Over the summer, a lot of fuss was made when Pixar’s animated film Elemental failed to immediately take off at the box office. Conservatives declared victory in the “Go woke, go broke” war. There were some think pieces about whether or not Disney+ and streaming services were taking families away from actually seeing kids movies in theaters, yada, yada, yada. But, plot twist: Elemental made a comeback and ended up not only doing very well at the box office, but also became one of Disney+’s most streamed movies of the year. Disney’s newest animated film, Wish seems to be following a similar trajectory to Elemental.
Wish was released in theaters last week, on November 22. Wish stars Ariana DeBose as the main character, Asha. It also features the voices of Best Chris, Chris Pine, Alan Tudyk, Natasha Rothwell, Victor Garber, Angelique Cabral, and Jennifer Kumiyama. The plot centers around 17-year-old Asha, who makes a wish upon a star to save her community from the villain, King Magnifico (Pine). Just like Elemental, Wish didn’t have a strong opening weekend. Unlike Elemental, which was favored by both critics and viewers, Wish is the first Disney movie in two decades to be certified “rotten” on Rotten Tomatoes. As of right now, it has a 50% approval rating by critics, but an 81% audience score.
Disney’s new animated film, Wish, just dropped into theaters this week, and the first opinions of viewers aren’t fairing well for the new movie. Rotten Tomatoes shows only 50 percent approval on the Tomatometer, officially placing Wish in the “rotten” category, for now.
The last time Disney produced a “rotten” animated film was nearly 20 years ago when the company released Chicken Little. Rotten Tomatoes shows that Chicken Little is extremely “rotten” with only a 37 percent rating on the Tomatometer.
However, the audience score for Disney’s newest film shows that there may yet be hope for Wish, as it stands at 82 percent positive thus far. It’s still early for Disney’s newest feature film, and the production company plans for Wish to be a competitor this Black Friday weekend.
On its first day in theaters, Disney’s Wish brought in $8.3 million, and it is expected to bring in around $45 million on its opening weekend. Though $45 million may not sound too shabby, it’s not nearly enough of a success when the budget for the film sits around $200 million.
Currently, Disney’s Wish is fighting for the spotlight against Napoleon and The Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. The good news for the movie is that it is one of the top three movies in theaters this holiday weekend.
We will probably take my kids to see this movie sometime over the next two weeks. We live across the street from our local cinema and like to do Sunday matinees as a family whenever there is a kids’ or family movie out. (Side note: Seeing Back to the Future in theaters last month was *awesome.*) If we hadn’t been traveling to see family for the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, we may very well have ended up going to see it. But we were out doing extended-family things, so we didn’t go. I suspect that this was the case with a lot of families with young children. Plus, I bet streaming services like Disney+ do have somewhat of an impact on theater-going. Plenty of kids don’t like or can’t handle going to the movies. Add in how expensive it can get, why bother with the stress and the expense when you can just stay home and watch something on the app that you’re already paying for each month? I’ll be interested to see if Wish makes a similar box office comeback as Elemental did, especially now that we’re about to settle into the winter-weather months.
photos credit: Cat Morley / Avalon and via Instagram and YouTube
I loved Elemental. I saw it on the app because we only got the dubbed version in cinemas which is great for kids but adults are used to watching films in their original languages
I have zero desire to see this movie. i dont know if the strike affected its promotion strategy, or if Disney just didnt know how to market it, but I asked my boys about seeing it and they just shrugged and I dont really feel I need to see it (if I wanted to see it, they would go with me.)
I will be interested to see how it does going forward.
Same. I have zero desire to see this one and I did not like Elemental. I say this as a huge Disney nerd who goes to the theme parks multiple times per year. I just don’t like the movies Disney has been producing these last few years.
I had zero desire to see it but needed something to do with my niece. She won’t watch anything if it looks scary and so she’s only been to the movies once before. She grudgingly agreed to see it so I was pretty excited to have the experience of just going to the theater with her. And it was fine. The main character’s voice work was great. It wasn’t terrible but it wasn’t omg amazing either. Idk it’s hard to pinpoint. There were some cute elements but it felt surface.
I just watched the trailer & still don’t know what it’s about. It has some great Disney animation touches & humor, but I’m still not seeing the point of the story, or what the story is exactly.
I’m saddened by the fact that many will see the underperformance of Wish (and Marvels, last month) to mean that people don’t want to see women and BIPoC as lead characters. But it seems to me that the strike hurt a lot of productions. Disney should’ve pushed this release to the holiday break, when most people are off and looking for things to do.
Make a great movie and they will show up. A different Studio but Barbie blew out the box office so strong female leads is not the issue. It’s a bad script and Marvel just pushing out content and expect people to show up. Marvel has had a string of flops since phase three ended. It’s not the women or BIPoC that’s the issue. It’s Kevin Feige shadow directing every movie and Nia DaCosta being boxed out creatively with The Marvels.
On the bright side for The Marvels Iman Vellani who played Kamala is getting a glow up as the bright spot in the movie. Hope we see more of her in future movies.
