Disney’s ‘Snow White’ Live Action Remake Bombs At The Box Office… Even More Than Anticipated

Could this signal the end for Disney’s run of live action remakes?

Assuming that might be a stretch, considering that the house Mickey Mouse built has been pumping out live action versions of their classic films since the late 1990s. The very first time Disney did so was with the Jungle Book in 1994. Since then, they’ve added 21 other films to their list of remakes, with the most successful being 2019’s The Lion King.

Just a side note, I’ve only ever seen the live action Lion King movie… haven’t ever seen the original cartoon version. That usually upsets people, so I thought I’d include it…

The latest entrant into the live action remake list is Disney’s controversial-from-the-get-go Snow White remake. It was originally supposed to hit theaters in March of 2024, and instead was pushed back to March of this year (it just premiered last Friday). Disney blamed the delay on the SAG-AFTRA Strike in 2023… but many assume it’s actually because of the backlash and controversy that’s surrounded the film from the get-go.

Here’s the trailer:

Magic mirror on the wall, show us the story that started it all Disney’s #SnowWhite is only in theaters March 21, 2025. pic.twitter.com/88u2KkyZh6

— Walt Disney Studios (@DisneyStudios) December 3, 2024

One of the first things that caused an uproar online was the casting of Rachel Zegler for the role of Snow White, who is of Polish and Colombian decent. The racial backlash that came from that was ugly, with many saying that the modernized movie had strayed too far away from the original source that described the Disney princess as having “skin as white as snow.”

And Zegler didn’t help herself when, while she was promoting her new Snow White film, the actress bashed the 1937 version. She stated that the original “scared” her, and implied that the trope of a prince saving a princess was outdated. Zegler even suggested that the prince was a stalker, and that the new version of the movie decided to skip the “weird” kiss that breaks the curse Snow White is under in the original.

At one point, there was some belief that Disney would punt on the Snow White project altogether. After all, the original teaser trailer that they put out was one of the most disliked and downvoted trailers of all time (not exaggerating there). However, Walt Disney Studios opted to keep the train moving… though at one point they interestingly ditched the dwarfs.

That’s been quite possibly the slipperiest of the slopes that the live action remake has faced: what to do with the dwarf characters. Obviously, the original story is titled Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. You know… Bashful, Doc, Dopey, Grumpy, Happy, Sleepy, and Sneezy. They’re critical to the story, but Disney wasn’t sure how to handle the casting.

So they dropped the seven dwarves from the title altogether, and fearing that they would offend audiences, they chose to go full CGI with the dwarves, and refer to them in the film as “magical creatures.” Believe it or not, going the CGI route with the dwarves caused an uproar in the dwarfism community. Even Game of Thrones star Peter Dinklage came out and said it was confusing to not give the roles of the seven dwarves to… real people with dwarfism.

All that lead to a perfect storm (or not-so-perfect if you ask Disney) of people both hating the idea of the remake and vowing to not go to theaters to see it. Disney even scaled back the red-carpet premiere of the film in an attempt to draw less attention to it. Which is odd, considering that Disney sank $270 million into the movie’s production budget, and then threw another $100 million out the window with Snow White marketing. When you’ve got that much moolah invested, you’d think you would do everything you can to get eyes on the finished product.

But like I stated before, it seems as though Disney knew this film would be taking a loss. So they likely weren’t surprised that the movie only brought in $42.2 million domestically, and another $43.9 million globally. A movie’s success is often determined by it’s opening weekend (sales typically drop off in the weeks after), and as of right now, Snow White is in the box office bomb category being $284 million shy of breaking even.

And with the bad reviews pouring in (it’s the first Disney live action remake to receive less than an A-grade from the audience), the Rachel Zegler led film may come up painfully short of the $300 to $400 million goal. Despite the sleepy opening weekend, Disney and the cast of Snow White are still touting the project as the “number one movie in the world.”

I desire the level of delulu Rachel Zegler has pic.twitter.com/i7Fxq5xXKb

— Melanie King (@realmelanieking) March 25, 2025

Ironically, I’d imagine that most people would rather spend their time watching the 1937 original film than the new 2025 version.

Maybe Disney will learn the “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mantra after their latest live-action fiasco?