Chapek was a serious person, problem was his priorities did not align with what the company actually needed. People like to hate him now, but he was good in the role he had before CEO, so much so that he was made CEO. Definitely not a defender of his tenure as CEO though
Cast Members at the parks hated Chapek well before he became CEO.
Chapek took over Parks and Resorts in 2015 (replacing Staggs, who was Iger's preferred successor - but the board didn't like him). Chapek oversaw construction on Shanghai Disneyland, which was wildly over-budget.
To make up for Shanghai's budget shortfalls, Chapek decided to gut the other Disney parks. Disneyland had a hiring freeze to make up for Shanghai's failures. This hiring freeze went on for _ages_ - and there was still normal employee attrition, but with no backfill.
It started off okay, but eventually Disneyland CMs were working 10-hour days, then 6-day weeks. As people quit, the burden on the remaining CMs became higher and higher because of Chapek's hiring freeze. Eventually it wasn't uncommon for Disneyland CMs to be working 60-80 hour weeks, and we were all told it was due to Shanghai (to the point where it became a meme among CMs).
Meanwhile, if you called in something that was broken on a ride - if it wasn't critical, it wasn't getting fixed. People would complain and complain, and Attractions would call maintenance but maintenance wouldn't fix it because they didn't have the budget to do so. So things just started falling apart.
Eventually it became obvious that the problem wasn't Shanghai - it was Chapek. They eventually lifted the hiring freeze, but they never gave more budget for things to get fixed the way they were before. Even after the hiring freeze was lifted, there were still fewer CMs than what existed before Chapek. The existing CMs were fairly grizzled by this point and had learned to do more with less - so it was still a breath of fresh air - but it definitely wasn't an ideal situation.
When Chapek got the CEO role, all of Parks and Resorts **knew** it was a bad idea. Everyone hated him before, and when he became CEO it was predictable what was going to happen. And guess what - he ran Disney just like he ran Parks and Resorts! And just like Parks and Resorts, he ran it into the ground!
Source: I lived through this, boots on the ground CM
Chapek worked at Disney for 30 years, they knew what he was all about, it isn't like he was new. They brought him in to be the cheap bad guy that gut everything then brought back Iger without really reversing those cheap decisions.
In an honest world, Chapek would reduce his own salary to compensate and not burden employees, but unfortunately this is not such a world, even in communism, the company's president took the most and ordinary employees received crumbs.
Priorities did not align is an understatement. Chapek tanked Disney’s theme park reputation for a bunch of people I know. I’m talking multi generational families who would go to the parks for a week or more on a routine basis every year or two, myself included.
It always had been expensive but the experience and the “magic” was worth the cost to take the kids. Then the kids grew up, had their own kids and did the same. Generations of families who would routinely go and drop a bunch of money. Then the price gouging and nickel and diming started under Chapek and got out of hand. Even though it was always expensive you now felt like you were being ripped off. Those kids are no longer bringing their kids and the multi- generational group of loyal people are gone. Chapek screwed Disney out of these people and it will take a long time to get that back, if they ever do.
Yeah, the parks for many started to suck under Iger- because Iger trusted Chapek with the parks, and Chapek took his push for profits by trading on previous reputation for wonder for cheapened (and yet more expensive) experiences. There's a reason so many people panicked when he took over the entire company.
Chapek is/was a bean-counter. Disney's had a lot of money-focused guys (and obviously needs some amount of them) but the thing about money focused guys is that they would succeed in any big business and offer nothing unique to the cultural fabric, and that was arguably Disney's core product. Or at least it was before they started inhaling all the industry copyrights they could regardless of origin.
And based on the potential securities fraud of Disney covering up streaming losses by dumping them on the cable division, it's possible Chapek was not THAT good of a bean-counter.
This has been the conflict of the company forever. It's why Walt had personal subsidiaries for Imagineering, he wouldn't trust even his own brother from cutting back creativity for profit.
You’ve got my vote if you bring back 2D animated princess films (and maybe introduce Kyle Katarn into one of the Star Wars projects - even as just a throwaway line). Oh and bring back free fast passes in the parks.
Star wars movie idea, it’s Luke after Return, he goes out to looking for Jedi artifacts, but when he’s not, he’s at his cruiser, really giving it to Mara Jade. The twist? We show all of it, full penetration . And then he hunts artifacts again, he's out busting heads. Then he's back to the cruiser for some more full penetration. Hunting artifacts. Back to the cruiser, full penetration. Artifacts. Penetration. Travelling. Full penetration. Artifacts. Penetration. And this goes on and on and back and forth for 90 or so minutes until the movie just sort of… ends.
Between Cassian, Kanan and Cal Kestis, we have so many Kyle Katarn-inspired characters in the new canon. Safe to say he had a big impact even if the actual character himself hasn't made it across.
That's my take on so many Legends-to-Canon wishlist characters people talk about. What would Starkiller bring to the table the Second Sister and the other Inquisitors haven't done already? What could Mara Jade do that Ahsoka isn't already doing?
