THB #439: Don't Cry For Disney, Box Office Guessers

I wrote about Disney each of the last 2 weeks and I was ready to stop for a while… but other media continues to insist on promoting a level of drama around the failure of Wish and the theatrical market in general that is so deeply misguided, that I feel compelled to offer some (more) factual perspective. I will try to keep it clean and clear. (I always want to say, “brief,” but who am I kidding?)

It’s A Small World… that water’s cold!

There are now 895 movies that have grossed $200 million worldwide or more.

641 of the 895 titles have been released in the last 20 years. 175 more were in the decade before that (1994-2003). Of the 79 films that reached that $200 million mark before 1994, only 42 grossed $300 million or more. Those were huge, huge hits in their day.

The $500 million standard is, obviously, more rarefied. 237 titles in all.

The first $500 million worldwide grosser in first release was Jurassic Park in 1993, all of 30 years ago.

Disney’s first $500 million grosser in first release was The Lion King, in 1994.

The first billion dollar grosser in first release was Titanic, in 1997.

Disney’s second $500 million worldwide grosser in first release ($554m) was Armageddon in 1998.

Monsters, Inc at cracked the $500 million worldwide mark for Disney in 2001.

The Disney signs of massive box office success really kicked off in 2003, with Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl and Finding Nemo both clearing the $500 million bar.

But after that, they went 5 of 6 years with “only” 1 $500 million grosser a year, 3 Pixar films, a Pirates sequel, and The Chronicles of Narnia: LWW (which was paid for mostly by Walden Media). 2007 was the exception with both Ratatouille and Pirates 3 cracking $500m

Then, in 2010, a breakthrough… 3 $500 million+ grossers… Tangled, Alice in Wonderland, and Toy Story 3… in the same year. Alice and T3 both grossed over $1 billion.

2011 delivered Cars 2 and Pirates 4.

That’s the history of big-number Disney box office… and then Marvel and Star Wars landed.

In 2012, The Avengers - after a costly deal to move distribution away from Paramount - became Disney’s biggest grosser to date. Over $1.5 billion in first release. Also that year, Pixar’s Brave.

2013 - Thor: The Dark World and the Pixar sequel, Monsters University were both over $500m… but Iron Man 3 and Frozen were both over $1.2 billion. There were 12 $500m grossers that year… 4 were from Disney.

2014 - Another year with 4 titles over $500 million (Big Hero 6, Captain America: the Winter Soldier, Maleficent, Guardians of the Galaxy), though none hit a billion. Cue the first “Is Disney slipping?” stories.

2015 - Disney wasn’t slipping. We were still not at Peak Disney, but there were 5 $500m+ titles, showing Disney range. Ant-Man and Avengers 2 from Marvel, Inside Out from Pixar, live-action remake Cinderella, and the massive debut of Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens… the new biggest Disney release ever. $5.4 billion these 5 titles alone.

“People still don’t want to go to the movies… those kids!!!… just because they like Spider-Man doesn’t mean they like comicbook characters!”

2016 - SEVEN $500m+ grossers, but this time, Disney had the Top 5 movies of the year with Captain America: Civil War, Rogue One, Finding Dory, and Zootopia all passing $1 billion and the live/CG Jungle Book just under. Disney Animation was soaring, with Moana also landing and Marvel got in Doctor Strange (my favorite MCU film), but it “only” did $678 million. Total for these 7 films, $6.6 billion.

But this was still not Peak Disney.