POLL: Talk of Bob Igor returning to CEO position.

[tarheelalum]

I’m hearing rumors Igor may return to the CEO position soon. Would you welcome Bob back if it’s true? Personally I think just about anyone would do better at this point. What’s your opinion?

[Mr Wiggins]

An excerpt from the CNBC story...

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10 media execs, under the cloak of anonymity, predict 2022′s industry-shaking events

CNBC
December 18, 2021

...It hasn’t even been two years since Bob Chapek took over as Disney’s CEO. But one executive told CNBC there are already internal wagers at Disney about Iger returning.

Iger, 70, repeatedly extended his contract after planning to retire in 2015, 2016 and 2018 before abruptly stepping down in 2020. He’s still Disney’s executive chairman until the end of the year.

It’s unclear if Iger wants to return. He’s already working on a second book, according to The Hollywood Reporter, after publishing one in 2019.

But Disney shares have stumbled this year, down nearly 20% year to date. Iger owns a lot of those shares. The board and Iger may get restless if Disney+ growth stagnates and the company continues to have turf tensions between executives.

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Meanwhile, the petition to fire Bob Chapek has passed 85,000 signatures.

[Spongeocto4]

While Iger could be reinstated, I can't see him running the company forever. If it were to happen, it would only be a temporary fix. Iger's era is still ending either way.

One possible outcome I could see, is Christine M. McCarthy, the current CFO, assuming the merged role of CEO/CFO. She just publicly signed a contract to 2024. I see her being a "Plan B", if things go south next year.

[Mr Wiggins]

From the Variety article "Bob Iger Makes His Disney Exit as a Titan of Transformation"...

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VARIETY: Bob Chapek has some pretty big shoes to fill. What would you say he needs to do to continue growing Disney and keep the company ahead of the curve?

IGER: Bob has to make a lot of those decisions himself. As the world changes and continues to be disruptive, he will be faced with circumstances, challenges and opportunities that are going to be very different than those I’ve been faced with. So he’s going to have to be facile. He’s going to have to have the ability to adapt to a changing time. I’m not presuming he has to do this a certain way. The one thing I have exhorted Bob and everybody else at the company to do is to keep those creative fires burning.
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And from the Hollywood Reporter article "Bob Iger's Long Goodbye"...

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One Disney veteran — not a Chapek fan — compares a lunch with Iger to a lunch with Chapek. “A conversation with Iger was, ‘Where can I help you? Did you watch this new Icelandic thriller on Netflix? I just finished this book about Churchill.’ Bob Chapek is all about business. He sits at lunch, there is 60 seconds of small talk about his home in Key West, and then it’s all Bob sending messages about how things are going great. He is on-message.”
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[xPhoenix]

Per the above-cited article, ain't gonna happen. If you read the article, you can see that Iger is ready to retire.

[xPhoenix]

Also, other than some concerns about Genie plus, I think the new Bob is doing "ok". Maybe give him 2022 to see what he's like when he's not just trying to make sure the company stays afloat through a crisis.

[WaltDisney'sAlec]

Per the above-cited article, ain't gonna happen. If you read the article, you can see that Iger is ready to retire.

Yeah the Variety piece (and every other podcast he's done) are just him talking about how he hasn't taken a day off in 20 years and that sounds genuinely so depressing I can't imagine he'll come back.

[merlinjones]

How about defrosting Walt?

[Mr Wiggins]

How about defrosting Walt?

Please don't do that. Walt spinning in his grave has been powering half of the So Cal electric grid for the last 30 years. If he's defrosted we'll have a major blackout.

[savarese04]

such irresponsible journalism. 10 executives interviewed about fantastic predictions for 2022. the other predictions were equally asinine but all fun to read. disney bloggers are the lowest common denominator of stupid with all the pandering for clicks (with apologies to the micechat crew who are miles better than that). it's like they have a google alert set up that tells them whenever disney is mentioned and they all post without actually reading.

these are people who failed book reports because they read the first and last chapters.

[Mr Wiggins]

^ It's not purported to be journalism. It's speculation.

Regardless of whether 2022 will see him replaced, nearly everyone agrees that Bob Chapek is bad news for Disney's domestic parks.

[WaltDisney'sAlec]

^ It's not purported to be journalism. It's speculation.

Regardless of whether 2022 will see him replaced, nearly everyone agrees that Bob Chapek is bad news for Disney's domestic parks.

Yeah, I think the takeaway here is less about Iger's return and more about how everyone in the industry sees Chapek failing at the job.

[Spongeocto4]

^ It's not purported to be journalism. It's speculation.

Regardless of whether 2022 will see him replaced, nearly everyone agrees that Bob Chapek is bad news for Disney's domestic parks.

