Disney: More Frozen, Zootopia and Toy Story as Disney+ loses 2.4 million subscribers - here are 5 takeaways from the Mouse House's latest quarterly report.

by Thinus Ferreira

In the first quarterly earnings report since he's back as Disney CEO, Bob Iger made several announcements and spoke and gave clarity about several issues - including that Disney+ lost 2.4 million subscribers and is also making more Frozen, Zootopia and Toy Story movies.

Here are 5 takeaways from Disney's latest earnings report:

1. Disney+ lost subscribers

Disney lost 2.4 million subscribers worldwide during the last three months of 2022 and now has 161.8 million subscribers globally. 

This is noteworthy since this is the first decline in Disney+ subscriber numbers since Disney+, which is available in South Africa since last year, launched in the United States in late-2020. Like the majority of streamers, Disney+ isn't profitable but Bob Iger believes Disney+ will turn profitable sometime in 2024.

2. Maybe less, but better content

In the arms race known as the "streaming wars", companies just threw money to produce a lot of content to try and catch up with Netflix, and to attract subscribers and scale up their service offerings - Disney+ included. That period is now fast coming to an end.

"We are going to take a really hard look at everything we make across television and film because things in a more competitive world have just simply gotten more expensive," Bob Iger said on the earnings call and noted that "we were as a company in a global arms race for subscribers".

He also said "We want the quality on the screen, but we have to look at what that costs us".

"In our zeal to go after subscribers, I think we might have gotten a bit too aggressive in terms of our promotion. We took our pricing up substantially on Disney+ and we only suffered a de minimis loss of subs. That tells us something. It may also tell us that the promotion to chase subs that we've been fairly aggressive at, wasn't absolutely necessary."

3. Streaming makes less money but is the future

Bob Iger said that streaming services like Disney+ are not as profitable as linear pay-TV channels but that video streaming is the future and that is what Disney is focused on growing.

"The streaming business, which I believe is the future and has been growing, is not delivering the kind of profitability or bottom-line results that the linear business delivered for us over a few decades. And so we're in a very interesting transition period, but one I think, which is inevitably heading towards streaming."

4. More Frozen, Zootopia and Toy Story

More Elsa! More Buzz Lightyear! More Gazelle! Bob Iger confirmed that Disney will be making further instalments of the hugely popular films Frozen, Zootopia and Toy Story. 

"I'm so pleased to announce that we have sequels in the works from our animation studios to some of our most popular franchises, Toy Story, Frozen and Zootopia," Bog Iger said. "We'll have more to share about these productions soon, but this is a great example of how we're leaning into our unrivalled brands and franchises."

5. Eliminating 7000 jobs

On Disney's earnings call, Bob Iger confirmed that The Walt Disney Company is cutting 7 000 jobs which will represent a reduction of 3.2% of its global workforce of 220 000 people. Bob Iger says the retrenchment are done to cut costs.

Did Disney steal Zootopia? Screenwriter Gary L. Goldman files a lawsuit against Disney over alleged copyright infringement and wants a jury trial.

A prominent screenwriter is suing The Walt Disney Company, alleging that the mouse house stole Zootopia from him and wants the case to be heard and seen before a jury.

Zootopia, that won the Golden Globe and Oscar earlier this year for best animation film is his idea, not Disney’s, says Gary L. Goldman who has filed a lawsuit claiming copyright infringement, arguing that “Disney Zootopia is substantially similar to the Goldman Zootopia” in a 37-page court filing.

In the eye-popping court papers, Goldman alleges that Disney copied not just his Zootopia film name for its film, but also its “themes, settings, plot, characters, and dialogue – some virtually verbatim” after he pitched his Zootopia idea to Disney in 2000 and again in 2009 and got rejected both times.

Goldman, a veteran screenwriter who wrote the scripts for films like Total Recall, says Disney even copied his character designs and artwork, and includes striking graphics to show how Zootopia’s main characters mirror the characters he created.

Disney in a statement says Gary L. Goldman’s lawsuit “is riddled with patently false allegations. It is an unprincipled attempt to lay claim to a successful film he didn’t create, and we will vigorously defend against it in court.”

In his court papers, Goldman goes through the alleged copyright infrigements one by one and how his Zootopia characters are nearly identical to Disney’s Zootopia.

Goldman’s script for instance has a squirrel named Mimi – cute and optimistic – who is discriminated against. Disney’s Zootopia has Judy, the bunny cop.

Goldman’s tall, horned Asian mountain animal running a club he named Max is called Yax in Disney’s Zootopia and is the same type of animal, and also running a club.

He does this for all of the main characters and shows how their attributes are the same as those of the characters of Disney’s Zootopia.

Same setting, themes, story, poses, characters

Goldman says besides copying his word “Zootopia” – a portmanteau that he came up with – even even dialogue from his treatment shows up almost verbatim in Disney’s Zootopia.

In Goldman’s version a characters says: “If you want to be an elephant, you can be an elephant.” In Disney’s version, Judy says: “You wanna be an elephant when you grow up? You be an elephant. Because this is Zootopia. Anyone can be anything”.

“Each of the works addresses the issue of whether, in a diverse society as represented by the different species of Zootopia, one can be anything he or she wants to be.”

“A corollary theme is whether, in order to do so, one can overcome not only the prejudices inherent in a diverse society as represented by Zootopia, but also the prejudices within oneself as a member of such a society,” says Goldman’s lawsuit.

Goldman explains how the settings of the two Zootopia’s are the same and even the story.

“Artwork in the two Zootopias has the same subject matter and substantially similar appearance, including shapes, colours, body structures, poses and facial expressions of the animal characters”.

“Both works begin with young, uncool heroes who live in small towns with their parents. The heroes work to achieve a career dream that their parents specifically discourage. They go to academies where they excel, achieve recognition for their work, and earn the opportunity to go to the big city for their dream jobs.”

“In the big city, the heroes come up against strong, powerful and entrenched bosses who want to maintain control over the heroes".

Goldman continues to detail the similar narrative structures between the two Zootopias and says the “plot structure and these events involve and are driven by similar themes and characters, and they are used in similar ways to express similar themes”.