Disney CEO Bob Iger addressed the recent flops at the box office for Marvel movies like “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” and animated Pixar films such as “Lightyear” and “Elemental.”
During Iger’s appearance at the Sun Valley Conference, he called the Disney film’s performance “disappointing,” adding that most of the problem was the decision to offer too much content on the Disney+ streaming service, Variety reported.
“There have been some disappointments,” Iger admitted. “We would have liked some of our more recent releases to perform better. It’s reflective not as a problem from a personnel perspective, but I think in our zeal to basically grow our content significantly to serve mostly our streaming offerings, we ended up taxing our people way beyond — in terms of their time and their focus — way beyond where they had been.”
“Marvel’s a great example of that,” he added. “They had not been in the TV business at any significant level. Not only did they increase their movie output, but they ended up making a number of television series, and frankly, it diluted focus and attention. That is, I think, more of the cause than anything.”
And when it comes to such Pixar flops as “Elemental,” Iger said the COVID-influenced decision to skip theaters and go straight to streaming, which was also the strategy for movies like “Luca” and “Turning Red,” was a mistake.
“That may have created an expectation in the audience that they’re going to eventually be on streaming and probably quickly, and there wasn’t an urgency,” said Iger.
“And then I think there was some, I think you’d have to agree that there were some creative misses, as well,” he added, without specifying further.
The “Ant-Man and the Wasp” sequel was released in February and, to date, has failed to earn $500 million worldwide.
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