'm having trouble recalling them.

[@danielecidda4180]

Wonka

[@anthonyalles1833]

What the hell was so "woke" about _Turning Red_ ? Just the fact that it featured an Asian family and focused on young girls? Is that all it takes?

[@onlyhereformoney175]

yes, because periods are "sexual" to conservatives

[@geckoo9190]

Yea, I think that the problem is more complex, if you ask me even wokeness doesn't have to be with those movies being bad, being bad has to do with the movie being bad, wokeness is just something that they use as a topic to try to disguise that the movie is bad, basically wokeness tries to be ketchup.

[@basteagui]

using wokeness as a disguise or KETCHUP would only work for a progressive viewer. for a conservative wokeness is less ketchup and more diarrhea over your fries

[@HeatherVerhagen]

Wokeness is one factor that I look at. Other important factors for me include poor writing and bad CGI, and fan baiting (ie actors and writers who seem disconnected with what their audience wants and decides they need to fix the story. These actors and writers call anyone who says their movie or TV show are bad an ist, regardless of what people are actually saying is bad. People don't like being called names or being told what to think or feel.)

[@futurestoryteller]

These people get mad literally because a movie contains someone who isn't white, or isn't a man, by any reasonable measure that is an ist

[@aishaalamoudi599]

very interesting, they just did the same to Netflix, Apple+, Universal and Sony.. is it a factor there too?

[@HeatherVerhagen]

@@AshAshAshAshAshAshAshAshAshAsh @stevenstrain283The showrunners of The Rings of Power seem to have called the Lord of the Rings fans racists because they don't like their show. I looked at a ton of comments and reviews about the show across social media, and maybe one person out of thousands said they weren't watching the show because it had black people in it. Everyone else said that the costumes, writing, wirework, etc looked really really bad. I think the message the showrunners are trying to send is "Say something negative about our show, and we'll call you a racist." I realize that some people deserve to be called out because of their opinions, but it looks like the showrunners are being bullies and trying to use their platform to silence people. It isn't working. When I see examples of what they did elsewhere when it comes to media, I believe that people with influence are essentially saying that other people's feelings and opinions don't matter, even if they are constructive, kind and true, and that is not okay for anyone to hold them or express them.

[@futurestoryteller]

@@HeatherVerhagen Sure, people are complaining the show is "woke" because of "bad wirework" by the way I watched the show, I'm not even certain what scenes would require wirework let alone work that looks silly.

[@aishaalamoudi599]

no they don't. a group of morons harass a black actor cause he must be white. That actor ignores them. Then in one interview he decides to say something like "c'mon guys, you believe dragons exist in this world but not black nobles?"-->Cultural warriors make videos titled "actor so and so attacks the fans", "studio so and so says if you hate the show then you're racist". You go and watch these videos and come here and make this comment. Reality: the guys who harassed that black actress on Obi Wan calling her the N-word, are the ones they called out, not the fans. Stop self-victimizing.

[@justalittlebitmo]

Rotten Tomatoes pulled negative reviews for Little Mermaid (and other movies) at the studios request. There was a paragraph about it on the website...that they're pulling or hiding certain reviews. Not sure if it's still there.

[@linusgustafsson2629]

Yea, Disney movies get special treatment where Rotten Tomatoes simply disable 1 star reviews and only count 2-10 star. Meanwhile all paid bots who give 10/10 are always kept, because it isn't review bombing if you bot a high score.

[@user-mc8xt1iq7c]

because its illegal to be honest about black people, or about white erasure

[@andrewmclaughlin2701]

@@user-mc8xt1iq7c I'm old enough to remember when Disney hired lesser beings to be trained by their white employees and then terminated the white employees ... a short while later, Disney was no longer creative and merely recycled old material

[@LordTaos]

Several comments... first is your data available for download? Would love to see it. Second, review bombing is a thing and so is review glow-ups. There was a news article about a movie (or show) that hadn't come out yet, & they included a screen shot of the reviews. The story was talking about all the people that had reviewed bombed it. But they showed the numbers and there were more 5 star reviews than there were 1 star. Third, I would put an asterisk next to the Force Awakens. It was the first Star Wars movie to come out in 20 years. Essentially there were 3 generations of fans going to see it. That's why it did so well in the box office. Plus many of the fans were willing to give the "mary sue" character a pass with that movie, assuming it would be covered nicely in the sequels (which is was not.) Lastly, you mention the latest in the Mission Impossible & Fast and the Furious movies not performing well... What number are they on? I am assuming, in general, that movies tend to go down the more sequels they have. (But again, that's me assuming that, I have not looked at any datal.) That may need to be taken into consideration for the scores as well. Anyway, thanks for the video, it was certainly interesting to see how everything fell on the chart.

[@kayakerdude3727]

It is because of being woke - Also disprespecting brands they bought ... the way they handled Luke Skywalker and Thor etc.. get woke go broke.

[@seriousbusiness2293]

Corrolation vs Causation. I think the percived wokeness is a simptom of a different issue. Disney is not taking any big risks anymore, not allowing super daring creative individuals to do there thing like in 'Everything Everywhere all at once'. Rather it feels like they have a checklist of things that worked at some point or another or have come out of focus groups. We get a little wokeness, little bit nostaliga bait, amazing visuals and a more generic version of a story we already heard before like if it was written by AI. You can feel its a corporate project and doesnt have as much soul or is the vison of one individual.

[@bloody4558]

It would've been a possibility if every other company hadn't been doing the exact same thing...

[@kennyc002]

Exactly. Everything Everywhere all at once is also a woke movie and also made gangbusters money and also won the Oscars.