So Marvel is just pushing out stuff when their movies are now becoming more diverse and are finally receiving award recognition. You must have missed Thor 1 & 2, Iron Man 2, and Ant Man 1 & 2. Those films were watchable but were far from being great films. The hate for the current slate of Marvel films is coming mainly from incels who are only happy when the stories are centered around white men.
@Ignoto
You are on the mark. The Marvels was a good film in my opinion. Really enjoyed it.
Incels and other angry males love to shit on anything that’s diverse. You already mentioned a few Marvel films that were bad from the white-men only era. There are more in that category that I thought were either meh or just okay and that I enjoyed less than the Marvels. Examples: Iron Man 3, Captain America 1, the Avengers, Age of Ultron. Captain America 3 had one outstanding fight but that was about it for that movie.
Yet all those movies were guaranteed box office hits.
Now, I understand if people don’t like the genre at all or never liked it, but acting as if all the movies pre-Endgame were that great is disingeneous. We all know why that hate is fashionable now: ‘too much’ diversity.
They try to bully anyone who enjoys a movie like the Marvels, implying or outright saying we must be silly and not understand how great movies are made. Meanwhile they fawn over every movie made by ‘respected’ directors that 9 out of 10 times are about white men.
I watched the Marvels and thought it was great fun! I was smiling through most of the movie.
I hope more people will support it. We need to see women-led movies and it was great to see such a positive depiction of a Muslim family too.
Men complain about cancelculture, while the majority of them boycott women-led media (except they call it ‘no interest in’) as a given.
Also, women-led movies tend to get worse reviews than male-led movies, and they love to pile on the bad reviews in their glee of hating anything led by women. Particurlarly when the genre is a male dominated one.
Yes, implicit bias is real. The “make a good movie and people will show” fails to understand that basic principle. I, too, loved the Marvels–I cackled at the flerkin scenes. And the “normal” depiction of a Muslim family (just living and loving each other) was great to see.
The flerkin stuff was very funny. Also enjoyed the concept of them switching places a lot. Kamala’s family brought even more funny scenes 🙂
Not to mention the singing planet, ahahah.
If the movie is not good why should people waste their money in going to see it? Disney should do better.
The Marvels is the first MCU movie not to break 100 million. Also, this isn’t about just the Marvels like I said. Disney and MCU has had a string of flops.
If your male toxicity, male hate, male aggression, male our movie not yours worked.
Then Dr. Strange Madness Mulitverse (too many words) Ant Man 3 and Indiana Jones white, male lead action movies. Should have been box office mega hits. And they flopped at the box office.
It’s great you loved the movie. Sing its praises!!
But it’s a bigger problem and something is not working and crap movies being churned out when there were amazing movies being made 10-11 years ago. People want great movies in all shapes and sizes. But deflecting blame is not the answer. Make better movies!!
We took the kids over the thanksgiving weekend and everyone clapped in the theater when the movie was done. I was surprised by that. It’s crazy how audience scores are so different from professional reviews
Legitimately one of the worst kid’s movies I’ve ever suffered through. Plot was a mess, and light to begin with. Even the younger kids in my group were asking – what??? – genuinely boring in places. Lacked cohesion. It was like ChatGPT took all the elements of a Disney movie and threw them in a blender. It deserves the bad reviews.
Just like said in the post, i personally almost never go to the theaters anymore, cause most movies are streaming pretty fast. I go to movies maybe 1-2 a year now, i saw Barbie in theaters, and probs are gonna go to see Killers of the flower moon in theater too.
The only movie I went to this year was Barbie and I saw it at the drive-in. I don’t miss the movie theatre experience at all.
This movie was an incoherent, jumbled mess of all things Disney. Pretty certain this is what happens when you get budget AI to write a screenplay.
We saw Wish on Saturday. My son requested it for his 10th birthday. We went to a matinee and a family of four, it was less than $40.
Unrelated but the previews felt unbearably loud. I nearly covered my ears and felt very old, LOL. Luckily the movie itself wasn’t turned up to volume 1000.
I thought it was cute? The music was great and their voices were strong. It felt bereft of any particular culture at all, unlike say, Encanto or Moana, or even Frozen. The main character being of African descent was nice to see. Saying all that, it felt VERY “in the Disney universe” like it could sit adjacent to ANY other Disney movie and there would be connections. I thought it was a good movie. It was imaginative, brought a sense of wonder, and also a strong main female character.
I don’t think it’s the best movie Disney has ever made, but we sure enjoyed it. My kids wanted to watch it again that evening at home, and my son has been playing the soundtrack non-stop. I don’t think it deserves a “Rotten” review. I have for sure watched way worse animated films.
My daughter is six and has seen it twice because she loved it so much, so it is hitting the target audience.
The biggest issue for me is I found the songs immediately forgettable, I could not tell you a single hook like I could after a single viewing of Encanto, Frozen or even Moana.
The plot was fine but seemed cluttered with secondary and tertiary characters which meant the questions about the main characters never got answered. No one seemed fleshed out as a character, even Asha or king who were supposed to be the leads. I was left wanting to know more and it felt long but too short at the same time.
It was just fine in the end.
A bit of topic: 200 million budget? I wonder how much of it was paid to those famous actors?
