To the surprise of absolutely no one save the most die-hard and delusional of the franchise’s dwindling fanbase, the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s most recent entry, The Marvels, has been revealed to have been not only the worst performing film of 2023, but also a more than $200 million dollar sinkhole USD for the already-financially-embattered Disney.
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This confirmation of the Marvel sequel’s crash landing was provided by Deadline‘s Anthony D’Alessandro as part of their Most Valuable Blockbuster tournament, an annual feature wherein the outlet compares the financial results of the previous years’ cinematic releases, as relayed to them “by seasoned and trusted sources,” to see which film was the best performing among audiences.
Sadly for Disney, in confirmation of just how far their quality has fallen, of the 15 films released by the House of Mouse and its subsidiaries – Ant-Man and the Wasp Quantumania, Chevalier, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, The Little Mermaid, The Boogeyman, Elemental, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Theater Camp, Haunted Mansion, A Haunting in Venice, The Creator, The Marvels, Next Goal Wins, Wish, Poor Things (though they also released the indie film All of Us Strangers, it was only given a limited theatrical screening in just four theaters, and thus is not being formally counted in this analysis) – only one of them managed to place in the tournament’s top ten, with the third and final outing for James Gunn’s take on Marvel’s band of space-heroes-slash-bounty hunters coming in as the ninth most profitable film of the year.
Meanwhile, four of the above releases ended up placing in the tournament’s bottom five, with Haunted Mansion, Wish, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, Warner Bros. Discovery’s The Flash, and The Marvels walking away from the competition as ‘The Worst Performing Films of The Year’.
To this end, while previous box office reports have confirmed that The Marvels was an absolute disaster for the studio – its theatrical run was the lowest performing of the entire franchise – it was not until Deadline spoke to their aforementioned sources that the true extent of the film’s failure was truly known.
Per Deadline, The Marvels pulled in a total of $218 million in revenue, with roughly $88 million of this pull coming from its theatrical ticket sales (a total reached after subtracting theater fees from its $206.1 millin world wide gross), $40 million from its home video sales, and $90 million from its various streaming releases.
However, in light of its expenses amounting to $455 million – $270 million from reported production costs, $110 million from print and advertising spending, $21 million from residuals and other distribution expenses, and $54 million from interest and overhead – the film ultimately cost the studio a net total of $237 million.
As for the other Disney films on Deadline’s bottom five, Haunted Mansion reportedly lost the company $117 million, Wish said ‘good-bye’ to $131 million, and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny burned an impressive $143 million.
Suffice to say, unless a significant creative reboot is undertaken throughout all of Disney’s studios, the House of Mouse is unlikely to pull themselves out of this significant monetary hole any time soon.
Unfortunately, given the recent rumors that Marvel’s upcoming X-Men reboot will focus on the team’s female members and that their Fantastic Four outing will gender swap the Silver Surfer, it looks like Disney is going to be on its financial backfoot for the foreseeable future.
Disney’s next release, Deadpool & Wolverine, is on track to portal its way into theaters on July 26th.