[@leos.2322]

Every other company like WB is doing precisely that. It isn't "perceived wokeness" it's activism pretending to be entertainment. Their writing is trash because the views behind those writtings are trash. To quote the girl who played remade Ariel "it isn't about love, it's about what she wants" aka it's about me. It's about ego and nobody cares about your egoisms other than yourself. This wretched view that in order to matter you need to search for power for power's sake makes their characters at best unrelatable and at worst into detestable villains prettending to be heroic or complex characters when they're in fact just one shade of black away from being as evil as Dio Brando.

[@Bustermachine]

@@leos.2322 I personally dislike the live action remakes and think they've often missed the point due to executive pouncing on shallow criticism, or misunderstanding nuanced critique, but, uh . . . Yeah the original Little Mermaid was like . . . Aerial falling in love at first sight with a person she doesn't know, due to her infatuation with the surface world and proceeding to voluntarily strike a deal with a literal sea witch who sang a song about the consequences of her deals if you can't keep up your end of the bargain. That's not love, that's childish naivety of a teenager. It always was. Like, did you not see the original movie? Jeez, the old standby analysis about the Disney renaissance was that they are movies overwhelmingly about their protagonists seeking their identities. Which is the definition of ego. There's plenty of valid criticism to be had. The live action films don't really justify their own existence, except as a cash grab. They add nothing and often break things while trying to ineptly fix critique. But this one just comes off as kinda weak to me and a character assassination of the actress.

[@erikstigter7897]

@@Bustermachine It's woke crap.. being attracted to someone is usually how love begins. Almost all entertainment have become activism/political. But you can keep ignoring the obvious. Many people I know including me aren't spending money on most of the things being made because we are of the opinion it's all gone woke, and apparently many more do as well.. so why not take that serious?

[@jameslewis2635]

The problem isn't so much that Disney went 'woke', its that they went about it really stupidly. Rather than tell stories that would represent various types of people naturally, they decided to change existing stories which was very irritating to long-time fans. Also, since the characters no longer fit the situations in the movies coupled by a lack of development time leading to poor writing made a lot of these films a bad time for all involved. Mulan and Star Wars sequels are prime examples of the mistakes Disney has been making. In Mulan the main character was made overwhelmingly powerful from the word go leading to a lack of any character development. In Star Wars the main character, Ray has hardly any lines and seemingly becomes overwhelmingly powerful with no training. Add to that the actress playing her was so poorly rehearsed in fight scenes that weapons just 'disappear' from foes hands so that she is not prematurely killed off. Some legacy characters were killed off at points that make no sense at all while one particular character is kept alive despite their death being what the movies needed and that the actress behind the character had already died (so Star Wars fans had to watch as Princess Leia became Mary Poppins in space). Also every male character left in the films were made to look like either a coward or a gung-ho idiot before the second movie of the trilogy was complete made the films a prime target for conservatives while the resurrection of Palpatine was a lazy and stupid move that made little sense in context to everything that had happened before (in universe) and would not have been needed if Disney had not allowed Rian Johnson (writing and directing 'The Last Jedi') to move away from the trilogy plan that JJ Abrams had drawn up. To be fair, 'The Force Awakens' was hardly a master class in film making, mainly consisting of plot elements copied and pasted from the original Star Wars trilogy but it made a lot more sense than 'The Last Jedi'.

[@cokelover-nb1qz]

the fact that they're pushing the "wokeness" like all the film's primary difference and message, in regards to newly made films, is about portraying the progressive elements that shouldn't be at the forefront in the movies and really shouldn't be the primary theme of most stories, the story should be. Stories are at the end of day stories and while all-good and all arguably all stories represent something, the story still comes first even in instances where you want to drive home a message, you can much better represent any message through a unique and vivid story that still is primarily a story and not a list of themes.

[@rrshier]

I remember this and a great example is the real-life alladin. The fact that they changed the story itself to have the woman become the sultan, and alladin (the character for which the entire story is supposed to be about) into just a secondary character to the leading lady (while woke), is just a complete misrepresentation of the story. I also think the stats shown in this video somewhat misrepresent the problem. If you buy into the notion that people who arent woke are "being silenced", and are even scared about speaking out, then it also follows that the numbers themselves would be skewed, as statistically, the only people putting out reviews would be those speaking favorably (or aligned with the, today, more socially acceptable message). Also, I would imagine that you generally would only be getting "ratings" from people who are going to see the movies. If ticket sales are down, then those that WOULD have seen the movie simply have not seen it, and thus don't have anything to review. In other words, the statistics don't account for people who just didnt see it, didnt review it BECAUSE of it's wokeness, or that the numbers are simply positively biased. The reviews never ask people who DIDN'T see it why they didnt. Those numbers are close to impossible to capture.

[@mostevil1082]

@@rrshier Those differences show up everytime in the difference between critic and audience ratings.

[@Belltone]

The part I hated was when they made Han Solo and Princes Leia divorced. That killed the entire love story of the first three films. It seems they were so woke they just couldn’t stand having a popular female character be married to a man. It was that love story that made the original movies tolerable by women.

[@bmoreerac9862]

Yes, - but if Milan and Rey had actual struggles to overcome, were portrayed flawed from the beginning, and had an actual character arc - they wouldn’t be the fem bosses they were intended to be and wouldn’t be in the woke category. The message in both those movies are “women are perfect and don’t need help”. That’s text book woke and also makes for a very boring movie. So yeah, Disney is absolutely losing money because the themes are to push woke ideology which makes for boring and uninteresting movies regardless of how you vote.

[@ReticentXS]

3:55 "So called race swapping"....

