isn't some up-and-coming actor.

Actually, he isn't even human.

It's this little guy, Baby Yoda,

or that's what fans named the child-like alien

from the hit Disney+ show, The Mandalorian.

Instantly meme-able, the little green character

helped make Disney's new show

and its new streaming platform a smash hit.

Since launching in November 2019,

Disney+ has surged to the upper echelon

of the crowded streaming ranks,

with 37 million subscribers in the US

and over 86 million globally.

It's success has marked a bright spot for Disney,

a company that has lost a little bit of magic.

In The Mandalorian, characters go to great lengths

and take a few risks to keep Baby Yoda safe.

(dramatic music)

And in many ways, Disney has made similar moves

to help its nascent streaming platform thrive.

Baby Yoda might have been a new character,

but the universe he lives in wasn't new at all.

Disney owns the Star Wars franchise.

It's one of the many well-known brands

the company packed into its Disney+ streaming catalog.

WSJ's Eric Schwartzel has been following Disney+'s growth.

- The Mandalorian has been the breakout hit of Disney+

and it's no surprise because it combines

a known entity, the Star Wars universe,

arguably the most successful franchise in Hollywood history,

with a new storyline that you can only see

and explore on Disney+.

- [Narrator] Disney+ offered 500 films

and over 7,500 TV episodes at launch.

- They had this stable of brands

that they could already draw on.

Plus, they had movies and characters

that people wanted to watch again and again.

So if Disney+ became the exclusive home

of the Iron Man movies and the Finding Nemo movies,

that was already a built-in advantage.

Then they were able to use those brands and characters

to make sequels and reboots that become events

on the service and give them this perfect bridge

of new material using older familiar characters.

- [Narrator] This helped garner 10 million subscribers

on its first day, with The Mandalorian

driving buzz and aclaim.

This overnight success couldn't have come

at a better time for Disney.

Even before the pandemic, investors had questioned

Disney's longterm growth potential.

Disney+ was viewed as a critical venture

to help the company capitalize on digital entertainment,

but with so many streaming options crowding the space,

the platform wasn't a surefire bet.

Here's former Disney CEO and current executive chairman

Bob Iger speaking to WSJ in 2019.

- This is a dramatic shift

in the way people consume entertainment and information.

Your business is going through the same thing.

And it requires an immediate shift in strategy

in order to stay healthy, in order to thrive.

- Investors were looking at companies like Netflix

and seeing those as companies

where there was a lot of growth,

whereas Disney, despite ruling the box office

and having theme parks that had to turn people away

they were so popular, had a major issue with cord cutting.

- [Narrator] This cord cutting was felt most

by Disney-owned cable network, ESPN.

And as cable subscriptions fell,

Disney's stock price became more volatile.

- Wall Street wanted to see a strategy

for growth and a strategy for the future.

And that is what led executives to conceive

of Disney+ and launch it in 2019.

So when the pandemic hit with Disney shuttering theme parks

and no theaters open to screen movies,

its share price took a dive.

With people staying home revenue shrunk

and Disney+ quickly became more important

to the company's bottom line.

- Without those traditional revenue streams,

Disney+ was leaned on even harder

as a place to look to for investors

as something that might keep the company afloat.

And frankly it has worked incredibly well.

- [Narrator] So well that Disney announced

a massive restructuring of the company,

positioning streaming as a top priority.

- Essentially, what we want to do is

separate out the folks who make our wonderful content

based on tremendous franchises from the decision-making

in terms of where the prioritization is,

in terms of how it gets commercialized into the marketplace.

- [Narrator] This included redirecting high-profile releases

like Hamilton and Mulan from theaters onto its platform.

♪ Alexander Hamilton ♪

♪ My name is Alexander Hamilton ♪

- They reorganized the company in a way

such that there is now an almost agnosticism

about where a movie or TV show will run.

It is more about creating that show,

building that programming, and then deciding

would this be best in a theater?

Would this be best on a TV network?

Would this be best on Disney+?

And increasingly Disney+ is the preferred option.

- [Narrator] This strategy seems

to have energized Wall Street.

Despite posting two consecutive quarters of losses in 2020,

including losing over $2 billion in its park division,

Disney's stock price has rebounded.

In November it announced plans to lay off

32,000 employees by March, 2021,

mostly in its parks division.

It also said it would be suspending its January dividend

to invest more heavily in streaming.

On top of this Disney+ set of projection

of 260 million subscribers by 2024.

But experts question how realistic

this forecast actually is.

A Disney spokesperson said in a statement

that with a rapidly expanding pipeline

of exceptional original programming in the works

the company believes it will significantly

expand its global subscriber base.

- What they're trying to do now is figure out

what they can do in terms of pricing

and also what they can do in terms of international growth,

because that is where a lot

of the new subscribers are going to be coming from.

There are some challenges ahead.

For one, it remains an incredibly competitive landscape

and no one really knows yet how many streaming services

the average consumer might want to subscribe to.

And the other question becomes what is temporary

and what is permanent when it comes to the way

viewing habits have changed during the pandemic.

- [Narrator] Questions like these will test

whether Disney can navigate

a post-coronavirus business landscape.

And if Disney+ can not only be the most magical,

but also the most streamable place on earth.