The Four Color Media Monitor

That's what Forbes is reporting, as it turns out one of the biggest flops in the Marvel movie franchise had quite a case of employees not receiving equal pay:

Disney has lifted the curtain on the disparity in pay between workers on its 2023 sci-fi superhero movie The Marvels.

Based on characters from Marvel Comics, the film starred Teyonah Parris, Iman Vellani and Oscar-winner Brie Larson as super-powered crime-fighters who unintentionally switch places after coming into contact with an other-worldly artefact.

The movie was the 33rd instalment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the first to feature women in all the main roles as the trio of leading ladies squared off against an alien antagonist played by British actress Zawe Ashton. It was directed by Nia DaCosta, who helmed 2021 horror hit Candyman, making it the first Marvel movie with a Black woman director. Although it was a showcase for diversity in front of the camera, it was a different story behind the scenes.

Filings from Disney show that just 34.8% of the 621 crew members who worked on the movie were women and their average hourly pay was 23.8% lower than men’s.

[...] The information about The Marvels was collected on April 5, 2021 shortly before filming began. Not only does the data show that the average hourly pay of women on the crew was 23.8% less than men received but it was even lower when taking the middle number if hourly pay is ranked from highest to lowest. Using that measurement, women's hourly pay was 25.2% lower than men’s. What's more, just 17% of the jobs in the highest hourly pay category were held by women and they only occupied 26.1% of the positions in the second-highest hourly pay category.

Disney was recently hit with a civil rights complaint accusing it of sidelining white men in order to ensure that half of its actors and creatives come from "underrepresented groups" so it would seem logical for it to have ensured that a similar target was set for women behind the scenes on The Marvels as it was such a prominent showcase for diversity.

It seems like a missed opportunity for Disney which has instead become an own-goal. It's especially surprising as the company is also currently facing a class-action lawsuit alleging that it paid female workers less than their male counterparts.

The lawsuit was lodged by approximately 9,000 female Disney employees in California making it the largest ever class-action case certified under California’s Equal Pay Act, which prevents gender-based pay discrimination. It covers employees from the Disneyland theme park and hotels, the cruise line, the Disney film and TV studios, ABC, Marvel, Lucasfilm and other units aside from Pixar, ESPN, Hulu, Fox and FX.

Wow, the movie may have been one of the biggest woke jokes of the Marvel movie series, but this is really taking the joke to a whole new low level, as it makes clear nothing's changed regarding Hollywood's whole approach to employment and wages. In other words, it was all just a big virtue-signal that didn't add up to anything.

Both the Capt. Marvel movie and The Marvels sequel look to be forgotten in coming years, but they may be remembered as the hugest hypocrisies in terms of employment wages for women. Maybe this is why it's better to just work on independent movies and not on big budget blockbusters whose makers, mostly likely comprised of committees, aren't interested in serious equality for women.

Labels: marvel comics, misogyny and racism