This article almost feels like gaslighting.
Disney has put out a ton of content that follows the same power. It generally can be summarized as "put out overpriced mediocre garbage, hamfist some culture war stuff in there, and then imply anyone who doesn't like it is some sort of deplorable.
This movie:
- Had a budget of at least 270 million, meaning that it would have to make like 700 million to be considered a success
- Looks mediocre as all hell regardless
- The Dwarves are CGI monstrosities that feel more at home in a horror movie. This is because Disney kept pivoting to dumber decisions based off petty internet drama.
- The decision to cast a Latina in a movie where the actress is explicitly white is on some level a deliberate decision to start culture war drama. Disney has had multiple WoC as princesses for over twenty years now, so it's not like they didn't have other movies they could have adapted
- They made Zegler look a lot less attractive than she is IRL via poor wardrobe choices, while managing to capture Gadot's beauty.
- Israel aside, I have zero idea why Gadot is cast in this. She's like the female version of the rock in that she's only really good in stupid action movies that take absolutely minimal acting abilities
- I understand Lemmy is super pro-Palestinian. However the general viewing public is a lot more divided, and many people simply don't want modern politics in a movie they take their small children too. This is the kind of shit you say at a premier of a small budget film, not something that has to gross hundreds of millions of dollars
- Zegler also harassed Gadot on set, despite the fact that she was trying very hard to not bring politics into the workplace. Again I understand Lemmy might think that's amazing, but most working people recognize that as the kind of shit they put in an HR training video
- Zegler also seemed to go out of her way to insult hardcore fans of the show. This is especially egregious because hardcore fans are the type of people to see an IP no matter how bad this is.
- Unlike Joker where you can just dodge criticism by calling fans of the original incels, hardcore fans of Snow White tend to be gay men and white women. The end result was a lot of the outrage came in the form of gossip influencers throwing shade, which the Disney PR machine was not prepared to counter.
The most ridiculous part of this is the trailer for Lilo and Stich, a movie that is a million times more minority forward than the Snow White remake, dropped to largely positive reception. 2024 is going to be simultaneous "Snow White failed because of bigotry" and a movie centered around two woman of color, and unconventional definition of family, and Hawaiian culture prints money hand over fist.