A Hit And A Miss For Disney As 'Thanksgiving Box Office' Slumps To One Of The Worst In Years

The Thanksgiving box office numbers this year portend to a not-so-promising year-end holiday season, although Walt Disney Company DIS fared better with its superhero film “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.”

Weak Numbers: The long weekend owing to the Thanksgiving holiday did not do box numbers any favor, as the three-day weekend collected $92.9 million in ticket sales, down from $101 million in the previous weekend, reported Box Office Mojo. This was worse than the $96.3 million in 2021. The drop was steeper compared to the pre-pandemic number of $181 million for 2019.

The five-day cume, which accounted for ticket sales between Wednesday and Sunday, came in at $133 million, down from $142 million in 2021 and $262 million in 2019.

The last Thanksgiving weekend to see three-day ticket sales below $100 million before the pandemic was in 1994, the report said.

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Disney’s Mixed Fortunes: The media giant's “Wakanda Forever” ruled the roost in the box office for a third weekend in running, with an estimated three-day cume of $45.9 million in North America, according to measurement firm ComScore. Worldwide, the movie collected $78 million.

Cumulatively, the film has collected $675.57 million, with $367.67 million of it from North America.

The entertainment giant, which has recently reinstated Bob Iger as CEO, faced disappointment with its “Strange World,” a computer-animated sci-fi adventure film. Over the three-day weekend, the movie collected $11.9 million domestically and $9.2 million overseas.

This marked the worst three-day opening for a Disney animated feature since 2000’s “The Emperor’s New Groove,” CNBC said.

Disney and Searchlight’s “The Menu,” Sony Group Corp.’s SONY “Devotion” and Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc.’s WBD “Black Adam” took the third, fourth and fifth positions, respectively. The worldwide three-day cume came in at $10.6 million, $6.192 million and $6.15 million, respectively. Domestic numbers for the three came in at $5.2 million, $6 million and $3.35 million.

The numbers for Netflix Inc.’s NFLX “Glass Onion” were not made available by the streaming giant. CNBC said the five-day cume may have been between $13 million and $15 million.

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