No surprise, but Disney officially confirms that the Rachel Zegler Snow White and Marvel’s Captain America: Brave New World movies are big fails at the box office.
Snow White has only brought in $200 million on a budget reported to be north of $270 million. Ditto for Captain America: Brave New World which has only brought in $400 million and change, with reports the budget is actually around $300 million or more.
Disney confirms flops
Disney released its quarterly earnings report on Wednesday. In its “Entertainment” section, Disney admitted that both Snow White, which stars the controversial Rachel Zegler, and Captain America: Brave New World, which replaces Cap with Anthony Mackie, flopped:
Theatrical distribution results were comparable to the prior-year quarter, as the carryover performance of first quarter releases, Mufasa: The Lion King and Moana 2, was largely offset by the results of second quarter releases, Snow White and Captain America: Brave New World, including the costs of their initial marketing campaigns. There were no significant titles released the prior-year quarter.
What does the Disney report say?
To explain the report, what the report from Disney says is that overall theatrical results were “comparable” to the same quarter last year — not better, despite releasing two major titles this quarter (Snow White and Captain America: Brave New World).
The report reveals that the box office performance from earlier hits like Mufasa: The Lion King and Moana 2 helped, but those gains were “largely offset” by the results of Snow White and Captain America: Brave New World.
“Offset” means that the financial gains from earlier movies (Mufasa and Moana 2) were effectively canceled out or reduced by the weaker performance and high costs of Snow White and Captain America: Brave New World.
So even though Disney made money from the earlier films, the disappointing box office and marketing expenses of Snow White and Cap 4 neutralized those profits, resulting in overall theatrical results that were just “comparable” to the previous year — which had no major releases.
Disney specifically mentions the costs of their initial marketing campaigns, suggesting those costs were not recovered by strong ticket sales of Snow White and Captain America: Brave New World.
Again, the report also notes that the previous year had no significant releases, so even with two big-budget films this year (Snow White and Captain America: Brave New World), Disney didn’t outperform that low baseline.
Disney is indirectly admitting Snow White and Cap 4 flopped relative to expectations, especially considering their marketing spend.