I feel really sorry for the voice actors because nowadays it seems every animation film & TV animation series is having known big name actor doing voice over. Not just one big name to carry the show, it’s several. Imaging the budget alone spending on those actors.
Case in point – Planet Earth III. Being on BBC & PBS, it should have their usual audience tone in. The viewing number won’t be bad. The production could get a good voice actor does the series but they went with David Tennant. I love David but just don’t think he’s the best choice for it. Others might disagree and it’s fine, we all have our own point of view. Just feel for the voice actors & audio book narrartors. Do they have an union?
The only “big name” actor I recognized on this movie was Chris Pine. Everyone was great, but I didn’t go see it for any of them on this particular film. Maybe I just don’t know who they are!
@Abby Ariana DeBose is an Oscar winner. Also Alan Tudyk I recognize but he is a prolific character actor who has successfully crossed over into voice acting. I don’t recognize the rest.
Thanks @Sass! I haven’t seen any of the films Ariana has been in, other than Hamilton (I have only seen the filmed version, once), so I didn’t recognize her. I do know Alan Tudyk–I feel like he’s basically a voice actor these days!
@Abby no worries! Yeah he’s definitely become a well known voice actor!
Was this a royal article? I didnt recognize this website for once
Lmao! One out of 16 ain’t bad
LOL. I don’t even care about this topic all that much, just honking (commenting) for non-royal content.
*claps*
My girls are 8 and 10 and they have zero desire to see it, nor do I. We’re looking forward to the third Trolls movie and have been watching the two Spiderverse movies on repeat. Other animation studios are just doing way more interesting stuff these days. We love everything from Sony studios.
I took 5 kids ages 5-11 last week. I really enjoyed it, the story didn’t feel like a repeat with different characters like so many kids movies. The music was good, animation beautiful. However…. it wasn’t composed by Lin Manuel and it shows, none of the songs sat with me like in his other movies. Also, the plot point was complicated and I did have to explain to the younger kids why the wishes mattered so much.
I’m relieved LMM isn’t a part of this one tbh. His style is unique – unique enough that it’s obvious when he’s had a hand in something and that takes me out of the experience. I think he’s oversaturated at this point and I’m fine with a Disney film not having him every now and then. That said I do love his work overall. (I didn’t care for Encanto)
Agree @Sass. I can always recognize a LMM musical at this point, so it was nice for them to change it up. I loveeee his stuff, but I don’t want every single musical to have the same sound.
Sad to hear this. My daughter, her bff, and I had been looking forward to this since we saw the trailer in theaters over the summer. We will likely still go see it, maybe lower expectations will help us enjoy it more 🤣
I so wanted to see this and it’s infuriating that in a movie with diversity they blatantly put very little effort into the screenplay – after reading reviews and seeing the trailer I sadly don’t want to spend money on it
It was very cute and delightful! It’s not incredibly deep which is why I’m surprised everyone is complaining about an overwrought story and tertiary characters. It’s a cute story about a teenage girl and finding your voice with the crux of the movie set in standing up for what’s right. It’s not a revolutionary Disney movie, but it is beautifully animated and has the cutest sidekicks I can think of in recent kids’ movie memory… it was fine. Also, I love that Disney stories aren’t revolving around love, men, handsome princes, etc. this is a sweet story with a smart and strong girl of color as the hero, and some cute friends and jokes thrown in… I don’t see why everyone is having a meltdown with these reviews. I thought it was darling and well worth the 40$ for popcorn and matinee tickets.
That little goat is sure cute!
This movie was adorable, unproblematic, fun, sweet, endearing, and I think has the potential to become a classic 15-20 years from now. People are very much overthinking it. My 7 year old absolutely loved it. It was super cute. It’s a warm cuddly hug of a movie. Just super cute and lovely. Well worth 40$ for popcorn and two matinee tickets, imo. It does have summer vibes somewhat though and might benefit from a summer re-release or something(?)
I am shocked that Chicken Little has a rotten score. It is fun! Also The Marvels is terrific fun. I blame misogyny for the bad press.
My kids (middle schoolers) absolutely LOVE going to the movies, and, as a former film critic, I’m always happy to take them. When they were younger we would go see absolutely everything that was remotely of interest to them. But the price has gone up so much over the last few years… At this point, if my family of five is going to spend close to $100 to go see a movie, it’s not going to be something that looks like a derivative snooze, which this does. If we even had any interest in seeing it, we’d just watch it on Disney plus in a couple of months.
@Flamingo,
Dr. Strange MOM made nearly 1 billion dollars. It was far from being a box office flop. Guardians of the Galaxy 3 and Thor 4 were also very successful. Marvel (Disney) has been getting a lot of hate from incels because their films are featuring a more diverse cast which is why you’ll see the slogan “Go Woke, Go Broke” being echoed by incels on X and YouTube. It’s certainly not the quality when finally the films are being considered and receiving awards something that would have been considered a joke in the early years of the franchise. In my previous comment I provided a list of mediocre films from the first Phase. From cohesive storytelling to the VFX the films that Marvel is currently making are much better. The difference between then and now is that a lot of the heroes are brown people and women.