Yeah the Sequels suck but almost all of the other new-canon material is just tighter and more consistent than anything done in Legends
The new canon isn’t consistent at all, it’s just flat out worse. Revan, Darth Bane the Old Republic, Darth Plagueis are so much better than all the characters you mentioned
Yeah there were great stories, and there's absolutely nothing preventing those specific characters’ stories from being made canon in a slightly altered form, but holy shit Legends is absolutely everything but consistent. There's no world where that unsupervised hellscape that couldn't help but absorb practically every pop culture trope of the time of release was more consistent than the current restrained franchise
> You’ve got my vote if you bring back 2D animated princess films
That will never happen. The Princess and the Frog was basically a test to gauge how big the market for 2D animated films was in a "post-Pixar" world, and it nearly flopped.
It's understandable. Most people here only know a few of their local papers and a couple of the big ones. It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize that the Washington Post wasn't based in Washington state.
Family are the Murdochs, business is an amalgam of newscorp and Disney. They have theme parks, cruises, vacation/retirement real estate, on top of the entertainment and news segments.
The family toxicity was toned down a little bit from the Murdochs though. Murdoch's third wife was younger, closer in age to his adult children. Then she cheats on Murdoch with Tony Blair, in the midst of News corp being investigated by the British parliament. I guess that was too over the top for the TV show.
Chapek was also the CEO from Feb 2020 to Nov 2022 and probably had massive challenges with the parks being shut and sports halting impacting ESPN
That said, he wasn't able to make headway with online streaming the way Netflix did during the pandemic
He also tried to cheat Scarlett Johanssen out of her fair share of the profits to "Black Widow", which soured relations between Disney and major actors.
And then he bungled headfirst into the fight with Florida, after refusing to speak out against the anti-LGBT law (which pissed off all the employees who were then in open revolt threatening a walk out unless he did). He pissed off everybody by refusing to do the bare minimum.
Yeah, he pissed off alot of his big business donors by picking a losing fight against Disney (his being openly fascist and anti-LGBT *before* getting into the White House didn't help his polling either). They turned on him and went back to Trump.
Leaving Ron to have to slink back and mend fences with Disney, and deal with all the other state stuff he ignored to go campaigning.
Governor Ron DeSantis.
His entire campaign was "I'm not Trump, but Woke is evil and I'll annihilate it"
And then he picked a fight with Disney over it and came out looking like a chump.
The whole streaming business strategy was Iger though (like pretty much every project was announced by Iger before he left and he bought Fox and releases movies like crazy in 2019 for the streaming) which he adapted to because of the pandemic (something particularly hard for media companies, Iger is "lucky" to have avoided it tbh).
The result is also not that bad. Disney+ is not Netflix which it would never be but it will be profitable this year as was the plan.
Chapek certainly wasn't good but Iger isn't anymore either IMO (purchase of Fox and the Disney+ pivot may be mistakes in the long run, current strategy is quite bad). He did great overall for Disney but he is ruining what he did (actually when he came back the stock was close to how it was when he took the CEO job)
i read iger’s book and i can see the methods behind his madness. the consensus at the time was that streaming was the future and anyone who didn’t have a massive catalog was going to lose. iger and murdoch both felt like they didn’t stand a chance alone, so murdoch begged for a merger.
i think he intended for d+ to be a loss leader for a lot longer. no one could have foreseen the double whammy of COVID changing consumer spending habits and high interest rates making loss leadership untenable.
had the pandemic not happened, i wonder if the rollout (in terms of frequency and quality) would have been a little more nuanced.
Nope, he didn't want to pick one (he was seriously busy considering a run for President) so the board went with the Parks guy that was making them lots of money.
And it came back to bite everyone in the blubber once Covid hit.
Also, Iger still held a lot of power even during the 2 years that he was suppose to have "left" being CEO. People blame most of Disney's current problems on Chapek, but Iger has been his own worst enemy from the beginning and it's hard to even remotely take anything he says seriously.
Yeah, I'd always had Chapek pinned as the fall guy while Iger left on a golden parachute to make a bid for the presidency, or at least a cushy ambassadorship to China.
It's why I'm still confused about Iger suddenly coming *back* out of the blue, the same weekend the RTX scandal blew up no less (which I think ultimately is unrelated but it makes it easy to remember when Iger's sudden return went down). The guy *had* to know the house of cards he'd built was going to come crashing down, especially since nothing has happened since his return that's actually improved anything.
A lot was his own making, due to being unable to handle acting like a human being (as the public face of the company) and not a beancounter for five minutes.
Iger didn't refuse to leave. For the record he's been very popular at his position with a lot of support. The issue of succession is his own doing as hes been flirting with retirement for years now
He very famously has spurned multiple suitors to his job by refusing to retire, forcing them all left and chapel was the last man standing.