[@AmberyTear]

4:02 Actually, many progressives and lefties ALSO criticize wokeness or rather pseudo-wokeness, corporate pandering and neo regression. It's not just conservatives. Conservatives are just against EVERYTHING woke while many of us are against pseudo-wokeness specifically. And we get a lot of that everywhere now. You can have very woke movie done well and you can have pseudo-woke movie that only has surface-level wokeness but it's actually empty, pandering or even toxic.

[@danielschauffer8216]

Every successful business in the history of time knows to make sure to understand and respect its customers. Disney has targeted a non existent customer base and/or at the very least ignored them. They say things like ‘toxic fan base’ when their projects fail. This is a clear indication that they have lost the understanding of what a business essential is!

[@moraldilemma1159]

Disneys mistake is that they dont want to spend money on the most important part of film making. Writing. They pull an IP out of a hat. They get a writer with no experience to write a story already outlined by corporate. (new writers will be cheap and wont talk about "artistic integrity" or stuff like that because they will be too scared/grateful to be working for Disney) Even if the writer manages to make gold from crap, Disney will still fill it with marketing gimmicks, product placement, pandering, nostalgia bait, and anything else that they think will make them money. This is how Hollywood has operated for 100 years and people are suddenly acting surprised.

[@KugleeKuglee]

@@moraldilemma1159 Rather than hiring a competent veteran (not young) writer, they usually hire a team of 5-8 - with mostly young inexperienced women (inexperience with LIFE, hard life) -, and there are always a couple of ultra wokes. There you have it, a recipe for failure.

[@marhawkman303]

@@moraldilemma1159 yeah modern Hollywood is defined by Disney, and many of the issues modern Hollywood has are the same as Disney. But Disney PARKS are having the same issues. Massive budget over-runs while not getting the job done.

[@Bustermachine]

@@moraldilemma1159 I'd call all of that fair. And the problem for me as someone pretty progressive is that it's basically using real people as an ablative shield to deflect criticism of a corporate engine that we'd probably all be better of without.

[@futurestoryteller]

This guy did not watch the video

[@borat656]

I'd like to see one more adjustment made: a Y axis of: box office - (cost to make x 1.5). Not for the wokeness argument, but rather because I expect Disney spends much more on their movies than most other studios, which would make their losses more pronounced.

[@jinno4594]

They also need to divide the US box office by 2: the cinemas/theatres take their cut of the ticket price. For other markets around the world, I heard the studios take less of a share, maybe 30 or 40%. Plug in those numbers and I expect their stats to come out differently. To be fair, as the sample size is quite small, so any stats that are derived from it are to be taken with a pinch of salt.

[@foodini666]

@@jinno4594 international is worse not better. china is like 75% for example.

[@jinno4594]

@@foodini666 I'm fairly sure that grammatically "around the world, the studios take less of a share" means something like "outside the US, it's worse for the studios". Not that my grammar matters much. The 30/40% was for some European countries, if I remember correctly.

[@davidmylchreest3306]

Simple box office gross for this type of study will suffice, as the gross is an indicator of how many people actually went out to see a Disney movie (because people claim if it's woke, everyone will stay away).

[@aaronfine734]

@borat656 matpat made a video on it and it turns out you are completely right

[@Obi-Wan_Kenobi]

This videos data collection isn't perfect and there are clear biases in the sampling, but this is still the most comprehensive data analysis of "woke" movies I've ever seen. It attempts to quantitatively evaluate the "go woke, go broke" claim and for that I think it should be commended. The statistics and sampling can be improved but this is a fantastic start.

[@MinkieWinkle]

also, you should never look at the critic scores. since no one listens to them. its like taking reviews of a product from the staff that made it. The big media companies OWN the critics/ large review sites. take IMDB for instance

[@Anduz001]

If The Little Mermaid, inc it's advertising budget, cost $400m to make and it splits it's profit 50/50 with theatres, how is $567m classed as 'in profit' for Disney!? They spent $400m and made

[@aishaalamoudi599]

This is my favorite; people on social media acting like seasoned financial analysts using numbers trolls throw around. You don't have to, we have "real" financial analysts who have insider information; they all broke it down: Little Mermaid was profitable a long time before it left theaters.

[@sagefields]

Yeah, it bombed just like every other Disney remake in the past couple of years. Hope they continue to burn through money.

[@annoyedok321]

Theaters can get as little as 0 the first week on ticket sales and 50/50 the 4th week. It's why popcorn is so expensive.

[@ignaciomoreno9655]

Well. Look at Indiana Jones, it is supposed to need 900 millions to break even. So, yeah.

[@LuisSierra42]

@@aishaalamoudi599 Yeah, but aren't you making the same mistake you are criticizing? how do you know it was profitable?

[@lyndanickerson1373]

The biggest reason why I'm not going to the movie very often is not due to being Woke! It's due to the cost of going to the theater! I took my daughter to see Barbie and it was over $50 for two of us! That means for my whole family it would be close to $100 or more to see a movie! Hollywood hasn't had a new idea in 40 years!

[@TKUA11]

Then go on Tuesday’s and Sunday’s: it’s half off. Plus, bring ur own food to the theater, since u have to grab ur bag with you anyways to not be burglarized

[@willdegra317]

Liberal voters support inflationary policies. So it’s not due to woke content, but due to woke supporters

[@97Corvi]

Wow Is that expencive in america ?! Here in Italy it's still arownd 11€ 😅

[@oldsenpai4337]

that why I don't go the first week or so, then the tickets normally go on sale.

[@guedesbrawl]

This. Imagine spending this much for a 2/3-hour movie when a video game isn't that much more expensive and a single game sometimes gives me 200+ hours of playtime.

[@hifijohn]

Actually most movies don't make much money , and many big money losers actually made a ton of money they just cost too much to produce.

