There have been a lot of poor and sexist takes on The Marvels‘ box office struggles, but one may have expected more from Disney CEO Bob Iger. Instead, he came out with a very cryptic and bizarre response that seemed to be throwing shade at writer/director Nia DaCosta.
The Marvels premiered on November 10 and saw DaCosta who made history as the youngest and first Black female director of a Marvel movie. Meanwhile, the female-led film received largely positive reviews from audiences and mixed-to-positive reviews from critics. It sees Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris), and Ms. Marvel (Iman Vellani) team up to combat Kree revolutionary Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton). The Marvels received high praise for being one of the most fun Marvel movies in a long time, boasting fantastic performances from its female leads, and effectively setting up the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Unfortunately, The Marvels has been struggling at the box office. Between the SAG-AFTRA strike, franchise fatigue, sexism, and the newness of the characters on the big screen, there was a lot standing in the movie’s way. The majority of the blame falls squarely on Disney for inundating audiences with sequels, remakes, and Marvel content, contributing to the SAG-AFTRA strike, releasing the Loki finale the day before The Marvels’ premiere, and pushing inflated budgets on its films.
Even Vellani pointed out that the cast and crew did their part and made a good movie, and now the box office flop is Iger’s problem. However, Iger doesn’t seem too keen on taking responsibility.
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Bob Iger thinks The Marvels set needed “supervision”
While speaking at the DealBook Summit, Iger addressed The Marvels’ box office struggles. First, he acknowledged the role he and Disney played in the debacle by giving viewers too much content via Disney+. It’s a sentiment he has expressed before, and he reiterated that the high quantity Disney was producing “diluted quality.” Iger cited this as part of the reason why multiple Disney films flopped this year. However, he honed in on the specific issues he thought The Marvels had, and things got weird.
Iger claimed that a lack of supervision on The Marvels set somehow caused the box office flop, as it was filmed during the pandemic, and he seemingly couldn’t send his “executives” to oversee it. He stated, “There wasn’t as much supervision on the set … where we have executives there really looking over what’s being done.” He didn’t expand on what he meant by that statement and oddly didn’t say that other flops, like Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, also had a “supervision” problem. Apparently, just The Marvels needed to be supervised … but why?
The Marvels did have supervision from its director, DaCosta. Why did Iger’s buddies need to be on set overseeing things when DaCosta was at the helm, and it was her movie? Is it a coincidence that the only film Iger mentioned needing “supervision” was helmed by a woman? Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be surprising if the statement were a slight against DaCosta. She seems to be the company’s scapegoat to blame for The Marvels‘ box office troubles.
Before the film premiered, insiders tried to make her look bad for exiting the film early due to delays and prior commitments; then, she wasn’t invited to the crew screening of the film and had The Hollywood Reporter falsely claiming she “bailed” on her crew for missing it. Meanwhile, there has been very distasteful gloating over The Marvels’ box office and attempts to dismiss DaCosta’s accomplishments.
Now, Iger is cryptically suggesting her film had to be supervised to succeed. Does he mean like how his executives “supervised” Marvel’s Disney+ shows … by crashing sets, driving out talented TV writers, and messing up shows they didn’t have the experience or perspective to make? What exactly would these supervisors have done? The reviews show that The Marvels is a good movie, and it was factors that had nothing to do with quality that led to the box office flop. Does he think if men are on set overseeing things, it just magically solves all the film’s problems?
DaCosta is a talented and capable director. Her set didn’t need supervision from Iger, and she made a great film without his executives being needlessly involved. Perhaps Iger is the one who needs supervision. If he had a supervisor to oversee that he paid his workers, treated his female-led films well, and didn’t saturate audiences with endless Disney franchise content, The Marvels likely would’ve fared far better at the box office.
As the CEO of Disney, Iger is one of the most powerful men in Hollywood, and it’s a pretty pathetic look to see he’d rather scapegoat a young female director than take accountability for the company’s issues.
(featured image: Neilson Barnard/Getty)