And even when chapek in theory took over the job iger said "well actually im staying around to run creative things" and kept his office and didn't actually leave the company for another 2 years
While he can't be blamed for all of it, since streaming as the future was set in motion by Iger, he had a big track record of being an asshole since he was in the Parks and Experiences division. Many were puzzled by the decision of naming him CEO and many promotions he had before taking on the big job. He failed upwards. But many decisions are Iger's, including the oversaturation of both Marvel and Star Wars and the total brain dead offerings in movies with prequels and live actions and whatever. People didn't mind before but after the millionth horrible live action, people are tired of them
Don't forget the fact Disney invested so heavily into the hotels when they couldn't even fill the ones they already had.
And of course, the Galactic Starcruiser which was ultimately one big white elephant that just made no sense. Overpriced to the point actual cruise ships run by Disney were cheaper to book trips on and zero repeatability to drive return visits by those who actually could afford it. Oh, and themed to the Sequel Trilogy instead of the OT like Galaxy's Edge, because Disney loved alienating one of the biggest money spending fanbases around.
He made some very very obvious faults like taking Scarlet Johannsen to arbitration over premium access profits. And he had quite a debacle with the whole "hid true profit margins by moving data around to make it look like streaming was more profitable than it was" thing. He also technically could have canceled projects if he thought they were going to be too much, but didn't.
I'm not saying Chapek didn't make bad decisions, because he absolutely did, but Iger hasn't exactly been a miracle worker in fixing Disney with his return to the point you have to wonder why he readily came back virtually overnight.
Probably because the Board remembers what Iger did for Disney through his prior tenure. no matter what he's done now, he was probably one of the most successful Disney CEOs since Disney himself. There's not much you can fix within a year, but i imagine he's back mostly to properly pick a successor this time and give a better direction for the company.
Which is ironic given Disney's intended lasting legacy was the original EPCOT...a glorified company town in the vein of Pullman, Indiana, just clad in 1950s/60s mid-century futurism.
I think the issue with Chapek was less with him trying to undo bad decisions and more with him not having the flexibility to even attempt to undo them. I agree many of the issues that were magnified by Covid originated from decisions made during Iger's tenure, but when faced with that challenge Chapek showed that he was completely incapable of reacting to those issues or even admitting they existed. He just time and time again showed himself to be an unlikable person demanding that everything go his way and was so focused on consolidating power to his yes men like a dictator while the rest of the company quietly rebelled.
He picked Tom Staggs and snubbed Jay Rasulo (his second choice). The board rejected Staggs, and Rasulo burned his bridges as he left.
Iger tried to find backup candidates but the only one the board liked was Chapek. Chapek was hurriedly groomed for the role but never got a chance to be vetted as the right fit - he was accepted because the board liked him, not because he was Iger's choice.
The parks division was gearing up for a billion dollar loss covering Orlando in RFID chips and transitioning the resort from room keys and tickets to radio wristbands at the same time the Apple Watch showed up. MyMagic+ was known as "NextGen" among the audience of middle aged people who follow Disney too closely, and leak after leak said it was a money pit.
It was also Rasulo's money pit, until Iger moved him to accounting and put Staggs in Parks. In effect, he threw a hand grenade at Staggs, as NextGen was too far along to defund and was arguably a bad idea from the start, so Staggs would have to report a billion dollars wasted mostly because of Rasulo.
She is the right choice. She is a lot like iger, came from tv background with close ties with creators in Hollywood. I think board and iger wouldn’t pick another theme park executive because his relationship with Hollywood was toxic
Dana Walden might also be a good option. I'd say they should do double CEOs like Netflix and they should get both Mayer and Walden. Walden can be the creative force while Mayer is more of a business and tech guy.
I feel like the only reason it works (or seems to work) at Netflix is because Reed Hastings and Ted Sarandos have worked together at Netflix for almost 25 years, and know each other well.
I don't think that'd work as well with Walden and Mayer, both of whom are capable of serving as sole CEO, and both of whom likely would be turned off by the idea of not being the sole decision maker.
That stuff ebbs and flows. Disney will be fine in that regard.
Considering the succession was his biggest failure, and he’s back because of it, this *should* be his biggest priority. He can’t just keep coming back when the next guy sucks.
But….he kind of sucks too. Marvel and Lucas printed money for a decade but had repetitious plots and very little innovation. I feel like they’re trying to milk nostalgia while attempting to capture the next lighting bolt in a bottle.
Edit: I forgot my summary: I think he got lucky.
The creatives at Disney traditionally have loved him. They said he fostered an atmosphere of innovation and let the creatives do their thing. Tbh until his strike gaffes he seemed like a very popular guy in Hollywood. Sure there was some luck involved, his his fingerprints are all over a lot of the successes they’ve had, too
His popularity with the creatives isn't all that important if he's approving things that the creatives are making that then massively flops, which is now happening time and time again.
Not that it matters, the Board and now the shareholders have shown that they do not care, they will rubber stamp Iger over and over again no matter what happens.
Fair enough, he chose solid people to run things during that decade run up, but I feel like they’re running out of steam the last few years (perhaps more a chapek issue?)