[@t0x1c_caustic23]

UPDATE: Critics using Rotten Tomatoes have been confirmed to have been paid by industry PR teams for better ratings on their Movies. (Shocker!). Plus funny how he brought up review bombing and how it skews the data when the data was terrible to begin with.

[@noldo3837]

Is it owned by Amazon? Was it that case with Rings of Power review wars? On the other hand, in that case, there WAS review bombing, and social media anti-hype.

[@t0x1c_caustic23]

@@noldo3837 So your reaction to me bringing up evidence of unproffessional critics who took bribes is..."BuT ThEiR wAs StIlL ReViEw bOmBiNg.". In my comment I never DENIED that review bombing happens. I simply pointed out while the industry was manipulating professional reviews the YTer was adding an astrics to the rotten tomatoes data for the wrong reason. Review bombing was not the reason that the data may/may not of been scewed but the professinal reviews themselves.

[@saryenn]

I cannot overstate the admiration i have for the amount of work and thought that went into this video.

[@aok2075]

In a short amount of time as well

[@StephenGillie]

Not really hard to throw together a few graphs about a popular trend...

[@vitoanania6042]

some parts aren't that impressive. for example the graph "Rotten Tomatoes - Wokeness" doesn't consider that the score by critics and the wokeness index have a cofounding variable (woke movies on Rotten Tomatoes tend to receive higher ratings) so if there this negative correlation existed it wouldn't appear on the trend line or would appear much less clearly.

[@randomnobody8770]

@@StephenGillie WAT?! They did original research and data analysis for those graphs (although not for peer review or anything). They had to devise a reliable survey, methodology, and conduct 1000s of survey, then analyze the data. This would take a qualified team quite a bit of time.

[@TheGeoDaddy]

Naw, it can’t have anything to do with ‘woke’ - women who loved “Sleeping Beauty” want a remake where the MESSAGE that the Prince was a perv, stalker rapist… and “women don’t need a man” Or parents want to have a transexual MAN dressed as a woman take their little girl in the “Princess” shop after spending THOUSAND$$$ to get to the Gayest Place on Earth… Christian, Orthodox Jewish, Muslim and Hindu parents want “cartoons” introducing and normalizing homosexuality to their kids… And Indy fans wanted nothing more than to see Harrison Ford simp for his FEMALE “stunning and brave” replacement just as Luke Skywalker to be nullified in favor of a “Mary Sue” The STATS don’t “lie” so keep pushing WOKE… that the rationale that convince the Bolsheviks that “Soviet Realism” was the Art Form of the Future!

[@Cleisthenes607]

The problem with Disney is they're spending way too much on these films.

[@HeatherVerhagen]

Yes. I recently saw a KZbin video that explained that directors and reshooting movies up yo 3 or 4 times and that this is causing the cost of the movies to skyrocket. Disney needs to hire more experienced directors with clearer visions for their projects.

[@menotyou4289]

Or at least directors who will listen to the writers when they say "don't start shooting before we're done writing!"

[@jm21763]

They are spending too much, but it's more the fact that they are willing to spend so much on such incredibly poorly written content!

[@PrayerWarrior4]

Some of the TV shows, were reshot over a dozen times to appeal to their test audiences....coating the company millions of dollars vs regular TV shows

[@AW-lo7sz]

A big problem, but when the experience was consistent enough that everyone would go and bring their kids, it mattered a lot less

[@afterthesmash]

This guy is not commenting on the work theory, he's effectively perpetuating it by taking seriously that other people take this seriously. No real difference if you ask me.

[@jeffreydurham2566]

I've noticed that movies at the theater have struggled in general. I think streaming is affecting people going out to see movies more than studios are willing to admit.

[@cencent2189]

Yeah other than Movies that make it a fun experience like Barbenheimer (where people dress up and go as a social event) have been more successful. The 2 of them are in opposite poles of this spectrum and people loved seeing both and both did well. I think that's just the future of cinema, movies that are fun events rather than just the same old since we have so much we content already

[@michaelcollins8628]

One of the issues I see in a lot of the movies that are underperforming. Is how studios are interacting with audiences. When someone in your movie goes out and starts calling people racist, homophobic, bigots, or toxic males if they don't watch their movies. Turns a lot of people off. Even many on the left don't like it.

[@josephmelendez3327]

Many on the left agree, they just are broader consumers of media so if a movie has poor storytelling or just looks like poorly (as was the case for most of the Disney remakes) they'll just skip them, instead of showing support for the idea with dollars. In addition, a lot of progressives still haven't returned to the theaters, and streaming pretty much cannibalized that industry.

[@Kiyoone]

The 'murican POV about what is "right" or "left" is fun. It is almost like it is inverted for the clueless Americans... Edit: That explains why they are so bad at geography

[@Dina_tankar_mina_ord]

I believe the reason barbie did so well is because it is a brand that actually fits that kind of woke narrative. Its does not feel forced and does not stick out like a sour thumb in the storytelling.

[@snoekercat6884]

and the hid the wokeness in the marketing!

[@gregmccauley1687]

yea it actually didn't seem that woke to me tbh. You have to consider the context. It's a fake toy world where the Barbie's as construction workers and trash collectors don't actually do these things because nothing is constructed and there's no trash. The men are side characters because they always have been in a doll marketed to girls. I thought it was a pretty decent movie

[@TheChannelJ1]

you think Barbie fits a woke brand lol the thin blonde white woman

[@Beeraltar]

It's also an original movie. Not another remake

[@luciusnguyen2449]

One thing I want to add to your point is that Barbie even though woke, it was not woke in a radical way like Disney. It still focuses on storytelling, with each character having their own flaws to overcome and most importantly it does not attempt to force the "Strong female character" trope into it. Unlike Disney, who often sacrifice storytelling and character development for the sake of wokeness

[@dstyKchp]

I don't think it's wokeness fully. It feels more like bad writing and shows and movies that audiences don't really want trying to make up for their writing via forced inclusivity or hand fisted social topics but that's just me.

