The actress looking comically like a Disney princess may make people accept it more

My thought is that Disney will probably rush it to Disney+ and hence it's legs will be cut short. Otherwise, it should hit $300m.

Going to be massive. $500+ mil domestic, easily.

I hate the 45 day rule. Hopefully this movie opens huge AND has great legs so Disney will keep it in theaters for more than 45 days.

It'll probably top $500m domestic before that deadline anyways #fingerscrossed

$130/$330m

The trailer's reception has been polarizing. I'm not sure to what degree, but it's mixed for sure. Well, I suppose I shouldn't the trailer's reception. We all know it's because they've blackwashed a beloved white character. It's the most controversy I've seen around a casting choice this late in the game that I can remember.

I'm also not sure how fringe the backlash is (or even how true it is; is it just for clicks? is it just for memes?), but I've seen a lot reporting and memes about the like-dislike ratio for the trailer (1.2 million dislikes compared to a couple hundred thousand likes). But I thought dislikes were now hidden on YouTube, so I'm not sure how believable those reports are. I've also seen the high view count, so people are interested - I suppose that could be genuine interest and interest spurred from the controversy. There's also generally been a lot of comments about it on social media - positive and negative.

There's also been a certain amount of damage management from Disney. They got the original voice artist (who is a white woman) to come out and say how fabulous the new casting is, so that might suggest how worried Disney is about the backlash.

I'm not sure how to digest and calculate it all to make a prediction. But one thing is for sure, gone are the days when social media chatter didn't reflect a film's consensus and impact a film's box office. I suppose I'll just keep my original prediction of $275-$325 million as that already included lower takings due to the backlash.

Dislikes were hidden on Youtube but apps were released allowing you to see them anyway.

I moved the last few posts to the political forum

The majority of people probably would've preferred an actress that more closely resembled the original character, but they'll probably still shell out their money when the time comes

The "redhead" issue has far more legs than the "race swapping" issue. Both are dumb and made up controversies, and the movie will be fine. (if good)

All bets are off if the movie is bad.

Likes
848K

Dislikes
2.1M


Yikes. That's a lot of dislikes. I'm black and I have two young daughters. We'll be there opening weekend but because we're fans of the IP (and my goodness, is that actress gorgeous). I get the controversy (i typically align that way). But bringing it back to the boxoffice, as Chippy said, if the movie is bad it'll tank. If it's decent, I do think families will show up, despite the vocal contingent, and we'll see a $300M+ domestic gross.

No trailer tonight apparently

I think the backlash exists because in many other cases white actors have been criticized for playing non-white roles, so now that they're doing the opposite it feels unfair. In an ideal world it wouldn't matter, I mean she's a mythological creature in the ocean. She's not even human. I feel like if this had come out in the 2000s no one would've cared, like how that Brandy Cinderella movie was released and there was no blacklash AFAIK. Something changed when it comes to the media and race in the last ten years.

What really people should be mad about is that this is a story about a girl who literally gives up her voice to be with a man and is ultimately rewarded for it. The original fairy tale is much better as a cautionary tale against that since Ariel dies.

I'm usually against all the race changing of well known existing characters i.e. Bond or Superman

However, I think it's not an issue here. The actress looks the part and it is a mermaid after all.

I still think it will be a big hit. $300m is certainly on the cards.

I think there's enough of a curiosity factor at this point since it seems we've been hearing about it since casting that people will show up OW

The bigger issue imo is fierce competition week 2 on. With the May long weekend it was already frontloaded but families are going to have a lot of options.

2nd weekend: Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse - First was universally acclaimed. It's going to vastly overperform.
3rd weekend: Strays (animated dog comedy with Will Ferrell and Jamie Foxx) + Transformers
4th weekend: Elemental

I'm a little surprised how close Disney put a Pixar movie to their animated re-imagining.

As a reminder, we have a 16 week gap earlier in the year with no family movies between Puss and Mario so really just lots of studios wanting to max out on summer weekdays.

*UPDATE*

185m OW
640m Dom
1.5b WW

Studios are idiotic.

Had no idea Strays was an animated film. Could it out-gross Transformers?

That is some solid competition.

Agree, Spider-man is poised to be quite big. I didn't love it as most seem to but I can see why it's popular. Should be good for $250m at least.

Also - don't' forget the Flash opens the same weekend as Elemental...

Strays is not animated, it has a trailer out and looks pretty funny

Thanks. Just watched it and it has a red band trailer lol.

Actually, a good thing that it's an adult film which should help it stand out. Reminds me a little of Ted.