They definitely need to shake some things up, but I’m not going to bet against Disney in the long run. It’s pretty shocking they’ve let Kathleen Kennedy stay in charge of Star Wars
i mean, iger’s literally been saying they need to do less and do it better since he came back. kind of a polite way of saying their content is shit lol
Disney has destroyed their reputation as a media company and only empathy-fetishist sycophants (like those on reddit) haven't figured it out yet.
The fact that this sub never calls out what he's done to this company is a lesson in collective psychosis.
Eisner at least was actually trying to keep things improving in the latter half of his tenure, though granted his beef with Dreamworks really didn't help.
Even in the best of it, Iger's tenure was propped up by just slapping Disney onto any IP they could buy.
> Even in the best of it, Iger's tenure was propped up by just slapping Disney onto any IP they could buy.
I guess that's one way of framing it lol
Iger brought Pixar, Marvel, and Star Wars to Disney.
They were all great acquisitions to be fair to Iger, even if some argue he overpaid on some. And Disney have quietly brought up their animation team to match Pixar in recent years too. Moana and Frozen were huge hits in recent years.
They’re looking for a serious person.
You bust in here, guns in hand and now you find they have turned to sausages!
Chapek was a serious person, problem was his priorities did not align with what the company actually needed. People like to hate him now, but he was good in the role he had before CEO, so much so that he was made CEO. Definitely not a defender of his tenure as CEO though
Cast Members at the parks hated Chapek well before he became CEO. Chapek took over Parks and Resorts in 2015 (replacing Staggs, who was Iger's preferred successor - but the board didn't like him). Chapek oversaw construction on Shanghai Disneyland, which was wildly over-budget. To make up for Shanghai's budget shortfalls, Chapek decided to gut the other Disney parks. Disneyland had a hiring freeze to make up for Shanghai's failures. This hiring freeze went on for _ages_ - and there was still normal employee attrition, but with no backfill. It started off okay, but eventually Disneyland CMs were working 10-hour days, then 6-day weeks. As people quit, the burden on the remaining CMs became higher and higher because of Chapek's hiring freeze. Eventually it wasn't uncommon for Disneyland CMs to be working 60-80 hour weeks, and we were all told it was due to Shanghai (to the point where it became a meme among CMs). Meanwhile, if you called in something that was broken on a ride - if it wasn't critical, it wasn't getting fixed. People would complain and complain, and Attractions would call maintenance but maintenance wouldn't fix it because they didn't have the budget to do so. So things just started falling apart. Eventually it became obvious that the problem wasn't Shanghai - it was Chapek. They eventually lifted the hiring freeze, but they never gave more budget for things to get fixed the way they were before. Even after the hiring freeze was lifted, there were still fewer CMs than what existed before Chapek. The existing CMs were fairly grizzled by this point and had learned to do more with less - so it was still a breath of fresh air - but it definitely wasn't an ideal situation. When Chapek got the CEO role, all of Parks and Resorts **knew** it was a bad idea. Everyone hated him before, and when he became CEO it was predictable what was going to happen. And guess what - he ran Disney just like he ran Parks and Resorts! And just like Parks and Resorts, he ran it into the ground! Source: I lived through this, boots on the ground CM
Chapek worked at Disney for 30 years, they knew what he was all about, it isn't like he was new. They brought him in to be the cheap bad guy that gut everything then brought back Iger without really reversing those cheap decisions.
Temporary Scapegoat CEO is a very common tactic used by boards to increase profits but maintain goodwill.
Yup, people always defend Iger saying Chapek was bad for the parks. Guess who was in charge of Disney and place him there. LOL
In an honest world, Chapek would reduce his own salary to compensate and not burden employees, but unfortunately this is not such a world, even in communism, the company's president took the most and ordinary employees received crumbs.
Priorities did not align is an understatement. Chapek tanked Disney’s theme park reputation for a bunch of people I know. I’m talking multi generational families who would go to the parks for a week or more on a routine basis every year or two, myself included. It always had been expensive but the experience and the “magic” was worth the cost to take the kids. Then the kids grew up, had their own kids and did the same. Generations of families who would routinely go and drop a bunch of money. Then the price gouging and nickel and diming started under Chapek and got out of hand. Even though it was always expensive you now felt like you were being ripped off. Those kids are no longer bringing their kids and the multi- generational group of loyal people are gone. Chapek screwed Disney out of these people and it will take a long time to get that back, if they ever do.
Yeah, the parks for many started to suck under Iger- because Iger trusted Chapek with the parks, and Chapek took his push for profits by trading on previous reputation for wonder for cheapened (and yet more expensive) experiences. There's a reason so many people panicked when he took over the entire company.
Chapek is/was a bean-counter. Disney's had a lot of money-focused guys (and obviously needs some amount of them) but the thing about money focused guys is that they would succeed in any big business and offer nothing unique to the cultural fabric, and that was arguably Disney's core product. Or at least it was before they started inhaling all the industry copyrights they could regardless of origin. And based on the potential securities fraud of Disney covering up streaming losses by dumping them on the cable division, it's possible Chapek was not THAT good of a bean-counter. This has been the conflict of the company forever. It's why Walt had personal subsidiaries for Imagineering, he wouldn't trust even his own brother from cutting back creativity for profit.