[@al_x_ander]

Overall return on investment is obviously the metric you should be using. How is it possible that you spent time putting this video together and didn't get the basics right?

[@daikansanchez7674]

Question: Did you guys used the Box Office data for the US alone or Worldwide? Because that could affect the results. Also, in terms of marketing, Disney's marketing has been almost exclusively "woke". So, the woke factor should also include the effects those marketing campaigns had on the performance of the movies.

[@lobachevscki]

It is the data of the US alone, I checked the numbers to confirm that and furthermore I ran them by replacing that box office with the worldwide one and the one combined and the correlation is basically zero, what they conclude in the video remains 'more true'. If anything 'wokeness' makes more money overseas. Also, you need to define what 'woke marketing' means in the same way the video defined a criteria for wokeness for movies, for example besides the casting itself The Little Mermaid marketing didnt state anything about the race of the actress, all that discourse was outside Disney.

[@Avdeev77]

You should consider profits from foreign box offices, I think >30% comes from abroad, and for an example, in my country wokeness affects the will to go the cinema way bigger, than in the US probably

[@foxsipher]

if you consider the profit of box offices around the world, it will cause more discrepancies due to the fact that there are more variants to consider, for example, a film not being shown in china for political reasons. In other words, being limited to the United States, despite having variants not related to the sampling question, will be closer to the final result.

[@cencent2189]

​@@foxsipherYeah, but it's still very important to factor it in. Because when it boils down, it still affects profits by a lot. The main thing I've seen with general audiences is that people don't really care about "woke" they just want new, fun, and crazy stories because the majority that have been coming out recently have just been similar outside of a few exceptions

[@PsychicWars]

@@foxsipher Not including the overseas profits fundamentally alters the outcome. A lot of the recent Disney movies that flopped did so because of a poor overseas showing.

[@zorromci]

I think Disney made the mistake of putting too much focus on its streaming service which has resulted in them needing to generate a huge increase in new content. The need to try guarantee success has resulted in Disney going down the route of remakes, even if that damages franchises like Star Wars in the future.

[@SciFiGrinch]

That was my opinion as well. Remake after remake after remake. Nothing new, just the same story with improved CGI, sound or music. While interesting at first to see how technology could improve the original, that nugget has lost its luster. If studios want to succeed they need to get a good story well written for film and shot in a descent way without breaking the bank and limit social messaging in the movie.

[@wilsonian4236]

​@@SciFiGrinchDisney needs to make new movies that are not part of its animation movies

[@catdogmousecheese]

I think over saturating the market is also a problem. I mean I'm a fan of Star Wars, but even I don't watch every single new mini-series Disney puts out anymore. Plus, how many more of these things can they really make? I mean what's next, is Jar Jar going to get his own mini-series? Or a sequel to the Star Wars Holiday Special?

[@archertwin22]

​@@catdogmousecheese Some KoTOR movies or shows might be interesting. But, I think they need to set the Skywalker Saga characters down for a few decades.

[@bjoardar]

"... in the future." *????* Their story telling was so horrid, I lost all interest in their future ideas after they killed off the Skywalker bloodline and brought back Palpatine because they couldn't figure out a good antagonist character. Not to mention, the story circulates around characters, not the world they live in. What ever happened to the "world building" concept?

[@kshaeta]

People don't go to the theatres because they put a stupid surcharge on buying tickets on line! What BS. No one's going to go to the theatre if the trend of screwing money out of people continues.

[@Ekkie101]

The Barbie movie was considered by right wingers and Fox Nooz to be overly woke, yet it was a box office blockbuster. The fear of "woke" is bullshit.

[@benjaminshropshire2900]

IMHO, that list of "things that make a movie woke" needs one more piece: the thing needs to be included for social reasons not related to the plot. A chunk of dialog that seems out of places and mostly their to make it pass the Bechdel test would be a prime example.

[@thamessinclair2010]

Not necessarily to make a movie woke in the neutral sense, but rather to make a movie woke in a lame way. _This_ is what really annoys people and can lead to financial damage. When wokeness is just superficial posing to check boxes, it becomes ridiculous and even tends to have a counterproductive effect. It's cargo cult, ritual over substance.

[@informatikabos5481]

I dont know since when you watch movies ... but having a political statement for not plot reason has been a thing since at least the 90s. I guess what upsets people is that social reasons are political statements people are not as used to.

[@benjaminshropshire2900]

@@informatikabos5481 for me, it's the virtue signaling aspect; as often as not, they aren't even doing a good job of convincing me *they* care about the thing, but rather it looks more like they feel stapling it on will win them points somehow.

[@houndofzoltan]

Well said. The analysis misses a lot of nuance.

[@informatikabos5481]

@@benjaminshropshire2900 That is a very valid criticism that people across the whole political spectrum share. At the same time, big budget Hollywood movies were never known for a lot of nuance or thought.

[@darkmater4tm]

I don't hate wokeness per se. I hate being shown a bad movie, and then being told I should love it because it's woke.

[@Vagabond824]

That's cringe.

[@bossman0116]

Exactly, Into and across the spider-verse, Arcane, The Batman, Black Panther (which if you ask me it's success kick started this entire overdrive)etc. All these have traits that one can consider "woke" but they're genuinely good and are well accepted. The driving force for a good movie is it being good. Not what it's supposedly representing.