I think Disney's film studios might be in a worse condition than the parks. In 2019, a whopping 7 Disney films made the top 10 international grossing films of the year. But in 2020, movies went straight to streaming because of the pandemic. In the end, Disney didn't have any on top 10 list internationally (Onward still made the domestic list.) Sure, Disney would of lost money by not streaming the movies, but for some reason Chapek thought a $30 price tag was great idea. Or better yet, no price tag! Free with Disney+!

You would think Disney would priortize theaterical runs this year, but they foolishly chose hybrid releases & streaming only. releases (Pixar has been regulated to Disneytoon Studios status) Because of this, only 2 Disney movies have cracked the top 10 international gross. (Shang-Chi & Eternals). It's no surprised that those films made the list, considering their Disney+ debut were both delayed.

Meanwhile, Encanto has only racked in $179 Million, but the film will still be going straight to streaming. Only 1 month after its' release. Compare this to the theatrical exclusive run of Spider-Man: No Way Home, which has already made $750 Million in just one week. The film is already the 4th highest film of year. Sure, Disney will get 25% of the revenue(at least $187.5 Million ), but that's a bit embarrassing for streaming happy Chapek.

And if the rumor was true, maybe Kevin Feige was right about fighting for theatrical releases for the Marvel movies...

[Eagleman]

^ It's not purported to be journalism. It's speculation.

Regardless of whether 2022 will see him replaced, nearly everyone agrees that Bob Chapek is bad news for Disney's domestic parks.

GEEE..."NO MORE BOB's"..........imo

[Tamandua]

Yeah the Variety piece (and every other podcast he's done) are just him talking about how he hasn't taken a day off in 20 years and that sounds genuinely so depressing I can't imagine he'll come back.

I can't imagine his job has been that hard. I'm sure he's exaggerating. I'd love to have a job where I have to take meetings with some of the world's most interesting people and have total access to resorts that people pay thousands of dollars to visit. I mean, the guy got paid tens of millions of dollars to do what many people only wish they could do for free. Poor Iger. He's sacrificed so much for us.

[linkeq2001]

such irresponsible journalism. 10 executives interviewed about fantastic predictions for 2022. the other predictions were equally asinine but all fun to read. disney bloggers are the lowest common denominator of stupid with all the pandering for clicks (with apologies to the micechat crew who are miles better than that). it's like they have a google alert set up that tells them whenever disney is mentioned and they all post without actually reading.

these are people who failed book reports because they read the first and last chapters.

Take the article with a grain of salt, but where there’s smoke there’s likely fire even if it’s just embers starting to burn. Disney is in absolute disarray these days. The head of imagineering “retires” and is replaced with a Chapek minion with zero experience, they lost tons of senior imagineers with the forced switch to Florida, the Disney studio that just opened in Vancouver is struggling to attract talent (several family members and friends along with their friends have been asked and most have said no preferring to stay at their current studios, complete 180 from the Pixar studio years ago). So while their films are still doing well at the box office the machine that pumps them out isn’t. But in the end it’s all about the dollars so we will see.

[jish5555]

The issue with Iger is that he was purely focused on business and expansion, which helped in some cases, but really hurt the films and parks overall. A lot of content that came out under Iger's tenure felt like it was there to make a profit and not to continue on with the creation aspect that we had seen in the past. This is why so many implementations were focused around IPs and not original material, be it in film, series, or parks.

[tarheelalum]

So it's not just fans that clearly see Chapek failing, but also his peers. So with everyone seeing Chapek failing, and the stock price in a constant nose dive, when will the board see it? Or rather how long will they tolerate it? I do not see any chance Chapek makes it through 2022.

[Eagleman]

So it's not just fans that clearly see Chapek failing, but also his peers. So with everyone seeing Chapek failing, and the stock price in a constant nose dive, when will the board see it? Or rather how long will they tolerate it? I do not see any chance Chapek makes it through 2022.

IMO in mid January of the new year.......I see a change over......imo
But right now the over all stock market, is not doing well .
I also Take the article with a grain of salt.......

[Spongeocto4]

IMO in mid January of the new year.......I see a change over......imo
But right now the over all stock market, is not doing well .
I also Take the article with a grain of salt.......

I say they'll give him at least 3 to 6 months, before potentially giving him the boot. The stock numbers have leveled off, but have not recovered to early fall's numbers.

January to May will be an interesting time frame to see what Chapek does. Will he make an awards push for the Oscars, or will he snub the whole thing by by having ABC cancel the program? Will he release Turning Red in theaters or demote it to Disney+ status for the 3rd consecutive Pixar film? Will he add more "Disney Stores in Target" in 2022 or scrap that idea and suggest to Target CEO Brian Cornell to close some Target stores next year (despite Disney not owning Target, but admit it everyone, you can see him make that kind of blunder!).