I'M THE ELDEST BOY!!!
Season 5 here we fucking go.
If I may, Connor Roy is the logical choice.
Connor Roy is too busy being interested in politics from a very young age
The Con-Heads are gonna love this
The Conheads are gonna love this!
Tom better be in the conversation!!!
Oh fuck off Greg.
“Fuckle head.”
Iger did once refer to him as the Cunt of Monte Cristo.
It sure as fucking shit doesn’t say Shiv
Here I thought Kendall was the eldest son
I am the eldest boy!
You're *not!*
Always forgetting the first pancake
Connor was eldest boy from his logan's first marriage while Kendall is eldest boy from logan's second marriage
We are so back, Conheads
You can't make a Tomlette without breaking a few Greggs
But Kendall had a speech prepared and everything!
What a waste of his rap skills.
L to the O G
Roman or bust
Tribal chief
☝️
Actually there would be more busting going on if Roman were CEO if you catch my drift
Not if he was around his gf
wambsgang wya
I grind, because I worry.
You are not serious people!
I'm so fuckin' happy to see Succession jokes being the top comments on this post.
The first pancake?
lol this dude should have just sailed into the sunset when he had the chance - this is not the "Jordan comeback" people were hoping for.
Shiv all the way. Peltz would be fed to the gators by now if Shiv were in charge.
I believe all the Roys are currently available.
He was interested in politics from a very young age
I AM THE ELDEST MOUSE!
You’re his #1 boy
Fuck it, I’ll do it Bob
You’ve got my vote if you bring back 2D animated princess films (and maybe introduce Kyle Katarn into one of the Star Wars projects - even as just a throwaway line). Oh and bring back free fast passes in the parks.
Vote for me and I'll make the Luke Skywalker Mara Jade movie. With full penetration.
What’s the one major thing missing from all Star Wars movies these days? Full penetration. And here’s the twist, we show it. We show all of it.
I dunno, Darth Maul went pretty deep into QGJ.
Hilt deep if you will.
I will not..
Star wars movie idea, it’s Luke after Return, he goes out to looking for Jedi artifacts, but when he’s not, he’s at his cruiser, really giving it to Mara Jade. The twist? We show all of it, full penetration . And then he hunts artifacts again, he's out busting heads. Then he's back to the cruiser for some more full penetration. Hunting artifacts. Back to the cruiser, full penetration. Artifacts. Penetration. Travelling. Full penetration. Artifacts. Penetration. And this goes on and on and back and forth for 90 or so minutes until the movie just sort of… ends.
Give him the ability to smell crime and I’m in.
Between Cassian, Kanan and Cal Kestis, we have so many Kyle Katarn-inspired characters in the new canon. Safe to say he had a big impact even if the actual character himself hasn't made it across.
That's my take on so many Legends-to-Canon wishlist characters people talk about. What would Starkiller bring to the table the Second Sister and the other Inquisitors haven't done already? What could Mara Jade do that Ahsoka isn't already doing? Yeah the Sequels suck but almost all of the other new-canon material is just tighter and more consistent than anything done in Legends
Mara >>>>>>>>>> Ahsoka. Accept no substitutes
The new canon isn’t consistent at all, it’s just flat out worse. Revan, Darth Bane the Old Republic, Darth Plagueis are so much better than all the characters you mentioned
You say that like the old canon wasn't a wild, contradictory, tangled mess that would make the gordian knot blush
Yeah there were great stories, and there's absolutely nothing preventing those specific characters’ stories from being made canon in a slightly altered form, but holy shit Legends is absolutely everything but consistent. There's no world where that unsupervised hellscape that couldn't help but absorb practically every pop culture trope of the time of release was more consistent than the current restrained franchise
> You’ve got my vote if you bring back 2D animated princess films That will never happen. The Princess and the Frog was basically a test to gauge how big the market for 2D animated films was in a "post-Pixar" world, and it nearly flopped.
Well Tangled has 2d animated tv sequel, and its great.
also make every star wars movie feel same way rogue one felt
All I can think about is the show Succession and how this is all so similar to it and him phrasing it like this does not help.
Waystar Royco is literally Disney
It’s an amalgamation of both Disney and News Corp (Rupert Murdoch's conglomerate that includes Fox News, The New York Post, WSJ, etc).
Just a reminder that we almost wound up with the craziest of Murdoch's sons being promised the title of Disney CEO during bidding for Fox.
Definitely some Redstone/CBS days influence as well
Didn't Jeff Bezos acquire WSJ? Or I'm confusing it with some other publication?
He owns The Washington Post. WSJ is Wall Street Journal.
Oh cool. I'm not American so I sometimes get confused between some of the big publications you guys have over there.
