The Best Seven Words to Describe Disney in 2023

As an annual tradition, MickeyBlog looks back each year and tries to identify the best ways to summarize Disney’s year.

This year proved especially intriguing, as the company experienced so much, some of which we’ll remember forever.

As for the rest, let’s all agree to pretend none of it happened.

Here are the best seven words to describe Disney in 2023.

Celebratory

Let’s start with the unforgettable event of the year.

On October 16^th, 2023, The Walt Disney Company turned 100 years old.

Less than half of one percent of all companies achieve this goal, which is understandable. It’s a math game.

Roughly 20 percent of all businesses fail within the first year, and two-thirds fail to reach a decade.

When Walt Disney started the company, he never could have envisioned it becoming the most treasured storytelling business in the world.

So, Disney wanted to celebrate its remarkable achievement.

For obvious reasons, Disney chose Disneyland Park as the home for all Disney100 activities.

Meanwhile, EPCOT hosted the Walt Disney World version of the event.

To make the year unforgettable, management ensured that both parks would offer new attractions and amenities.

Disneyland guests experienced the new Mickey’s Toontown and Adventureland Treehouse, while World Celebration Gardens debuted at EPCOT.

Of course, EPCOT also added Luminous The Symphony of Us, a new nighttime presentation, and Journey of Water | Inspired by Moana, a nature-loving attraction.

So, Disney added a touch more magic to the parks as a lasting tribute to its centennial celebration.

Chaotic

At the start of 2023, Bob Iger had just returned to his job. He immediately faced an activist investor push by Nelson Peltz.

Now, the year ends with a second activist investor push by Pelz and his billionaire buddy, Isaac Perlmutter.

In between these events, Disney laid off thousands of employees, suffered earthquakes at snow at Disneyland, and watched a bear roam through Magic Kingdom.

You can read the Strangest Stories of the Year article and tell me which ones sound the most like Mad Libs, but the true answer is, “Most of them.”

Chaos was the driving, thriving constant at Disney in 2023.

Defensive

Given everything that transpired, you can understand why Disney couldn’t take the offensive often.

The company found itself the new target in an ongoing right-wing attack on Disney values.

To the company’s credit, it stayed true to its beliefs and held firm to the relatively new cast member Key of Inclusion.

For whatever reason, that only made people like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis angrier.

So, the Governor embarked on a legislative attack against Disney that ultimately stripped the company of the Reedy Creek Improvement District.

At this moment, the governor’s Central Florida cronies control Reedy Creek, a fact that directly leads to the next word.

Before we get there, we should discuss the other reason why Disney remained on the defensive throughout the year.

Whenever the company released a new movie, odds were good that it would struggle at the box office, at least at first.

This reality is partially due to the changing box office behavior caused by streaming media consumption and the pandemic.

Few cared about such nuance, though. They simply wanted to slam Disney whenever possible, and that reality left Mickey Mouse playing defense.

Litigious

The weird part of the Reedy Creek change was that Disney counteracted it legally and cleverly.

According to the ordinances and bylaws in place, Disney could extend various contracts for years.

That’s why I almost used “King Charles III” as a descriptor for Disney in 2023. If you know, you know.

Once Disney pulled off its clever piece of legalese, a disgruntled and humiliated DeSantis pushed the envelope even more.

Florida’s governor demanded that politicians vote to rewrite state laws to strip Disney of its rights.

At the time, the governor falsely claimed he wanted to level the playing field, DeSantis happily authorized a similar district for Universal Studios.

So, Disney has had no recourse but to sue in federal court. The company skipped state court for obvious reasons.

In addition to the politicians working for DeSantis, he has also benefited from unique timing to reset the composition of Florida’s Supreme Court.

Disney would be less likely to win there. So, it has sued DeSantis and the members of the newly formed Central Florida Tourism Oversight District.

If Disney wins this case, it (presumably) restores all rights and privileges at Reedy Creek.

Otherwise, the deck seems stacked against the company in Florida. And that’s why Disney has turned litigious.

Remarkably, this isn’t even the only newsworthy case involving the company, either. It also settled a class action lawsuit with Disneyland Magic Key owners.

Currently, we also have the ongoing matter of the gender pay gap lawsuit as well. Disney lawyers are the real winners this year.

Rebuilding

I understand why the news sounds so pretty glum regarding Disney, but I’m happy to report that looks are deceiving here.

Yes, the forward-facing parts of the company have faced numerous setbacks.

Still, as I recently wrote in my Current State of Disney evaluation, when you start checking the infrastructure, the bones are good.

Not coincidentally, Iger has referred to 2023 as his rebuilding year. When the CEO returned, he was shocked to discover a dire situation.

Iger came back to a company that was when in dramatically worse shape than he left it.

So, Disney’s leader did exactly what a good leader does. He evaluated the worst problems and moved to address them.

Disney methodically checked off several boxes on its way to improving its balance sheet.

Nobody will ever describe fixing the numbers as sexy or exciting, especially for a creative company like Disney.

Still, many of Chapek’s worst mistakes were caused by the company’s financial jeopardy. He made short-sighted decisions that worsened the situation.

In 2023, Iger appears to have solved longstanding problems with the decline of Linear Networks.

The CEO has found a joint system with its streaming business that maintains the revenue stream for one without jeopardizing the potential growth of the other.

Similarly, streaming has reduced its losses by $1 billion in a calendar year.

While the Direct-to-Consumer division is still leaking more than $100 million a month, Disney believes it’ll turn a profit at some point in calendar 2024.

We’re taking some of this on faith here, but Disney does appear to have rebuilt its empire on a stronger foundation in 2023.

Struggling

Despite what I just said, we all must acknowledge the reality of a rough 2023.

Peltz and Perlmutter wouldn’t be causing problems again unless Disney’s stock had stagnated.

As I mentioned recently, when Disney fired Chapek, the stock hovered in the low $90s. At the close of business today, the stock was still in the low $90s.

There’s nothing investors hate more than a stagnant stock price.

Similarly, there’s nothing that Disney fans hate more than a constant onslaught of negative news about their favorite company.

That’s the reality of 2023.

Unworthy

I recognize that many of the words I’ve chosen this year seem to conflict directly.

That’s another way I could have summarized Disney: paradoxical.

A lot of what we’re discussing requires detailed debate to appreciate the nuances of the matter.

Still, there’s one aspect where everyone can agree. Disney’s 2023 film slate was unworthy of the brand.

I’m actually one of the most positive people about some of Disney’s 2023 releases.

In fact, I just watched parts of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny yesterday and wondered anew how anyone would dislike the film.

The climactic scene, the one that takes place in an apartment, brings the entire story of Raiders of the Lost Ark full circle. It’s a masterstroke.

Similarly, The Little Mermaid, Elemental, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 are all A to A+ films.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that Disney released Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and thought that was a good idea.

Similarly, the company missed the mark with Wish and Haunted Mansion, two stories that should have been better than they were.

Disney achieved several unsettling box office achievements this year…and I don’t mean the good kind.

The studio didn’t release a $1 billion film for the first time in a decade, it won’t be the number one studio for the first time in eight years, and so forth.

More importantly, Disney’s overall storytelling quality fell short of the long-established mark. This year’s films were unworthy of the Disney brand.

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Feature Photo: Disney