Well, we can’t do box office numbers. So we’re doing this now.
As reported by Deadline, Soul, the latest Pixar animated film, absolutely rocked the Nielsen weekly streaming charts for the last week of December. The film, about a music teacher and jazz artist separated from his body, was released on Disney Plus as a substitute for a wide theatrical release, a choice made due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. During that first week, it was streamed for a grand total of 1.6669 billion minutes. This translates into roughly 500 million views of the film, though that’s assuming everyone who streamed some of it streamed all of it, which is likely not the case.
That total of roughly 1.7 billion beat out the most-streamed title on Nielsen’s charts, which is almost always The Office. During that week, the end of the show’s long tenure on Netflix, it ranked up 1.435 billion. It’ll be moving to Peacock soon, as the streaming service’s ads will gladly tell you.
[referenced id=”1660772″ url=”https://gizmodo.com.au/2020/12/soul-feels-like-pixars-first-black-movie-made-with-white-people-in-mind/” thumb=”https://gizmodo.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/29/tmzwfgdir56wu9lgslnl-300×169.png” title=”Soul Feels Like Pixar’s First Black Movie Made With White People in Mind” excerpt=”In Pixar’s Soul, a music teacher with a burning passion for jazz suddenly dies. The event puts him on a path in the afterlife that makes him realise how he never lived with much passion during his time on Earth, and how hard he’s willing to fight for another chance.”]
The Nielsen streaming charts are a new-ish way to keep track of media consumption habits, and it’s interesting to see that big event releases are making an impact. As for the other big Christmas release, Wonder Woman 1984, Nielsen has not yet added HBO Max to its chart system. So, uh, we don’t know.