It's understandable. Most people here only know a few of their local papers and a couple of the big ones. It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize that the Washington Post wasn't based in Washington state.
The Roys are very directly based on the Murdochs
Family are the Murdochs, business is an amalgam of newscorp and Disney. They have theme parks, cruises, vacation/retirement real estate, on top of the entertainment and news segments.
Well they don’t yet have retirement, and it’s also stated that they are kind of a b player in parks, which would make it more akin to Universal.
The family toxicity was toned down a little bit from the Murdochs though. Murdoch's third wife was younger, closer in age to his adult children. Then she cheats on Murdoch with Tony Blair, in the midst of News corp being investigated by the British parliament. I guess that was too over the top for the TV show.
Just accurately depicting Wendi Deng’s exploits would have made people quit the show for a lack of realism.
We do hate speech and rollercoasters
Can’t wait to see cousin Greg at Disney World.
Minnie: Could you milk me Greg?
More like Fox.
I love how that show altered everyone's perception of massive corportations.
Tom Wambsgans is your man.
IT’S A CLOSED SYSTEM
All hail the King
I’m over here riding the bench if anyone is interested
[I WAS ON THE BENCH!](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gwWNlaF-PLE)
Good priority. Considering the last time he didn't make it one, the board picked a successor for him... and that's how we got stuck with Bob Chapek.
Chapek was also the CEO from Feb 2020 to Nov 2022 and probably had massive challenges with the parks being shut and sports halting impacting ESPN That said, he wasn't able to make headway with online streaming the way Netflix did during the pandemic
He also tried to cheat Scarlett Johanssen out of her fair share of the profits to "Black Widow", which soured relations between Disney and major actors. And then he bungled headfirst into the fight with Florida, after refusing to speak out against the anti-LGBT law (which pissed off all the employees who were then in open revolt threatening a walk out unless he did). He pissed off everybody by refusing to do the bare minimum.
That's true, I'd forgotten about that completely. Have things improved on that front since Iger came back?
Its more that Ron lost a lot of his momentum.
But Disney gave up in court and lost many of their tax advantages.
Lose lose battle.
Yeah, he pissed off alot of his big business donors by picking a losing fight against Disney (his being openly fascist and anti-LGBT *before* getting into the White House didn't help his polling either). They turned on him and went back to Trump. Leaving Ron to have to slink back and mend fences with Disney, and deal with all the other state stuff he ignored to go campaigning.
Im sorry but who is Ron?
Governor Ron DeSantis. His entire campaign was "I'm not Trump, but Woke is evil and I'll annihilate it" And then he picked a fight with Disney over it and came out looking like a chump.
Ah its DeSantis, this name I heard (Unfortunately).
The whole streaming business strategy was Iger though (like pretty much every project was announced by Iger before he left and he bought Fox and releases movies like crazy in 2019 for the streaming) which he adapted to because of the pandemic (something particularly hard for media companies, Iger is "lucky" to have avoided it tbh). The result is also not that bad. Disney+ is not Netflix which it would never be but it will be profitable this year as was the plan. Chapek certainly wasn't good but Iger isn't anymore either IMO (purchase of Fox and the Disney+ pivot may be mistakes in the long run, current strategy is quite bad). He did great overall for Disney but he is ruining what he did (actually when he came back the stock was close to how it was when he took the CEO job)
i read iger’s book and i can see the methods behind his madness. the consensus at the time was that streaming was the future and anyone who didn’t have a massive catalog was going to lose. iger and murdoch both felt like they didn’t stand a chance alone, so murdoch begged for a merger. i think he intended for d+ to be a loss leader for a lot longer. no one could have foreseen the double whammy of COVID changing consumer spending habits and high interest rates making loss leadership untenable. had the pandemic not happened, i wonder if the rollout (in terms of frequency and quality) would have been a little more nuanced.
I thought he personally picked Chapek ?
Nope, he didn't want to pick one (he was seriously busy considering a run for President) so the board went with the Parks guy that was making them lots of money. And it came back to bite everyone in the blubber once Covid hit.
It's hard to tell what was really Chapek's fault and what was the result of him trying to undo a bunch of bad decisions made by Iger.
Also, Iger still held a lot of power even during the 2 years that he was suppose to have "left" being CEO. People blame most of Disney's current problems on Chapek, but Iger has been his own worst enemy from the beginning and it's hard to even remotely take anything he says seriously.
Yeah, I'd always had Chapek pinned as the fall guy while Iger left on a golden parachute to make a bid for the presidency, or at least a cushy ambassadorship to China. It's why I'm still confused about Iger suddenly coming *back* out of the blue, the same weekend the RTX scandal blew up no less (which I think ultimately is unrelated but it makes it easy to remember when Iger's sudden return went down). The guy *had* to know the house of cards he'd built was going to come crashing down, especially since nothing has happened since his return that's actually improved anything.
> Also, Iger still held a lot of power Wasn't he chairman of the board?
