Disney’s ‘Wish’ Swallowed Up By ‘Hunger Games’ And Conquered by ‘Napoleon’

The Walt Disney Studios had such high hopes for Wish (2023). Or, to be more precise, Disney really needed a hit to change the narrative. It has been a bad year for Disney, and to celebrate Disney Animation Studios’ 100th Anniversary, it was looking for Wish to be a culmination of all they’ve learned in that time. But now, it appears that Wish is not meeting Disney’s expectations and will continue the disappointing year for Disney.

Related: The Reviews For Disney’s ‘Wish’ Are In and They’re…Not Great

With the Thanksgiving weekend numbers coming in, it appears that Wish will come in third place with an underwhelming $31.7 million over the five days. The prequel Hunger Games: Songbirds and Snakes (2023) came in first in its second weekend of release with $42 million. But the surprise of the Thanksgiving weekend was Ridley Scott’s epic Napoleon (2023). The historical drama barely took second place with $32.5 million.

With Wish costing more than $200 million to produce, it appears that Disney Studios could be in for another multi-million dollar loser this year. Disney hopes that Wish could have a similar run to Pixar’s Elemental (2023), which started slowly but grossed more than $500 million at the worldwide box office. But while Elemental had good word of mouth and reviews, Wish hasn’t been so lucky.

Disney Owned Thanksgiving

Before Covid, Disney owned the Thanksgiving weekend, but it has spelled doom in the past two years. In the five-day Thanksgiving break, Disney released Coco (2017), which grossed $71 million; Ralph Breaks the Internet (2019), which grossed $84.6 million; and Frozen II (2019), which grossed $123.7 million on its way to more than $1 billion.

But then came Covid, and last year, Disney released Strange World (2022) over Thanksgiving weekend, which only brought home $18.9 million at the box office. Strange World and Lightyear (2022) started Disney’s downward slide at the box office. And that slide has continued with some of Disney’s priciest films this year.

Related: Disney Movies Are Failing, Can Bob Iger Save Them? 

Disney desperately needed Wish to break its losing streak this year. With massive flops like Haunted Mansion (2023), Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023), Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023), and The Marvels (2023), Disney could be on the hook for more than $1 billion in loses. The latter had the worst opening weekend for a Marvel Studios film and the largest drop in box office ever for a Marvel film.

But Wish was supposed to change all that. Disney returned to its winning formula with a “traditional” story and a classic villain. There are more than 100 classic Disney Easter Eggs throughout the film. But even that doesn’t seem to be moving audiences.

There are several reasons that Disney films have flopped lately. Audiences have grown used to waiting for movies to come out on Disney Plus and would rather not spend the money at theaters when it arrives in their homes in months. Disney’s jump into the political arena has alienated some of its fans. And finally, the movies just haven’t been that good lately. Whatever the reason, Disney needs to fix it now.

Wish stars Ariana DeBose as Asha, Chris Pine as King Magnifico, and Alan Tudyk as Valentino. The Disney movie was written by Jennifer Lee, Allison Moore, and Chris Buck. Lee is responsible for the Frozen series. It is still in theaters.

We will continue to update this story at Disney Fanatic.