It’s been a tough stretch for Disney+ and streaming services in general. Once considered a novelty, streaming has exploded in recent years, with streamers like Netflix, Hulu, Disney, and even Roku shelling out big bucks to secure star power and create their own content. It all seemed to be working until it wasn’t.
With so many players entering the game and only so many hours in the day to stream content, the market became competitive quickly. As more competitors entered the streaming game, costs rose, and choices became confusing, with a number of services being bought, sold, rebranded, and shuffled.
The ensuing chaos has caused many viewers to streamline their options. After all, the entire point of streaming was to cut the cord from cable. Unfortunately, as content became specific to certain streamers, people needed to subscribe to numerous platforms to find the programs they wanted.
The broadcast networks exacerbated the problem by gobbling up their own content and only releasing it onto their own streaming services. Subsequently, at the end of the day, many people were paying as much for all of their streamers as they previously were for cable.
Many of the bigger services like Netflix and Disney+ concluded that they must produce their own content and lure viewers that way. Netflix cut exclusive, expensive deals with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston for original movies. However, the quality of the films didn’t match the star power, and many of the movies didn’t even break even.
Crater, an original sci-fi movie from the producers of Stranger Things, has been removed from Disney Plus less than two months after its release. https://t.co/KReUOi9wD5 pic.twitter.com/OG4at3KSJM
— IGN (@IGN) July 5, 2023
Disney+ grew too fast as well, buying Hulu and attempting to add more streaming to ESPN. Now, as these services, with the exception of Roku, continue to bleed cash, they are furiously trying to find ways to slash costs and survive what looks to be a streaming bubble that is set to burst.
As more and more programs disappear after one season, Disney+ recently made the bold move of dumping a full-length, original sci-fi movie less than two months after its premiere. An unprecedented move for the Mouse, but perhaps a sign that things are actually worse than they look.
The latest axe to fall was on a movie called “Crater.” The movie cost just more than $50 million dollars and is, or was, a young-adult sci-fi drama starring rapper Kid Cudi and actress Mckenna Grace from the recent Ghostbuster reboot.
While the film received lukewarm reviews, it essentially wasn’t marketed at all. Whether that was a cost-saving move because they knew the film would flop or unintentional remains to be seen. However, what won’t be seen ever again is the movie. After seven weeks, the $50 million dollar money pit is wiped from the books and existence.
Part of the issue could be the content. The movie was a story about four friends living in a lunar mining colony who embark on an exploration of a legendary crater. Interesting enough, but director Kyle Patrick Alvarez and John Griffin, who wrote the screenplay, couldn’t resist the urge to infuse wokeness into the movie.
One reviewer said: “The screenplay by John Griffin (creator of the cable sci-fi series From) also takes pains to infuse the story with sociological elements concerning conservation and exploitative labor practices that feel a bit heavy-handed and jar uneasily with the more frivolous moments. The poignant ending, too, proves uncommonly emotional for a film geared toward kids.”
What could have been a fun fantasy set on the moon between four friends turned into a woke lesson about the evils of capitalism and a treatise on unions. Fun stuff for kids!
Now, since “Crater” cratered, like the dark side of the moon, it will never be seen. More proof that Americans are sick of wokeness and another red flag for the Mouse and the streaming industry as a whole.
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