That article was such bullshit I had to look up the source and yup--not some newspaper or industry analyst, it's just a Star Wars website called JediNews. TF.N posted a similar thing.

Lowered expectations indeed.

$23 million for a 3D Star Wars re-release is abysmal. And it was $22.6 million. No one even wanted to see the Green Hornet plus it got bad reviews and that made $35 million at the same time of the year in 2011. That's a great opening. (it made no money after, but great opening). And if you read the analysts--"as predicted"--they weren't expecting $22.6 million, they thought it would do more, one even expected it to open with $35 million like Green Hornet.

This stuff is probably coming from the same guys who used to say the PT will be remembered as fondly as the OT in 10 years, and everyone will look back and see how wrong they were and how great the films were. Then it opens to awful business and the SAME BAD REVIEWS (in fact, the film officially became "rotten" on Rotten Tomatoes because of this month) and the gushers are going "see, isn't it great?" like a bunch of crazy people who simply refuse to acknowledge something so painfully obvious. Trust me, if AOTC gets released you'll see it opening to $18 million and walking away with $30 million overall and those same idiots will be telling people its great. "For a 13 year old film guys, let's lower expectations." Explain 1997 then, idiot. TPM was a turkey in 1999 but people were going to see anything that was new Star Wars 20 times so it made money. This time they all know it sucks and it's no longer "the new SW film" so it still got the bad reviews but now everyone stayed home too. I still don't know anyone in real life that has seen it, or plans to, and I live in a house full of white male nerds in their early 20s.