You Can Now Stream the Biggest Box Office Flop of All Time on Disney+

For a film that lost Disney close to $200 million, John Carter's digital afterlife is downright bizarre. But before you fire it up for a rewatch, or maybe even your first-ever viewing, it's worth asking: how did a movie this ambitious, based on a sci-fi legacy that predates Star Wars, crash this hard?

The $300 Million Misfire

Let's get the numbers out of the way:

• Production Budget: $307 million
• Worldwide Box Office: $284 million
• Estimated Loss: ~$200 million write-down by Disney

That's not just a bad day at the office—that's the kind of red ink that gets executives fired. In John Carter's case, it helped push Disney studio chief Rich Ross out the door. And it's a miracle the marketing chief didn't join him in exile.

A Franchise 100 Years in the Making

John Carter wasn't some random, half-baked IP. It was based on Edgar Rice Burroughs' 1912 classic A Princess of Mars. This pulp series shaped modern sci-fi before George Lucas or Frank Herbert ever dreamed up their universes. Star Wars, Dune, even Avatar owe their DNA to Burroughs' Barsoom.

But instead of leading with that, Disney's marketing made the baffling choice to hide the source material entirely. No mention of the author. No of Mars in the title. Just John Carter. Which sounds less like a space epic and more like a dude you'd hire to install your gutters.

The Title That Killed It

Redditors still roast the title to this day. One nailed it:

"Buena Vista Pictures presents Edgar Rice Burroughs' A Princess of Mars. That would've sold more tickets than John Carter, some guy maybe?"

And that's not just hindsight. The confusion was real. As one Redditor said, "I kept confusing John Carter with Jack Reacher." Another chimed in: "I'd read the books and didn't make the connection until five minutes into the movie."

A Masterpiece of Bad Marketing

The marketing was a masterclass in how to bury a movie:

• The first trailer? Moody, confusing, no clear plot.
• Super Bowl ad? Random Zeppelin music slapped over CGI.
• Main character? Generic title, zero connection to the sci-fi classic.
• Merch, theme park tie-ins, Disney Channel hype? Nowhere to be found.

Even Andrew Stanton, Pixar veteran and the film's director, admitted the "of Mars" was pulled out of the title because focus groups said boys wouldn't go see a movie with "princess" or "Mars" in the title. The result? Nobody knew what the hell John Carter was.

Disney Didn't Need John Carter to Succeed

Here's the extra sting. By the time John Carter bombed, Disney was already buying Star Wars outright. They didn't need their own space saga anymore—they owned the actual space saga. And just months after Carter's release, Stanton was quietly moved back to Pixar to direct Finding Dory, which went on to make over $1 billion.

The Cult Following It Never Earned in Theaters

Yet if you browse Reddit or pop culture forums today, there's a stubborn crowd that insists John Carter is secretly good.

One fan described it as "a good cheap beer on a hot day"—not life-changing, but reliably entertaining.

And there's some truth to that. The movie has charm, great production design, and Willem Dafoe doing motion capture as a 12-foot-tall green alien named Tars Tarkas. Plus, the underrated Lynn Collins gives the film a much-needed jolt as Dejah Thoris, Princess of Mars (even if the studio kept softening her character during reshoots).

The Sequel That Never Happened

Stanton had grand plans. He teased fans years later with plot details for the sequel, The Gods of Mars, involving Carter and Dejah's child being kidnapped and a secret civilization beneath Mars' surface. But with Disney losing the rights to the property in 2014, those sequels are permanently dead.

Still, the irony remains: Disney+ is home to the one movie the company would probably rather forget. Yet there it is, quietly streaming alongside the Star Wars movies it tried to compete with—and lost.

So if you want to see the biggest box office flop of all time, you know where to find it. And who knows? You might even like it. Most people who've watched it actually do.