[@fuzzypanda1684]

What you just described is part of wokeness; looking at an apple and telling you that it's actually a whimsical singing sock puppet and if you disagree then you're a Nazi.

[@stsk7]

not sure you should like wokeness, it's combative and divisive

[@fawzibriedj4441]

I don't think it's a common argument "you should love it because it's woke". In the other hand, "I won't see it because they swapped races" is a common argument...

[@martinsolomon5500]

Well this is nonsense. Because you haven’t included the marketing costs. It’s just box off of dollars vs production cost.

[@odolwa099]

Thank God someone on YT finally bothered their arse to do the math on this!!

[@joegutierrez1554]

Look, I can only speak for myself and my family. We don't watch disney movies anymore, due to them going woke

[@akiyajapan]

"Wokeness" is a modern day part of bad writing and mishandling of iconic properties. They can't be separated.

[@ryandylan6946]

Disney: *race swapping only white characters TLDR: Its not wokeness guys its just bad storytelling.

[@Agent_Ste]

@@ryandylan6946 wokeness is a sympom of bad storytelling

[@akiyajapan]

@@ryandylan6946 race swapping has nothing to do with storytelling. It has everything to do with Disney making supposed attempts at being somehow "representative" and that's pure wokeness.

[@TankEnMate]

@@akiyajapan But if the old little mermaid had never been released this one still would have bombed; it was a crap movie.

[@alanrobertson9790]

The aspect of wokeness I hate the most is that in historical settings, the script reflects the writers attitude in 2023, and not what people would have thought in the historical period.

[@vitoanania6042]

the graph "Rotten Tomatoes - Wokeness" doesn't consider that the score by critics and the wokeness index have a cofounding variable (woke movies on Rotten Tomatoes tend to receive higher ratings) so if there this negative correlation existed it wouldn't appear on the trend line or would appear much less clearly.

[@IAMShteve]

Indeed. Critics on RT fall over themselves to rate woke movies well. The audience score is more useful, though that is skewed by the opposite where woke films are review bombed. Maybe somewhere in between the two is the real number.

[@jimluebke3869]

@@IAMShteve Even audience scores are "fortified" -- the studios pick a number, maybe 85% or similar, and put their thumbs on the scale to make it stay there. Rotten Tomatoes ratings can't be trusted.

[@orderoftheyawgmoth]

@@jimluebke3869 The best example of this is the infamous Rise of Skywalker RT score that was locked down to 86% for years.

[@ClassicalPower]

You don't need to draw a chart to realize how bad this has become.

[@frightening_volleyball1231]

I feel like, and I could be wrong. The reason conservatives are such a small minority in the entrainment business is because most conservatives don't take much part in the arts. How many times have you heard older cons saying "get a real job", "don't go to that liberal school", "be a mechanic". Again, I could be wrong, but it feels like It's not that conservatives lost the culture war, it's that they didn't even participate

[@Tygryss84]

Force awakens is an outlier - it was early movie, and new release of bellowed brand. So box office would be higher 🤔 and audience weren't as allergic to this as it is now. Show just recent 2-3 years - that would show up more correlation imo🙂

[@llamalinguist3250]

I thought the same thing. Force Awakens is an outlier because it was the first installment of the new Star Wars franchise so people didn't yet know how bad Disney was going to mess it up. Barbie is an outlier for two reasons: 1. Misleading marketing (similar problem to Force Awakens) 2. There are very compelling arguments that it is actually an anti-woke masterpiece and therefore may not belong on the woke side at all.

[@-FFFridge]

Adding my reply so that this comment gets pushed up

[@jedbex7070]

So is Barbie, the marketing around it made it seem like a normal movie made just to have a good time. No one knew it was woke until after the first weekend when it had gotten most of the conservative and normal peoples money.

[@arturzinurov4781]

Yeah Force Awakens made a shit load. But there are no movies that got a HALF of that tho.

[@Roofhack]

Yep, it was pretty stupid to put both the first two new disney star wars in there. They are going to skyrocket the statistics towards one side.

[@edwoodsr]

TLDR missed a two main points: (1) studios do not get 100% of the box office, rather about 50% of domestic and 30% foreign); (2) there needs to be a plot over time (for example the Star Wars sequel trilogy box office decreased as the anti-woke sentiment grew).

[@scratchy996]

Star Wars sequel trilogy box office decreased because the movies are bad. Even if you ignore or change the woke parts, Disney movies are still bad. Replace Rey with a guy, make the "gender studies" admiral a dude, remove all traces of wokeness, and the movies are still bad. It's not just Star Wars, it applies to all Disney movies. I'm sure a corporation like Disney does market research, and they know the audience gets less intelligent by the day ( that has been empirically proven ), so they create content geared towards a retarded audience. The problem is that they went overboard with the retarded part.

[@aishaalamoudi599]

yea, he forgot to inject bias into his math. Since when do we say the team which scored the most goals isn't necessarily the winner, we have to check how much the club spent training them first??? I love how you guys invent new metrics: Star Wars under Disney became the 2nd largest film franchise in history, but you twist that into "plot overtime" just to get the outcome you want.

[@jeronimo196]

@@aishaalamoudi599 "Since when do we say the team which scored the most goals isn't necessarily the winner" - since the team retired 4 years ago. Star Wars is now a streaming-only franchise, since even disney knew better than to burn money on a Ryan Johnson trilogy, or a D&D trilogy, or any of the other movie projects they announced and quietly scrapped.

