Unlike the release of Mulan, The Mandalorian, and Pixar’s Soul, Disney+ gained no meaningful boost in new subscribers from Disney Premier Access for Raya. In fact, the total number of purchases made for Premier Access has dropped by 30% compared to the initial sales generated by the release of Mulan. Again, Raya and the Last Dragon was a financial disaster, and instead of blaming the film’s subtle Woke messaging, Disney blamed COVID.
Encanto was the next Disney animated feature. Like Raya and the Last Dragon, the production cost for the feature was $120 to $150 million. Encanto earned close to $231 million in total ($96 million domestic), which is considered both a critical and financial success. What happened? So maybe Lee’s new woke crew are geniuses? Not so fast. Because Encanto was a musical, it required a longer production time than Raya and the Last Dragon. Its production took five years, as Raya took three. Lasseter was still in charge during half of its production. He had his hand-picked creative team running it all. By the time he was fired, the story was locked down, and the songs were in place. The production of Encanto was like a high-speed train, with the pandemic barely slowing it down.
Most critics, along with the youthful audience, agree that the film’s success is due primarily to Lin-Manuel Miranda’s catchy sing-along-style songs. (My child still makes me play its soundtrack on long trips.) I also credit the beautiful location and dynamic character design. In other words, the production was an unstoppable force that remained immune and untouched by Lee’s incoming DEI recruits.
“..Strange World as it would be [Lee’s] first film with her fingerprints and her new ‘reimagined’ agenda all over it.”
Riding high on the success of Encanto comes Strange World. Let me be clear: many sources tell me that Jennifer Lee and her crew were incredibly optimistic about the success that would soon be Strange World as it would be the first film with Lee’s fingerprints all over it. With this new crew of activist millennials and hand-picked writers and directors in place, Strange World would be the start of DEI-sney’s new slate of socially conscious films for children.
Raya “co-writer” Qui Nguyen returned on his sophomore venture to both write and direct Strange World, once again under the supervision of veteran animation director Don Hall. According to Variety, under Lee’s leadership, the production cost of Strange World ballooned to $180 million. It also marked new territory, story-wise, for Disney Animation. Of course, we already talked about the absence of a villain unless you consider Climate Change a villain. But, now was its environmental story that served as an allegory of our catastrophic reliance on fossil fuels. Who needs energy anyway… and everyone lived happily ever after.
Meanwhile, up in Emeryville, Pixar had been secretly slipping LGBT characters into the background of its films. In Toy Story 4, there was a pair of lesbian mommies picking up their kids. Onward had a self-identifying lesbian cop. Lastly, Lightyear featured a lesbian commander, Alisha, who had a pregnant wife and featured Pixar’s first same-sex kiss.
[…] Part 4 describes the new storytelling mandates put in place not only at Walt Disney Animation but also at Pixar, Star Wars, and Marvel. Lee’s first feature film with her complete stamp of approval from start to finish was Strange World, which leaned heavily into producing an environmental allegory with a gay teen love story. Audiences stayed home for this one. Tanking at the box office, Lee responded, “This is a bummer, but the ‘message’ is important, and we will press on with it.” And press on they did, which brings us to Wish. […]
[…] like in Hollywood and comic books, feminists used harassment and discrimination allegations to gain power in the […]
I’m currently reading teh 20 year old Mickey Mouse Mystery Magazine. Italian, and Mickey playing PI in a noir kind of city. It’s great, and adapting it for D+ would probably work. They’re not going to do it, though, because it’s not woke.
I am always confused by the marketing of these movies. Do they dry run them to identify the market? Do they understand their audience? Do they have data to suggest that the LGBT… community are drawn to these kinds of films? Or is that that they have no idea and are on a crusade to save us from ourselves?
Do you think that MovieBob is going to throw a hissy fit about this, becoming so irate that he skips second lunch in order to defend the honor of a company that currently produces the lowest brow entertainment for mid-40s virgins in the world?
Make a good movie with a good plot. If you want to make a message movie, then release it to the population it was made for. Do NOT release it and try to force the general public to like it by calling them names, misogynist, homophobic, transphobic. Look up the cycle Victim, Victimizer, Victim. That is what Disney created.
Great article as always. Thank you! ありがとう ございます
These insider insights are exclusive here. Congratulations, Film Threat. David takes on Goliath, once again.
Real gay people (not the pretenders created by propaganda making it trendy), make up less than 4% of the population; and those people are much less likely to have children/families. It is no wonder traditional families and people find this alienating and unappealing. I know everyone I talk with is sick of having this endless gay parade shoved in their faces, while they are told how wonderful being gay is. If everyone was ‘queer’ then humanity would die out.
I recall certain people saying the reason Strange World didn’t do well was -because- the advertising budget was slashed. I wonder if it’s just to have something else to blame or if it was a legitimate factor.
I think ‘Strange World’ and other films that include LGBTQIA relationships and other polarizing themes would be much less controversial if they received the PG-13 rating at minimum so at least parents know there will be mature themes present.
That is an EXCELLENT idea that I’ve never thought of. As a former Democrat turned independent with 2 small children, I now read ever single review of every movie before I take my kids. For the past couple years, I’ve been taking my 11 year old to Tom Cruise flicks, Chris Nolan rereleased (Batman Trilogy and Interstellar) and things like Godzilla Minus One (her first fully subtitled film) and she loves it! We have fun together and she gets to fall in love with the cinema like I did as a child. She’s very mature for her age, but that is an option for some preteens and teens.