Hollywood just got another reminder that self-infatuation and lecturing audiences have consequences: October’s domestic box office cratered to roughly $425 million, the weakest October haul in nearly three decades, and the Halloween frame itself was the worst weekend of the year for theaters. Studios left audiences with little new to see and ticket buyers stayed home, proving that PR lectures and woke messaging don’t translate into box-office dollars. The numbers are ugly, and the markets that supported old-school entertainment are signaling their displeasure.

Let’s call it what it is: Hollywood has spent years insulting its customers while milking them for higher ticket prices and streaming subscriptions, then acting surprised when those same customers walk away. The industry prefers virtue-signaling press conferences to making films that entertain families and patriots, and that ideological arrogance is a business decision that’s now paying the bill. Conservatives have warned for years that culture matters to commerce — apparently some in Los Angeles are only now learning the lesson.

Part of the practical explanation is mundane but telling: studios mostly sat on their big titles over Halloween and millions were distracted by other things, including a packed sports calendar that kept people away from the multiplex. When the World Series and trick-or-treating compete with your release calendar, that’s on executives who chose to play culture-war games instead of programming smart. Weak scheduling and a refusal to read the room combined for a disastrous three-day haul that nobody in Hollywood can spin into success.

The list of squandered opportunities reads like a who’s-who of misfires: heavily promoted tentpoles underperformed and prestige-minded projects never found audiences, leaving theaters with scraps. When big names like Dwayne Johnson and major franchises can’t move the needle, it’s not just a market blip — it’s evidence that studios are out of touch with what ordinary Americans want to watch. The math is brutal and the creative choices are on full display for investors and viewers alike.

Americans should stop subsidizing a coastal entertainment complex that treats them with contempt and then laments poor returns. If conservatives want to win the culture back, we do it by supporting creators who make great, honest entertainment and by voting with our wallets rather than begging for apologies from self-adoring elites. The people who run these studios don’t wake up to moral lessons — they wake up to profit and loss, and the current losses are a message loud enough for even the most out-of-touch executives to hear.

So sing if you must; point, laugh, and keep your money away from corporations that have written off half the country. Hollywood’s cultural tantrum has a cost, and this October’s box-office bloodletting ought to be a wake-up call: stop alienating your audience or stop wondering why nobody shows up. The cavalry can’t rescue studios from their own choices — only better movies, better scheduling, and less preachy nonsense will.