[@aishaalamoudi599]

@@jeronimo196 Wow; another NEW metric; to judge a studio we ignore the films the studio actually put out, and start riffing about movies they could've put out but didn't ! Using this metric, you can claim James Cameron is a huge failure. 5 Star Wars films in 4 years; 1 made over 2bil and is still the biggest domestic in history, 3 made >1bil. pffff what a disaster !

[@jeronimo196]

@@aishaalamoudi599 new metrci/old metric - disney lost momie on Solo and haven't greenlit another SW movie since. "The greatest franchise since MCU" and they dare not produce a movie for fear of bombing. Which is where the MCU is also headed for - "The Marvels" is going to be a spectacular failure.

[@neurothoughtmachine]

Since the beginning of time: companies understood that if a company remains neutral, that company will NOT suffer the loss of stock/shoppers/audience (revenue) being felt by those who jump on a policital bandwagon.

[@johngrimes93]

Really appreciate this statistic attempt it was interesting. Two major caveats though: 1. Movie Critics and people who rate movies are also incredibly woke. 2. Disney’s wokeness is turning away Disney’s audience. Barbie might be woke movie that did well but the Barbie target audience is not the same as a Disney’s typical audience. The wokeness is turning away the Disney fans!

[@arkane5260]

You forget to mention that Studios only take in about 50% of the box office money. Disney has lost close to a billion dollars with regards to their recent movie releases. The little mermaid also lost money but not as much as the other movies. Disney only takes it about 50% of the money made at the global box office (55% Domestic and 40% International with China only being 25%). Lightyear needed to make around 600 million (If marketing was 50%) just to break even.

[@frankmurphy9374]

Bingo, his analysis was flowed due to this omission. Studios take in about 50% of the receipts dometically and about 40-45% of the receipts internationally. Alot of those Disney movies lost hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office.

[@jimmynaylor1759]

Was going to bring this up as well. Poor research really. Also negated to mention that the stated Disney box offices are in fact low. As has been revealed, Disney regularly under reports budgets. Dr Strange MOM was around 100 million off what they initially reported. That means films like Indiana Jones needed to make closer to 1 Billion to break even. The biggest problem Disney has is it caters to a vocal minority and produces poorly written and inadequately produced material. Wokism is a factor in this.

[@agyarhardjasudjana7804]

Yep agree. I think TLDR should've at least touched a little about budget and revenue. There's a huge difference between movie A that make $500 mio with $100 mio budget and movie B that makes $500 mio with $300 mio budget

[@jimmynaylor1759]

@agyarhardjasudjana7804 Indiana Jones is a prime case study. Reported budget of 300 to 320 million. Reshoots of nearly 100 million. Marketing if 100 to 150 million. Realistic budget stands at approx 500 million. With Box Office return needs over 1 Billion to break even. With current Box Office it looks like it's about 100 million short of initial budget let alone target. As has been reported by actual financial analysts, Disney has lost over 1 Billion in the last year on its films. Disney also has seen a significant drop in Park Revenue, increase in Taxation in both Florida and California. Law Suits in Both suits which will cost hundreds of millions before settlements. They are hemorrhaging money rapidly.

[@krim7]

​@@agyarhardjasudjana7804 But you also need to factor in government rebates & tax relief into this debate. Lots of places offer rebates of 10-45% of the money studios spend in a particular place. If you film in London, you can get 25% of all the money you spend back. So if you film half your movie 200 million dollar movie in London, the company is getting back 25 million dollars. This is why so many films these days are shot in lots of different locations - it is all about maximizing these rebates/tax relief incentives.

[@markbadham3360]

It may not be sufficient to look at how "woke" a movie is perceived after the fact, but how it was perceived before its release. For example, The Force Awakens benefited from the positive Star Wars brand value at the time but contributed to the erosion of that brand non the less.

[@Hatemoth]

Absolutely, a bad movie will impact future movies.

[@NTJedi]

Agreed... the fact this fella included Force Awakens which was literally riding the golden chariot of previous Star Wars movies with all new main characters while also including previous beloved characters proves the fella hosting this video doesn't understand basic logic.

[@Alan_Duval]

Except The Force Awakens was a great movie, unlike JJ Abrams' subsequent attempt, in part because it went after the nostalgia for the previous films, which was the right thing to do. Too great of a departure from the previous films would've caused the entire franchise to tank then and there. That said, I think he kinda blew his wad on his first Star Wars movie and was right to leave the franchise then. If only he'd stuck with that determination instead of rejoining for the third instalment.

[@NTJedi]

@@Alan_Duval The Force Awakens... Rey literally learns her Jedi powers without any training... that's not good writing. It was the beginning of their Mary Sue character and as Kathleen Kennedy began saying "The Force is Female". The Force Awakens was a big success because their was no Star Wars movies or shows for a very long time which were not cartoons.

[@link10909]

@@NTJediThat didn't really become a criticism until later on, a lot of fans gave it the first one some grace believing the writers had a plan. Once the later films came along and showed this writing was all bad and being rewritten on the fly the first got reassessed and its weaknesses became mainstream points.

[@IngameAnimation]

Imagine investing in Disney while they "we don't care we are doing worlds work" while your money turns into liquid and pours from your hands

[@brandonbaggaley2317]

The interviews with the actors during the promotion of a film should be taken into account as well.

[@cobbler9113]

Yep, Snow White looks like it’s going to be the most insufferable film known to humanity. This is purely because of the conduct of the actress playing Snow White.

[@BlueBoboDoo100]

Ticket prices have also far outpaced inflation. It's insanely expensive to take the family to a movie right now. It's far more tempting to wait for a movie to come to streaming. Disney in particular, trained their audience to expect movies to come to Disney+ within a few weeks of theatrical release, during covid.

