Disney Pixar has another bomb on the books with the release of the animated movie, Elio, which underperformed this past weekend at the box office.
The flick, reported to have a massive budget of $150 million plus marketing, only opened to $21 million domestically, with a $35 million worldwide gross. It’s the lowest and worst ever opening for Pixar.
Elio flopping follows Disney Pixar’s latest flops, including Elemental, Onward, and Lightyear. Elemental did go on to have decent legs, which is now what is hoped for Elio, as at least similarly, Elio has a good fan score at Rotten Tomatoes with 91%; however, the critics aren’t too high, with only an 84% Rotten Tomatoes Score. The film also received an “A” CinemaScore.
It should also be noted that Disney Pixar’s failure to continue to resonate with fans follows both Marvel and Star Wars’ continuing to flop with fans. It’s a trend that has been going on at Disney for years. When will it end?
So what happened?
I think the biggest issue with Elio is that nobody had a clue the movie was coming out. I’ll be honest, up until last week, I never even heard of the movie. What’s that say?
Elio also likely got buried by the releases of both How To Train Your Dragon 2, and Lilo & Stitch, which combined brought in $46.7M this weekend.
Along with getting buried by those releases, Elio‘s marketing (again, non-existent) probably got overshadowed by the likes of the upcoming summer blockbusters, which have seen their marketing kick into overdrive, with Jurassic World Rebirth, Superman, and Fantastic Four.
Story-wise, I just watched the final trailer, it appears to be about some Hispanic kid who gets picked on and is handicapped, and he goes to space where he is accepted and finds similar friends.
I’ve seen some outlets call out Hispanics for not showing up, well, they didn’t for Ballerina, and they didn’t for Blue Beetle. Like most people, I don’t think Hispanics go out to self-identity and validate their existence through entertainment; they just want good content.
They didn’t even cast a Hispanic actor in the main role, but Yonas Kibreab, who is apparently Filipino and African-American.
Elio‘s biggest name is Zoe Saldaña, so it’s not like this movie has big names, not that names really matter (Lightyear).
I also think they could have added a subtitle to Elio, maybe something like “Cosmic Adventure” or something similar.
What’s next for Disney Pixar?
With Elio bombing, it seems likely Disney Pixar will be focusing on less original films and more on IPs people are familiar with. Case in point, last year saw Inside Out 2 bring in nearly $1.7 billion.
Toy Story 5 is also in the works, along with Incredibles 3, and Coco 2.
