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   From: sick.companies@disney.com   
      
   Taking time out of his busy schedule running Disney, Bob Iger flew to the   
   Cannes film festival in support of Harrison Ford’s latest movie, even   
   posting on social media snapshots of the aging action hero on the red   
   carpet.   
      
   Lucasfilm Ltd. had just premiered the fifth installment in its Indiana   
   Jones franchise and a lot is riding on the fedora-sporting, bullwhip-   
   toting archeologist portrayed by the now 80-year-old Hollywood star. At   
   nearly $300 million, Dial of Destiny is one of the most expensive films   
   ever made and initial reviews suggest it could bomb big at the box office   
   when it lands on June 30.   
      
   When Iger acquired Lucasfilm for just over $4 billion a decade ago, it   
   paired the century-old animation company with the studio behind Star Wars   
   and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Yet the match made in heaven now risks   
   becoming an albatross around Disney’s neck.   
      
   The third Skywalker trilogy started off with a bang in late 2015 with The   
   Force Awakens, only to end with a whimper four years later as fans   
   deserted the franchise. The studio hadn’t produced a theatrical release of   
   any kind since, allowing the Marvel Cinematic Universe—despite recent   
   setbacks—to supplant it as Disney’s cash cow.   
      
   “The Force has left Lucasfilms,” said Eric Schiffer, CEO of private equity   
   firm Patriarch Organization, in an interview. “That emotional connection   
   it enjoyed with fans has been damaged.”   
      
   The Los Angeles-based media industry investor and self-admitted Star Wars   
   fan still counts the deal a success for Iger, but he believes it got lost   
   producing too much subpar content for Disney.   
      
   At Disney, less is now more   
   “To get the Force back, Lucasfilm needs to reconnect with its Joseph   
   Campbell roots—the inner set of mythologies we’re all hardwired to that   
   motivated Lucas to create Star Wars in the first place,” said Schiffer.   
      
   He argues the constant hunger to feed the streaming business with fresh   
   material helped sow the seeds for the current malaise.   
      
   Even as The Mandalorian—“the series that started it all for Disney+” in   
   Iger’s words—helped the CEO attract subscribers and catch up quickly to   
   Netflix, it came at a cost of stretching the Star Wars brand beyond   
   recognition.   
      
   Now that growth has faltered, with 4 million customers canceling their   
   membership in the three months through March, and Wall Street is pushing   
   Iger to end the scattergun approach of showering creators with money for   
   new content. Instead, investors want him to end the over $10 billion in   
   cumulative streaming losses since the launch of Disney+ three and a half   
   years ago.   
      
   The idea that less is often more could apply to Lucasfilm’s Indiana Jones   
   films, which enjoyed their heyday in the 1980s. Fans were largely   
   satisfied when the titular character finished on a high note, literally   
   riding off into the sunset at the end of the third film.   
      
   And so, when Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls was released fifteen years ago,   
   the spectacle of seeing an aging Ford emerge unscathed from a nuclear   
   blast by hiding in a refrigerator left no one asking for more.   
      
   But they will get a sequel nonetheless when Dial of Destiny swings into   
   theaters a full 42 years after the first installment. Factoring in   
   marketing and distribution costs, including the cinemas’ cut of receipts,   
   it will likely have to pull in around $800 million at the box office just   
   to break even.   
      
   Franchises cannot be measured in box office receipts alone   
   Iger didn’t come out of retirement in November just to watch his prize   
   possessions wither on the vine. The board expects him to right the ship,   
   breathe life back into the dormant stock and resume paying a cash dividend   
   to shareholders.   
      
   To do so, he’ll need to churn out family-friendly fare full of iconic   
   characters and thrilling settings capable of being repurposed into   
   immersive experiences for his amusement parks.   
      
   “The value of intellectual property cannot be measured simply in a   
   franchise’s box office receipts,” said Guy Bisson, co-founder of the media   
   industry research firm Ampere Analysis. “You need to take into account its   
   contribution in streaming, in merchandising, in the characters and rides   
   at parks.”   
      
   For example, Disney finance chief Christine McCarthy explained to   
   investors something seemingly mundane as refreshments can squeeze more   
   revenue out of each Disney World visitor if they can be turned into a Star   
   Wars-themed experience.   
      
   But Lucasfilm, which did not respond to Fortune’s requests for comment,   
   knows it is running out of excuses now that a movie based on a Nintendo   
   video game proved you can still rake in over $1 billion post-pandemic as   
   long as you have the right concept.   
      
   For this very reason, Iger notably started off his fiscal Q2 earnings call   
   this month by congratulating Universal for the success of Super Mario   
   Bros: “It gives us reason to be optimistic about the movie business.”   
      
   A little advice.  It's free, you don't have to take it.  Remove all woke   
   and LGBTQIA+ activists and get back to the business of making marketable   
   content.  The degenerate 2% you are sucking assholes with will catch up   
   and kill the company.   
      
   https://finance.yahoo.com/news/force-left-lucasfilm-gone-wrong-   
   083000919.html   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)