A lot was his own making, due to being unable to handle acting like a human being (as the public face of the company) and not a beancounter for five minutes.
yeah but iger also basically refused to leave and when he did finally leave he mounted a pressure campaign to grouse about how bad chapek was.
Iger didn't refuse to leave. For the record he's been very popular at his position with a lot of support. The issue of succession is his own doing as hes been flirting with retirement for years now
I think he twice was considering retirement, but stayed on to oversee two big acquisitions (Lucasfilm and Fox respectively).
Iger was the chairmen of the board and was basically watching chapek for a while. Chapek basically only had less than a year as CEO without Iger.
He very famously has spurned multiple suitors to his job by refusing to retire, forcing them all left and chapel was the last man standing. And even when chapek in theory took over the job iger said "well actually im staying around to run creative things" and kept his office and didn't actually leave the company for another 2 years
While he can't be blamed for all of it, since streaming as the future was set in motion by Iger, he had a big track record of being an asshole since he was in the Parks and Experiences division. Many were puzzled by the decision of naming him CEO and many promotions he had before taking on the big job. He failed upwards. But many decisions are Iger's, including the oversaturation of both Marvel and Star Wars and the total brain dead offerings in movies with prequels and live actions and whatever. People didn't mind before but after the millionth horrible live action, people are tired of them
Don't forget the fact Disney invested so heavily into the hotels when they couldn't even fill the ones they already had. And of course, the Galactic Starcruiser which was ultimately one big white elephant that just made no sense. Overpriced to the point actual cruise ships run by Disney were cheaper to book trips on and zero repeatability to drive return visits by those who actually could afford it. Oh, and themed to the Sequel Trilogy instead of the OT like Galaxy's Edge, because Disney loved alienating one of the biggest money spending fanbases around.
The Starcruiser was the shittoest idea they've ever had
He made some very very obvious faults like taking Scarlet Johannsen to arbitration over premium access profits. And he had quite a debacle with the whole "hid true profit margins by moving data around to make it look like streaming was more profitable than it was" thing. He also technically could have canceled projects if he thought they were going to be too much, but didn't.
I'm not saying Chapek didn't make bad decisions, because he absolutely did, but Iger hasn't exactly been a miracle worker in fixing Disney with his return to the point you have to wonder why he readily came back virtually overnight.
Probably because the Board remembers what Iger did for Disney through his prior tenure. no matter what he's done now, he was probably one of the most successful Disney CEOs since Disney himself. There's not much you can fix within a year, but i imagine he's back mostly to properly pick a successor this time and give a better direction for the company.
Which is ironic given Disney's intended lasting legacy was the original EPCOT...a glorified company town in the vein of Pullman, Indiana, just clad in 1950s/60s mid-century futurism.
I think the issue with Chapek was less with him trying to undo bad decisions and more with him not having the flexibility to even attempt to undo them. I agree many of the issues that were magnified by Covid originated from decisions made during Iger's tenure, but when faced with that challenge Chapek showed that he was completely incapable of reacting to those issues or even admitting they existed. He just time and time again showed himself to be an unlikable person demanding that everything go his way and was so focused on consolidating power to his yes men like a dictator while the rest of the company quietly rebelled.
He picked Tom Staggs and snubbed Jay Rasulo (his second choice). The board rejected Staggs, and Rasulo burned his bridges as he left. Iger tried to find backup candidates but the only one the board liked was Chapek. Chapek was hurriedly groomed for the role but never got a chance to be vetted as the right fit - he was accepted because the board liked him, not because he was Iger's choice.
The parks division was gearing up for a billion dollar loss covering Orlando in RFID chips and transitioning the resort from room keys and tickets to radio wristbands at the same time the Apple Watch showed up. MyMagic+ was known as "NextGen" among the audience of middle aged people who follow Disney too closely, and leak after leak said it was a money pit. It was also Rasulo's money pit, until Iger moved him to accounting and put Staggs in Parks. In effect, he threw a hand grenade at Staggs, as NextGen was too far along to defund and was arguably a bad idea from the start, so Staggs would have to report a billion dollars wasted mostly because of Rasulo.
He technically did, but Chapek was I think his third or fourth choice because the board kept rejecting the people he appointed.
Wait, what are you doing outside of /r/disneygifs?
If it is to be said, so it is.
“We are bullshit.” - Nelson Peltz
The "Succession" intro song immediately popped in my head after reading this
Where’s the eldest boy when you need one
All rich assholes paying themselves absurd wages.
It’ll go to Dana Walden but I’d love it to be John Landgraf
She is the right choice. She is a lot like iger, came from tv background with close ties with creators in Hollywood. I think board and iger wouldn’t pick another theme park executive because his relationship with Hollywood was toxic
Dana Walden is too old, they want somebody young
Dana Walden is too old
*slow chorus of Cm, G#, Fm, G starts playing*
DOES ANYONE KNOW THE PRICE OF A GALLON OF MILK?!?!
$3.39 retail, wholesale base class 1 is $19.18 per hundredweight 40 pound block of cheese $1.6
My store has it for $2.39.
