There Seems to be No Limit to What Disney Can Screw Up

The animated Disney film, The Little Mermaid (1989) was one of the most successful pieces of intellectual property that Disney has ever created. In terms of merchandising and everything downstream from there, it was a home-run. That means that the live-action remake should have been a no-brainier. Except of course, that Disney had to change EVERYTHING about the film, including the soundtrack. Why? Because reasons, and you are racist/misogynistic/whatever for even QUESTIONING the changes that they made.

How much did that rap song cost to write, to film, and to animate? Did they achieve anything except making meme fodder for the internet?

Anyway, I really love the financial side of the movie industry. And so we have the following from Forbes: Disney Sinks $300 Million Into ‘Over Budget’ ‘Little Mermaid’ Movie.

Disney has revealed that the cost of making the live action version of its classic cartoon The Little Mermaid swelled to nearly $300 million by the end of August last year, eight months before the movie opened.

The colossal cost blows its estimated budget out of the water. Variety forecast that the movie had "a $250 million production budget" and there is good reason why it sailed past that.

Say that again: Disney spent $300 million on production as of August 2022, nearly a year before the movie was released. That doesn't include $1 of marketing. Posters. Ads. Trailers. What do you think they spent on marketing?

So they couldn't break even on their most profitable legacy IP. They may have even damaged that IP, since it will take some time for people to forget the live-action abomination. What do you think their chance of breaking even on Snow Off-white and the Seven Portland Baristas is? Slim or none? Then there is Bambi, which they are planning to "remake, for a modern audience." Which means that they are planning to remove the death of Bambi's mother from the film because reasons. I'm sure that will be a success. Or maybe not.

This is Valiant Renegade's video The Little Mermaid 2023 - How Much Disney REALLY SPENT & LOST

Even Forbes, which has some of the best reporting on Disney, is trying to cover for them in some articles, but the Truth is that EVERY division of Disney has lost its way. The Parks are pushing Woke agenda, even though families are staying away. Marvel is a joke, Lucasfilm is dead. Pixar is a hollowed out shell of its former self.