The first Disney+ Original Film sequel is set to stream in just under 48 hours from now. Despite the date, poster, and trailer releasing over a month ago, Disney never bothered to publish a Coming Soon page in its coming soon row. Plenty of Original films get this privilege, but Hollywood Stargirl joins March’s Cheaper by the Dozen as being a film they didn’t deem worthy of in-app promotion.
As we’ve said almost daily via tweets since November when the Coming Soon row launched, Netflix would NEVER skip a page for an original title and they release 100 originals a month! We’ve mentioned this exact fact to their communications team, publicists, and even Marketing head Asad Ayaz multiple times via e-mail or tweet. It’s definitely a problem and it reflects poorly on all of them that it hasn’t improved in the 8 months since the Coming Soon row launched.
That’s why we’ve made it our priority project for months to get them to properly use their Coming Soon feature. We gave up long ago on our original focus: actually adding Walt Disney era content on Disney+ or showing respect to Gen X, Baby Boomers, etc by adding classic content they expected at launch. We’ve accepted that they just don’t care about their library and that Originals are the only thing they focus on anymore. In theory, this Coming Soon issue should be much easier to fix.
Disney+ Disappoints
That’s the thing about Disney+ – they have many, many small issues (such as incorrect episode orders, aspect ratios, and metadata) but don’t fix ANY of them which results in the service as a whole appearing unpolished and uncaring. Despite what their head of Operations has assured me multiple times, it just doesn’t seem to be true that they care about presentation. We’re 2.5 years into a service that has never fixed an aspect ratio that isn’t The Simpsons and stopped fixing episode orders over a year ago after doing just a few shows. Now we have a feature people were so excited about when it launchd that is regularly ridiculed by Disney+ subscribers for providing almost no “coming soon” titles.
Do we expect any of our efforts to change anything? Of course not. Disney execs have fingers in their ears at all times. This entire thing is about principles. We fight to get them to add each missing original from the Coming Soon row because they can’t seem to figure out how to do this simple task. They operate a more proper Coming Soon row on Disney.com which is what makes it even more bizarre!
The feature is such a wasted tool compared to Netflix, HBO Max, and Apple TV+ that we’d like to see them start using it correctly. If it requires us to keep fighting, we will. They’re so reliably inadequate that we have an entire page tracking the many originals they blow off.
Nobody can blame us because we’ve been fighting for this title for weeks. Here is a partial timeline.
April 28 – We published an article that was basically a “second report” as nobody else covered People’s scoop until we did. In the article, we specifically asked them to add a Coming Soon page swiftly.
April 29 – We submitted feedback via help.disneyplus.com Asking them to please provide a Coming Soon page for Hollywood Stargirl and 4 other titles.
May 14 – We tweeted at the marketing man himself, Asad Ayaz asking him to please help.
May 21 – We tweeted at @DisneyStreaming twitter a few issues with the Coming Soon row. They have not fixed any yet.
May 23 – We e-mailed the Hollywood Stargirl publicist, pleading with her to get help get the film uploaded for promotion.
We also contacted the publicist of Rise, releasing June 23rd. As you can see, that did nothing either. Will that film eventually get a page? At least there are still a few weeks to find out…
May 24 – We tried again, tagging DisneyStreaming in another thread looking at how Apple TV+, HBO Max, and Netflix are able to figure out their Coming Soon features.
May 26 – We tagged the Stargirl twitter in another desperate attempt for someone who can actually do things at Disney+ to see it or take action.
We also tweeted Asad Ayaz again. We even contacted Grace herself asking her to “get her agents” on Disney’s case about not promoting her film in-app.
It’s clear they don’t care at all. Sorry, Hollywood Stargirl. Maybe next time.
Drew Ryan is a film, TV, and Disney geek. He has degrees in English, Student Personnel Administration, and Library & Information Science from Lawrence University, Concordia University-Wisconsin, and University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Interested in the minutia and licensing of streaming service content, he is always publishing lists, suggestions, and advocating for Disney’s missing library to be added to Disney+. Drew subscribes to Disney+, Hulu, Netflix, HBO Max, and Paramount+. You can find him waxing nostalgic over classic Disney Channel or geeking out over Marvel, CW shows, & Disney on Twitter.
