Disney which has made it abundantly clear that it is not afraid to gobble up competitors in the entertainment industry might have taken a bite of something rotten when they picked up 20th Century Fox earlier this year. In their first quarterly review of the new subsidiary, Disney minced no words in saying that the failures of Dark Phoenix and Stuber will weigh heavily in future decisions by the parent company.
Disney CEO Bob Iger mostly kept a professional demeanor but in the context of Hollywood talk, his statement was pretty damning: “The Fox studio performance was well below where it had been and well below where we hoped it would be when we made the acquisition.”
Dayum.
Can’t really fault Iger’s feelings though. It hasn’t been a good year for the new relationship. Stuber was not only a critical flop but barely recouped its shooting and advertising budget. Dark Phoenix received even worse critical remarks and only made 250 million in the box office against its 200 million dollar shooting budget. The only movie that has come out since Disney bought the company and could be measured as a success was Breakthrough, the Christian drama that a computer could have turned out.
The ground was already shaky for the former Fox heads but with this poor of a showing in their first quarter and with the likes of a Will Smith animated comedy and a sorely unneeded Terminator film coming out before the end of the year things aren’t looking any better. If Disney bought Fox just to get their gloved mitts on the Avatar series, they better hope the road to their releases doesn’t cut too deeply.
Fox Feels Pressure after Dark Phoenix and Stuber flops [Variety]
