The reigning king of Hollywood studios, Walt Disney (DIS 1.62%) hasn't been looking very powerful lately. The summer movie season is in full swing, but the company has taken a few big whiffs recently with its big-budget releases.
Might this provide an opportunity for rival Paramount Global (PARA +0.00%) to take the box office throne in this critical period for the film industry? After all, it's got some strong intellectual property (IP) underpinning its summer slate.
The magic fizzles
Entertainment powerhouse Disney got off to a roaring start with its summer blockbusters. Superhero yarn Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, released the first weekend of May, had quite the splashy opening. Across its debut weekend, Guardians ruled the box office, taking in more than $118 million in domestic ticket sales according to film industry tracker Box Office Mojo.
By comparison, the distant No. 2 -- The Super Mario Bros. Movie from Comcast's Universal Pictures -- grossed less than $19 million. Two caveats here: Mario had been released nearly one month previously, and there were no other debuts with the size, scope and marketing muscle of Guardians.
Disney went downhill from there. Its next release was a live-action version of the classic fish (well, fish-human hybrid) tale, The Little Mermaid. The film did OK at the U.S. box office, but its overseas performance fell short. So far, 54% of its nearly $500 million in worldwide gross has come from U.S. ticket sales. Big hits tend to favor markets abroad -- in Guardians' case, the mix has been 58% from overseas and 42% in the U.S.
Finally, Disney's Pixar released its latest CGI animation spectacular, Elemental, in the second-to-last weekend of June. While a charming film stuffed with beautiful imagery and featuring the latest animation magic, it hasn't sufficiently resonated with audiences. It was only the No. 2 box office performer domestically in its opening weekend.
Worse, with its $29.5 million take, it earned the dubious distinction of having the lowest-grossing North American debut in Pixar history. This is a studio known for its monster box-office home runs, so this was clearly a whiff. Meanwhile, so far it's grossed less than $122 million, well short of its reputed $200 million budget.
Robots, turtles, and death-defying stunts
Having two uninspiring releases in a row, of course, doesn't necessarily spell doom for a studio's biggest season. Hollywood history is rife with streaks of pricey flops from studios that later recovered to deliver winners again.
It is concerning in this case, though, as Disney can usually be relied on to hit the audience sweet spot for its big summer releases. Mermaid is well-recognized intellectual property, and the company has historically done well with live-action reworkings of its classic animated titles. Also, as mentioned, Pixar tends to be a reliable audience pleaser.
Generally speaking, neither Mermaid nor Elemental earned glowing reviews -- in contrast to more than a few beloved Pixar classics like Toy Story or Finding Nemo, so that probably had an effect. Also in the case of Mermaid, the animated hit that precedes it was released in 1989; perhaps that's too distant in the past to spur widespread interest with a young audience these days.
Whatever the reasons, Disney's weakness at the box office provides opportunity for another studio to win the summer. Paramount is a good candidate as it has three big-budget films connected to well-known brands.
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Key Data Points
And one has already been a hit: Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, the latest in the historically strong-performing machines-to-robots saga, which hit theaters in mid-June. In its opening weekend it beat a good performer, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, in that film's second week of release, and has marched on to a worldwide gross of over $341 million.
Two others are also new entrants in durable movie franchises. Mission Impossible-Dead Reckoning Part One looks promising as audiences never seem to get enough of Tom Cruise doing crazy stunts while saving the world. That film debuts next month, and in August we'll witness the release of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. This has been a TV/film/toy money-spinning brand since the 1980s.
Haunted franchises?
Of course, one should never count Disney out in the quest for summer multiplex mega-bucks. The remainder of its big releases, however, might not offer great competition.
Yes, it's got Harrison Ford's swan song as the title character in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, opening at the end of June. Yet the early reviews are mixed, and the octogenarian Ford is long past his years as the swashbuckling young blade of the early Indy films.
July release Haunted Mansion is Disney's latest attempt to capitalize on one of its popular theme park attractions as it's done so successfully with the Pirates of the Caribbean series. If a Haunted Mansion movie sounds vaguely familiar, it might be because Disney already tried this with a 2003 version starring Eddie Murphy that didn't perform memorably in theaters.
So if I had to hazard a guess, I'd predict that this won't be a triumphant summer for Disney at the box office. Another studio is more likely to take the crown, and with its decent start and two promising releases yet to hit screens, Paramount has an excellent shot.
