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November 25, 2022

Disney’s first animated movie with a prominent gay character bombs

By Andrea Widburg

In 2021, Disney greenlit Strange World, an animated movie about a family journeying through a mysterious land to save a resource that’s losing its energy. Bob Iger, who is returning to Disney to “save” it from Bob Chapek’s sad tenure, was still on board in 2021, so he must have greenlit it. That’s a relevant fact because the movie bombed at the box office. Coincidentally or not, the movie has an openly gay subtext as one of the main male characters crushes on another boy.

Before the movie opened, the media wanted audiences to know about the gay romance, probably under the mistaken belief that audiences would care:

Disney’s upcoming adventure film “Strange World” will feature a gay teen romance — the first in an animated feature produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios.

[snip]

On Friday, Disney screened three sequences from the film at the 2022 Annecy International Animation Film Festival, one of the world’s most important festivals for the film animation industry that takes place in the city of Annecy, in southeast France.

In one of them, Ethan (Young-White) flirts with a boy named Diazo in front of his friends, who tease him in a friendly way.

His father, Searcher Clade (Gyllenhaal), later joins in and embarrasses him in “an overeager show of acceptance,” as the scene is described by Variety.

People in the entertainment world were charmed:

Unfortunately for Disney, audiences were less charmed, so the movie bombed big time (h/t Not the Bee):

Some people think that the reason the movie bombed is that Disney failed to market it, perhaps intentionally:

My suspicion is that, while many parents don’t want their kids to have thrust upon them even more pro-LGBTQ material than they’re already receiving in school, a big reason for the box office bomb may be that most heterosexuals just aren’t that interested in gay romance. They can’t relate to it, and they’re not impressed with Disney making such a niche film. Despite the left’s relentless “gay, gay, gay” push, gays are, on average, no more interesting than any other people, and things that are of unique interest to them, such as same-sex relationships, don’t change that fact.

But yeah, thinking about it some more, it’s probable that the failure is mostly because Disney isn’t supposed to be pushing children into a lifestyle that is unhealthy. No matter how the LGBTQ crowd tries to dress it up, we know that they have more substance abuse, partner abuse, depression, and suicide than the general population—and that’s true no matter how supportive the greater culture is.

Additionally, you only have to watch the videos the LGBTQ crowd posts on Twitter and TikTok to see that these are unhappy people. No parent wants that for his or her child. So, much as Disney wants to push the lifestyle, American parents don’t want that kind of pressure.

Image: Empty movie theater by ArtPhoto_studio.

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