[@weird-guy]

And that imo is the reason number one why they are loosing money Disney +, the second is that some movies/series are just bad and with bloated budgets, go woke go broke only worked with bud light because the beer consumers of are mostly men and conservatives even then InBev is only losing money in the USA

[@jeronimo196]

Ticket prices, along with the prices of housing, healthcare and education. It seems the only thing that doesn't outpace inflation is the average worker compensation since the 80s - which is nearly a constant 1:1.

[@andrewmclaughlin2701]

@@jeronimo196 In 1963 the minimum wage was $1.25 or five silver quarters. The melt value today bounces between $22-$25. In 1963 a waitress was paid the true minimum wage and without tips could buy 25 candy bars in exchange for one hour of work. Today a candy bar is $2.00 and the federal minimum wage is less than eight dollars making it impossible to afford four candy bars in exchange for one hour of work. In 1963 tips were not taxed. In 1963 there was not a lesser minimum wage for wait staff. The money is rigged against the worker, everybody shall be overcome by the debt created by the dollar being printed. We live in the most brilliant open-air prison ever created.

[@disciple68]

Didn't Rotten Tomatoes take down negative reviews for some Disney movies? That would significantly effect the results of that scatter chart. Can someone confirm if thats the case?

[@yalhexander5641]

Yes that is the case, they called it a "review bomb" and just removed all the negatives. Crazy that they never say this happens in reverse XD

[@theloneranger8725]

Yes, that's true, but it's not just unique to Disney. All the studios are doing it to attempt to hide just how bad some of their products are. Amazon turned it into an art form to try and hide how horrible the viewing numbers were for The Rings of Power. They actually thought we are that stupid and can't discover the truth.

[@DeFaulty101]

@@yalhexander5641 Which movie?

[@DuelyusSeazer]

Yea they've done this for a tonne of movies. From memory it started with the all-female Ghostbusters

[@Bustermachine]

@@DuelyusSeazer I mean, you can go and check the history of the audience score. It currently sits at 49% and plenty of the negative reviews seem to be from back when the movie was first released.

[@StephanieP-zj3df]

It may just not be wokenness but Disney is Rehashing too many legacy characters and spinoffs and they just don't have any original ideas.The problem with Disney is that they have irrevocably harmed their family friendly brand for no reason at all and I don't think they'll ever get it back.

[@thomasarthur3680]

Can’t help but feel that everyone completely ignores that most of Disneys products are exactly the type of things that less people buy when they have less money during tougher economic times (holidays, theme park visits, movie tickets, streaming services, etc.) and that in one of the larger economic downturns recently profits were always going to be down.

[@emsnewssupkis6453]

Um, yes, that is true BUT the loss of profits began with Disney during an economic UPTURN. It is just much worse now.

[@Theartofhappytravels]

@@ESCght23 As someone from the US, but now lives internationally in different places. No one actually cares if a company is “woke” or not. It’s a U.S. thing.

[@Sahtoovi]

@@ESCght23 of course you call him a "leftie" when he shows you the facts and the facts do not align with your delusions. at least try to look objective. you're just making yourself laughing stock

[@dycedargselderbrother5353]

@@Sahtoovi "Facts" is a little strong. It's subjective analysis, as is virtually all things economics.

[@christophermccullough2280]

Oh dear...... what an over reach.... Its because tomato's are in short supply, is it?..... Excuse me... In times of economic hardship, spending on entertainment goes up, not down, as people seek diversion from reality...... Keep up

[@maddercat]

One thing they're not accounting for also is that theaters are taking half the earnings+marketing, Almost no movies are making money except Top Gun/Barbie/Mario. They're not actually basing this on how profitable the movie actually is but straight budget vs earnings which isn't a good correlation for woke/broke.

[@TLDRbusiness]

I don't disagree, but considering there's no reliable data for these movies marketing budget, it's hard to factor in reliably and accurately. Fortunately, most movies of this scale tend to spend about 50% of their production budget on marketing, so it's likely that all of the movies would cost about 50% more, thus not significantly impacting the trend line

[@liamcollins9183]

​@@TLDRbusinessthe general rule of thumb is 2.5 times the budget you see on wikipedia or box office mojo, to account for the 50% cut that theatres take from ticket sales and a marketing spend of 50% of the budget. If a film has a budget of $100 million, then the studio would typically need to make $250 million at the box office to begin making a profit. Of course studios spend less than this on some films, and much more on others (i.e. Barbie). So when you're looking at a film like Indiana Jones 5, with a massive budget of $300 million (some sources speculate an even higher budget after all the re-shoots), then it needs to make approx. $750 million before Disney can make a profit, of which it's barely earned half, 7 weeks since its release.

[@thalyasylos2745]

@@TLDRbusiness the way I see a lot of people evaluating a movie's profitability is by looking at the box office divided by its budget value. If a movie makes at least 2.5x (250%) of its budget, then it probably breaks even and makes money. While if it makes less than that, it loses money. So that's why it would be interesting to see a version of the graph where the y-axis was the movie-budget/box-office to see how many recent movies crosses this 2.5x profitability threshold.

[@weird-guy]

Most movies no matter the studio is losing money and let’s not to talk about “Hollywood accounting “

[@nobodyknowsforsure]

@@thalyasylos2745 pretty much this is what I wanted to see.

[@bradjasperson134]

I don't mind the gender and or race of a protagonist changing as long as it's interesting, serves the story, and isn't simply pandering. I feel like several of Disney's choices were twisting themselves into knots in order to pander, very much at the expense of the story.

[@THillick]

The difference is conservatives don’t say that you can’t produce what these companies want. Just that we don’t have to engage with it. Unlike “liberals” that demand complete compliance. It really is that simple.