Disney Is Sitting Out The $8.3 Billion Genre Battle That’s Taking Over The Rest Of Hollywood

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Walt Disney Studios has consistently been Hollywood’s leading studio for years. In the past decade, they’ve achieved remarkable success by combining powerhouse franchises like Marvel and Star Wars with beloved animated films from Disney and Pixar. They’ve also found success with live-action versions of their classic cartoons and revivals of other popular stories.

After buying 20th Century Studios in 2019, Disney significantly strengthened its position as a major film producer. Popular franchises like Avatar, Planet of the Apes, Alien, and Predator are now key parts of Disney’s film schedule. This helped Disney become Hollywood’s highest-earning studio in 2025, with its movies collectively earning $6.6 billion.

Disney has a strong future lined up with several highly anticipated movies. Between now and 2027, audiences can look forward to films like The Mandalorian and Grogu, Toy Story 5, a live-action Moana remake, and Avengers: Doomsday. Further down the line, Disney plans another Avengers film, a new Star Wars movie, Frozen III, and films based on popular series Bluey and The Simpsons. With so much established content, Disney is well-positioned to continue delivering popular movies for years to come, spanning a wide range of genres.

Despite its many strengths, Disney is surprisingly missing out on a major trend: video game movies. With films like A Minecraft Movie proving incredibly popular, Hollywood studios are now prioritizing these projects, as the genre is worth over $8.3 billion. Disney’s reluctance to participate is unusual and could potentially harm the company’s long-term prospects.

Disney Is The Only Major Hollywood Studio Not Developing Video Game Movies

Hollywood is currently in a fierce competition to create the best video game movies, with major studios heavily investing in projects to win over audiences.

I’m really excited about what Sony is doing with video game adaptations! They’re leading the way, starting with a new Resident Evil movie this year directed by Zach Cregger. And get this – a live-action The Legend of Zelda is planned for 2027! Because they own PlayStation, they have so much potential, and they’re already working on adaptations of games like Helldivers, Bloodborne, Ghost of Tsushima, Horizon Zero Dawn, and Days Gone. Plus, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see another Uncharted movie starring Tom Holland sometime soon.

This year, Paramount will release the Street Fighter movie and the third Angry Birds Movie. They’re also developing several new Sonic the Hedgehog films, building on the franchise’s billion-dollar success, and are supporting the long-anticipated Call of Duty movie.

Following the success of the first films, Warner Bros. is planning sequels to both Mortal Kombat and The Minecraft Movie. Universal is likely to continue making Super Mario movies, and another Five Nights at Freddy’s film is in the works. Even A24 is joining the trend, with plans for a movie based on Elden Ring by Alex Garland, and a live-action adaptation of Death Stranding.

Both Amazon and Netflix are actively working on turning popular video games into movies. Amazon is planning films based on The Sims and Split Fiction, while Netflix has been developing live-action movies for Gears of War and Bioshock for quite some time. Beyond those, several other video game adaptations, like a Battlefield movie, are currently in the works without a studio attached. Plus, many video games are also being adapted into television series.

Despite having the financial resources and production capabilities through studios like Walt Disney and 20th Century, Disney has largely avoided making movies based directly on existing video games. While they’ve explored video game themes with films like Tron, Wreck-It Ralph, and Free Guy, these were original stories inspired by gaming, rather than adaptations of specific games.

Video Game Movies Have Become A Lot Bigger After Disney’s Last Attempt

Disney hasn’t made a video game movie in over ten years. Their last big attempt was the 2010 film Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time, starring Jake Gyllenhaal. Although it earned $336 million globally, it wasn’t profitable and received negative reviews from both critics and audiences.

Four years after its first attempt, Disney released the action film Need for Speed. While the movie earned $203 million at the box office – more than its $66 million production cost – critics didn’t like it. Disney quickly realized the challenges of making successful films in this unpredictable genre and decided to stop trying.

Disney is now facing a challenge because video game adaptations are becoming a much larger part of the movie industry. Hollywood studios are actively developing these films because they’ve proven to be successful and can create new, popular franchises.

Since Disney stepped back from video game adaptations, Sony proved their potential with Uncharted, earning over $400 million even during the pandemic. Five Nights at Freddy’s nearly reached $300 million despite being released on streaming at the same time. Sonic the Hedgehog 3 quickly surpassed $500 million, The Minecraft Movie exceeded $950 million, and Super Mario has become a massive $2 billion franchise.

As a huge movie fan, I’m seeing so many awesome video game adaptations coming out, and it feels like everyone but Disney is getting in on the action. Honestly, I think Disney’s missing a trick here. They have so much incredible source material just waiting to be turned into films, and ignoring it would be a huge mistake – it’s like they’re overlooking a real opportunity!

Disney Ignoring Video Game Movies Is A Risk

For years, movies based on video games had a reputation for being bad, but recent films are proving that reputation wrong. These adaptations are much better quality, and audiences are clearly enjoying them, as shown by their strong ticket sales. This success is leading some to believe that video game movies could become the next big thing in Hollywood, even surpassing superhero movies in popularity and profit.

Disney might struggle if it doesn’t start incorporating video game adaptations into its movie strategy. While the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Star Wars are currently successful, that won’t necessarily continue forever. Similarly, there’s a limit to how many Avatar sequels audiences will enthusiastically see, and how many James Cameron can even create. Disney needs new, original franchises, and relying on reboots and remakes isn’t the answer. Video games offer a promising path forward.

To really make this work, Disney will probably need to buy the rights to more video games. One major exception is Kingdom Hearts – Disney already owns this popular series created with Square Enix, and fans have been hoping for an animated movie based on the game for years. However, Disney hasn’t given any sign that they plan to make it.

Disney faces a challenge in finding popular franchises to adapt, similar to the broad appeal of games like Minecraft, Mario, and Sonic. Without the availability of Pokémon rights, there aren’t any clear frontrunners. Given their $1.5 billion investment in Epic Games in 2024, a movie adaptation of Fortnite would be a logical choice if Epic Games ever decides to pursue one.

Disney has a knack for recognizing popular trends early – they successfully jumped on the superhero wave with Marvel and revived Star Wars with Lucasfilm. However, they haven’t yet found success with video game adaptations. Now, Disney needs to embrace this growing genre or risk falling behind as the movie industry and audience preferences change.

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2026-04-25 22:09