Published Jul 18, 2026, 12:05 PM EDT
Brennan Klein (he/him) is a senior news writer at Screen Rant, host of the Attack of the Queerwolf podcast, and contributor at Alternate Ending and Horror Press. He has been writing and podcasting about pop culture (especially horror movies) for over a decade at platforms including Blumhouse, Fangoria, Dread Central, The Backlot, and Arrow in the Head.
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Moana is staying afloat at the box office.
2026’s Moana is Disney’s live-action remake of their 2016 movie of the same name, featuring Dwayne Johnson reprising his role as the demigod Maui opposite a new ensemble cast that includes Catherine Laga’aia, Rena Owen, John Tui, and Frankie Adams. Perhaps because it comes just 10 years after the original movie and less than two years after Moana 2, the remake had a disappointing domestic opening weekend of $43.1 million that drew dangerously close to the $42.2 million domestic debut of Disney’s 2025 live-action flop Snow White, putting it on a path to lose up to $100 million.
However, *Moana *is showing reasonably solid retention during its sophomore weekend. Per Variety, it is projected to end Sunday with a 3-day domestic total of $5.5 million, which sees it dropping a relatively slim 56%. If its current projections hold, it will officially earn the lowest week 2 drop for a direct Disney live-action remake since 2019’s Aladdin.
This does not include prequels, as both 2024’s Mufasa: The Lion King and 2021’s Cruella had smaller sophomore drops, with the former rising 3.9% and the latter falling just 48.8%. However, Mufasa benefited from the fact that it debuted during the Christmas season, when movies have unusually strong retention, while Cruella debuted during a pandemic-depressed box office period during which there was very little competition from other theatrical releases.
Below, see a breakdown of the week 2 box office performance of the direct Disney live-action remakes between the debut of 2019’s Aladdin and now:
However, even if the Moana remake maintains similar retention throughout its theatrical run, it seems highly unlikely that it will ever break even. While it could reduce its losses from last weekend’s $100 million projections, it is still hampered by its enormous reported budget of $250 million, which is paired with a reported marketing spend of roughly $100 million. Because movie theaters keep half of ticket sales, this likely places the remake’s estimated break-even point at a whopping $700 million.
Only six of Disney’s direct live-action remakes have ever grossed more than $700 million worldwide (The Jungle Book, Alice in Wonderland, Lilo & Stitch, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, and The Lion King), and all of them had domestic debuts of more than $90 million. Considering the fact that Moana started with less than half of that number, it seems unlikely that even unprecedented retention would push it past its break-even point.
Regardless, it does seem that the new movie is developing solid word-of-mouth. While critics’ ***Moana ***reviews earned it a dismal 31% score on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer, audiences are rating it considerably higher. In fact, it has already received more than 1,000 verified user reviews, which have earned it a Verified Hot score of 89%. It also has a CinemaScore of A-, which is tied with Alice in Wonderland, just slightly below the A scores earned by The Jungle Book, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, and Lilo & Stitch, and above Snow White’s B+.
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Dana Ledoux Miller, Jared Bush
Beau Flynn, Dwayne Johnson, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Dany Garcia, Hiram Garcia