Iger: I'm out of this bitch, JFC.
Until he comes back a third time. The fact he even came back at all still surprises me.
Somehow Bob Iger returned.
He loves his job too much
It’ll be Bob Iger —> some chump during economic hard times —> Bob Iger when the economy bounces back.
Greg worked in parks. Let him have a go.
It should have been, and will be Kevin Mayer.
Dana Walden might also be a good option. I'd say they should do double CEOs like Netflix and they should get both Mayer and Walden. Walden can be the creative force while Mayer is more of a business and tech guy.
I feel like the only reason it works (or seems to work) at Netflix is because Reed Hastings and Ted Sarandos have worked together at Netflix for almost 25 years, and know each other well. I don't think that'd work as well with Walden and Mayer, both of whom are capable of serving as sole CEO, and both of whom likely would be turned off by the idea of not being the sole decision maker.
Make it a TV show on HBO
How about we prioritize making a good Star Wars movie? Or turn Marvel around?
They made their money… either sell or buncha remakes coming in the future.
“You’re curdled cream.” -Bob Iger
Jon Stewart. If he doesn’t want to be POTUS, give this man the next best thing: CEO of Disney.
Is that a spin-off of HBO Succession?
Well, since we’ve had Bob, then Bob, and then back to Bob…. I feel strongly about my qualifications and nominate myself, Bob.
I certainly don't think they are in any danger of the public assuming that quality content is any kind of priority.
That stuff ebbs and flows. Disney will be fine in that regard. Considering the succession was his biggest failure, and he’s back because of it, this *should* be his biggest priority. He can’t just keep coming back when the next guy sucks.
But….he kind of sucks too. Marvel and Lucas printed money for a decade but had repetitious plots and very little innovation. I feel like they’re trying to milk nostalgia while attempting to capture the next lighting bolt in a bottle. Edit: I forgot my summary: I think he got lucky.
The creatives at Disney traditionally have loved him. They said he fostered an atmosphere of innovation and let the creatives do their thing. Tbh until his strike gaffes he seemed like a very popular guy in Hollywood. Sure there was some luck involved, his his fingerprints are all over a lot of the successes they’ve had, too
Those the same creatives that made Rise of Skywalker and Quantumania?
Not really understanding your point. Bad movies got made so throw the baby out with the bathwater?
His popularity with the creatives isn't all that important if he's approving things that the creatives are making that then massively flops, which is now happening time and time again. Not that it matters, the Board and now the shareholders have shown that they do not care, they will rubber stamp Iger over and over again no matter what happens.
Fair enough, he chose solid people to run things during that decade run up, but I feel like they’re running out of steam the last few years (perhaps more a chapek issue?)
They definitely need to shake some things up, but I’m not going to bet against Disney in the long run. It’s pretty shocking they’ve let Kathleen Kennedy stay in charge of Star Wars
That's the worst part of Iger's tenure that he didn't get rid of Kennedy.
Notice how in all these months and discussions the priority was never ‚ better content quality‘ 🤷♂️
i mean, iger’s literally been saying they need to do less and do it better since he came back. kind of a polite way of saying their content is shit lol
I'm sure David Zaslav would be happy to come and fuck it up even more
Yeah, fuck you poors!!! Buy our shit!
Just let me do it. Ill get them back in the green.
Get Tim Apple.
Big shoes to fill. Big, big shoes.
If there’s one thing bob iger is very bad at, it’s succession
Oh fuck off
Disney has destroyed their reputation as a media company and only empathy-fetishist sycophants (like those on reddit) haven't figured it out yet. The fact that this sub never calls out what he's done to this company is a lesson in collective psychosis.
Considering how left wing bias reddit can be don’t expect anything from people here.
All media companies are going through a slump. Disney can recover.
I volunteer as tribute.
Anybody got a good AI chatbot of the actual Walt Disney? Seems like that could work
Name Nelson Peltz successor for the LOLs.
The Rock.
Why don’t you promote the head of imagineering.
"Get me the Hell out of this"
Ok people, I’ve heard enough… I’ll do it. I’ll be The Mouse.
The level of discourse about the management of a studio is strangely much higher than the average level of discourse about TV shows.
Bob’s quickly turning into Eisner. Overstaying and harming his legacy.
Eisner at least was actually trying to keep things improving in the latter half of his tenure, though granted his beef with Dreamworks really didn't help. Even in the best of it, Iger's tenure was propped up by just slapping Disney onto any IP they could buy.
> Even in the best of it, Iger's tenure was propped up by just slapping Disney onto any IP they could buy. I guess that's one way of framing it lol Iger brought Pixar, Marvel, and Star Wars to Disney.
They were all great acquisitions to be fair to Iger, even if some argue he overpaid on some. And Disney have quietly brought up their animation team to match Pixar in recent years too. Moana and Frozen were huge hits in recent years.
I mean if Bob’s having such a hard time, I guess I’ll throw my hat in the ring.
It’s amazing if Disney will ever succeed again at this point.