7 Reasons Moana (2026) Bombed

7 Reasons Moana (2026) Bombed

Moana (2026) is the latest Disney live action remake to come out, and while some people were predicting this movie to make $1 billion, many people thought the film would bomb at the box office, personally I was in the latter category. We now have the opening weekend box office for the film, and it is looking like it is going to perform similarly to what Snow White did last year. Why did Moana (2026) bomb on opening weekend? 

• Reason #1: Moana’s live action remake is too soon: Ever since this movie was announced this was a big reason that people were talking about is that this remake is simply coming out too soon after the original. As of right now, the original animated movie is not even 10 years old, the movie turns 10 years old this November. Right there, remaking a movie just 10 years later is stupid. The other problem with that is Moana 2 came out in November 2024, less than two years ago we got a sequel to the animated movie. That movie did not get the best reviews, a lot of people view it as an inferior sequel, it it made over $1 billion. So, it was this movie that everybody went to see because they love the original and Moana (2016) is an incredibly popular film with little girls. Remaking Moana just 10 years later, does not have the cultural impact that it should. You look at why Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, and The Lion King make $1 billion, well it is because those movies are multi-generational. The original animated movies for those three films, came out 25-30 years earlier than the live action remakes. That means that the kids that grew up watching those movies and even saw them in the theater are now old enough to have kids that are the target audience for the live action remakes. But the kids that saw Moana in the theater that were like seven or eight years old, are now 17 and 18 years old and they do not have kids that can relive the magic they did when they were a child. 
  

• Reason #2: Disney’s Live Action Remakes Fatigue: This is an interesting one because sometimes this is a major reason, but other times the movie can beat the fatigue and beat $1 billion. I think we can look at 2025 from last year with Snow White bombing but also Lilo & Stitch which made $1 billion. But I think for all the live action remakes that have bombed or underperformed, you must mention fatigue for these live action remakes. Alice in Wonderland (2010) was the first major one to hit $1 billion, and we got several of them in the early 2010s. Right around 2017 when Beauty and the Beast (2017) made $1.3 billion Disney started cranking out these live action remakes. In 2019, we got Aladdin and The Lion King which both made $1 billion. Throughout the 2020s we have gotten so many live action remakes. So much so, that I feel like Moana (2026) was them scrapping the bottom of the barrel of trying to figure out which of their animated movies actually deserve a live action remake, the fact that Moana (2026) is coming out just 10 years later I think shows the desperation of Disney these days…

• Reason #3: Desperation Move: As soon as this was announced, it was clear that it was a desperation move on Disney’s part. They saw all the box office bombs they had so they announced several sequels to Pixar films plus some live action remakes, including Moana (2026) that clearly is not going to be making the money that Disney is hoping for. I think part of the reason why Moana (2026) is bombing is because I think audiences are starting to pick up on the fact that Disney is desperate when they’re remaking their animated movies less than 10 years after the original animated movies, 2 years after the animated sequel. Had more Disney’s films in the 2020s been $1 billion hits and were not bombs, then I do not know if Moana (2026) would have been green lit because Disney would not have been as desperate as they are now. The other thing related to this; I am convinced part of the reason this film is happening is because The Rock wanted to play Maui in live action before he got too old. That is what I am thinking here and so it is a desperation move on Disney’s part, but The Rock was pushing this film to happen so he could play Maui in live action. I do not know if that is true, but that would not surprise me at all.

• Reason #4: Busy Summer Season: Summer 2026 has been quite the summer where we have had multiple big giant studio films releasing every single week starting in May. Moana (2026) is the least blockbuster to hit theaters and clearly people are just burned. Part of the problem is you have so many family movies out right now. With this, Toy Story 5, and Minions & Monsters, and those films are doing MUCH better than Moana is. It means that there’s competition from other family movies that have better reviews and people are more interested in. Toy Story 5 is this multi-generational franchise that people have loved for 31 years now. Audiences love the chaotic energy of the Minions, so whenever there is a new movie out, they are interested in it. So, there’s direct competition with Moana with other big high profile family movies. The Odyssey is not direct competition; there’s not really audience overlap. But The Odyssey is going to pull Moana away from the major screens because that is a movie that everybody is excited about and they want to see it on the big screen. Spider-Man: Brand New Day is two weeks after that. Pretty soon, Moana is going to be a film that nobody is talking about because people have moved on to the next big blockbuster and they are the ones that people are more excited about. 

• Reason #5: Inflation on Movie Tickets: This one goes back to what I just talked about, but inflation on movie tickets keeps on going up and up which means it is getting harder and harder for families to buy tickets because it is so expensive. How this ties back to what I just talked about is when you have inflation in movie tickets but so much competition it means people are having to choose which movies they want to see. When clearly there’s more interest in other family movies such as Toy Story 5 and Minions & Monsters, Moana is the one that gets left behind because it was the last one to come out and it’s the one that people were the least interested in. Especially when we have The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New Day coming out later this month, they are having to figure out which movies they want to see and which movies they do not want to see. All of the movies that I mentioned have higher interest so they’re the ones that people go see and if they have time or the money to go see Moana, they might but it’s probably not a high priority for many people. Especially the people that do not have kids. 

• Reason #6: Negative Reviews: Going into 2026, I was not sure how well Moana (2026) would do. I was saying that if the movie gets good reviews like Lilo & Stitch then it will make $1 billion or at least be profitable, but if it gets negative reviews like Snow White then it is going to bomb. The reviews for the film have not been great. As of right now, on Rotten Tomatoes it has a 33% with 157 reviews counted. Ever since the score dropped, it has been in the 30s. The highest I saw it was at like 37% and the lowest was like 32%. When a movie gets negative reviews, there is less of a rush from people to go and check out this film. Had the film’s score been 25%-30% higher then maybe it would have done slightly better at the box office. But when you have a Rotten Tomatoes score that’s low, and worse than Snow White which was already a movie that people hated, it is not surprising that your film is going to bomb.

• Reason #7: Weak Marketing: Whenever there’s skepticism surrounding a film, good marketing can help the interest in the movie. Unfortunately, Moana simply did not have good marketing. Any time they dropped a trailer or a new piece of marketing, it was heavily criticized for looking fake and overly CGI. Despite mostly taking place on islands where they can easily shoot there, they decided to shoot on green screens. There was a lot of talk with the first shots of Dwayne Johnson in a wig which looks weird and clearly looks like a wig. When the whole conversation surrounding the new trailers is nitpicking the small things and not admiring the scope and storytelling of the film or the fact that it is being adapted into live action. If the marketing were good and the conversation surrounding the trailers was better the excitement going into the film opening weekend would be much higher.