When Disney first purchased the Star Wars brand, the company did so in hopes of extending its market reach. Thanks to its iconic Disney princesses and other “girl brands,” the company had a firm grasp on female audiences. Marvel and Star Wars specifically were purchased to help Disney bring in more “boy” audiences.
Internally, this was well-understood. Purportedly, in 2015, an anonymous Disney employee admitted to the company allocating fewer resources toward promoting Marvel and Lucasfilm to female audiences. They weren’t the target. At least not back then.
Largely, in the nearly ten years since then, Disney’s Star Wars projects have largely leaned away from that tact, instead opting to go for more of a unisex and even female-first audience. Four of the five theatrical Disney-Star Wars releases (“The Force Awakens,” “The Last Jedi,” “The Rise of Skywalker” and “Rogue One”) have all featured central female protagonists. Another female-focused movie, the upcoming Rey prequel, will star a female character and be directed by a feminist activist as well.
Based on a recent report from Forbes, perhaps Disney should have stuck to the original plan.
The report, published Sunday, reveals that the Disney-Star Wars box office profits have failed to make up for the cost of purchasing Lucasfilm (the company behind Star Wars).
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Disney bought Lucasfilm for $4 billion, but the net box office profits from Star Wars films have only been $1.2 billion, and that’s not even factoring in the cost of marketing those films. The latest Indiana Jones film — another Lucasfilm property — likely lost the company a significant sum of money at the box office as well, driving those profits down even further.
On the television front, the Star Wars brand isn’t looking much better.
Though, as Forbes noted, the incredibly popular first season of “The Mandalorian” saw a surge in Disney plus subscribers, later seasons of the sow and its spinoffs have failed to bring in nearly as much viewership or critical acclaim.
The report goes on to imply that Disney may have recently misled its investors about the success of its Star Wars properties.
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The company sent a 67-page presentation to stockholders in March to boast of its Star Wars successes.
According to the presentation, Disney made a 2.9 times return on the property thanks to merchandise, DVD and Blu Ray sales and box office returns.
But the $4 billion Lucasfilm purchase wasn’t factored into the equation. In fact, according to Forbes, the calculation isn’t of profits, but rather just revenue generated. So various costs that went into each of these endeavors weren’t properly accounted for.
Also thrown into the supposed 2.9 times return on investment was projected sales of Star Wars merchandise over the next ten years.
Suffice it to say, Disney had to play around with its numbers quite a bit to justify their business practices to stockholders.
Now the Forbes calculation isn’t perfect either. As noted by the report’s author, it doesn’t account for the undoubtedly “huge profits Disney makes on the Star Wars merchandise, DVDs and Blu Rays,” nor does it account for the monumental marketing costs that go towards its movies, nor the operating costs of its parks or streaming shows.
All that said, Disney thought Star Wars was going to be a sure bet.
If the declining state of its shows and movies is of any indication, that is in no way the case today.
