The InterWebDotNetz lost its mind Thursday night as reports hit saying the Disney Store had removed all the merchandise for the Grooming Syndicate’s latest flop, the $180 million streaming series The Acolyte.
For those of you who don’t know, The Acolyte was advertised as “the gayest Star Wars ever.” It also earned the lowest audience score in Star Wars history. It was also quickly and very publicly canceled by Disney earlier this week.
Then the merch was memory-holed.
And now the merch is back.
Because Disney queers little children and seeks to hopelessly confuse them, I will assume the worst about Disney because Disney is the worst. So here’s what I think happened…
In a word: residuals.
This is just informed speculation on my part, but it’s the only thing that makes sense.
One of the primary reasons studios pull content from their streaming series, as Disney did with its super-gay Willow series, is to avoid paying residuals to those whose contracts call for residuals. Generally, the writers, directors, producers, and lead actors.
In the theatrical world, residuals are usually (not always) based on box office performance after break even. After the studio breaks even on its production and publicity costs, everyone gets a piece of the raw profits.
Streaming residuals are generally based on three criteria: 1) how many people watch, 2) how many people subscribe to the platform and can access the show/movie, and 3) the increase in subscribers around the launch of the show/movie.
In other words, streaming residuals are not based on raw profits. The studios cannot say, Okay, we’re all making money here. A studio could end up paying residuals on a show/movie no one watched based on its overall subscriber number, which makes no financial sense.
To get a little deeper in the weeds…
On top of residuals, there are financial costs involved in hosting a show no one watches.
Finally, The Acolyte managed to embarrass Disney in a way no one thought possible. According to my faulty memory, Disney has never rushed out to publicly and loudly cancel a show like it did The Acolyte just days/weeks after the season finale aired.
So what does this have to do with pulling the merchandise…?
It’s the same thing… Contracts can call for all the same people to get a piece of the merchandising.
But even if there are not residuals involved…
If enough people don’t buy it, imagine the massive losses involved in design, manufacturing, shipping, and storage costs. According to this report, only 50+ people in the last month pre-ordered an upcoming six-pack of Acolyte action figures from Amazon. On Amazon, 50+ means between 50 and 100. Something that sells over 100 receives a “100+” badge. If that’s the case, and there’s no reason to believe it’s not, there’s no way that Acolyte collection justifies the design, merchandising, storage, and transportation costs.
To give you an idea of how low “50+” is, last year I wrote a novel that received about a millionth of the publicity The Acolyte received, and it was selling “50+” on Amazon ten months after its release, which bummed me out.
So.
To save money, Disney pulled the merch.
To try and memoryhole an embarrassment, Disney pulled the merch.
Then.
The social justice crowd online lost its mind, and Disney caved, even though the groomers will lose money keeping the merch available.
What I love about this, and I do so very much love it, is that the social justice crowd are not even Star Wars fans. I doubt ten percent of the people who whined about the merch cancellation even watched The Acolyte. I doubt one purchased a piece Acolyte merch. As the Critical Drinker astutely points out:
The cold, harsh truth is that the mythical, “modern audience” that Lucasfilm has been chasing for ten years now simply doesn’t exist; never has existed; and never will exist. The people who shout most loudly about it on social media don’t actually care about shows like The Acolyte and won’t even bother to watch it. All they care about is what it represents, the message it puts across, and I’m afraid that doesn’t translate into money for your studio. The reality here is that Disney gambled and lost bigtime on this one.
Nevertheless, Disney has spent a decade shitting all over core fans, then lost them, and still allows the social justice tail to wag the dog, which is why the merch magically returned. Like Willow, Disney would likely love to pull The Acolyte series itself from Disney+, but the social justice warriors—the only fans Disney has left after alienating Normal People—won’t allow it.
John Nolte’s first and last novel, Borrowed Time, is winning five-star raves from everyday readers. You can read an excerpt here and an in-depth review here. Also available in hardcover and on Kindle and Audiobook.
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