Why can't/didn't this film attract a larger audience?

The movie had a decent story but it was poorly executed. First the eyes are annoying. It would have been a much more acceptable movie to most people if they had gone the same route as Akira: Ghost in the Shell which was a stupid movie but which at least didn't have the distracting CGI garbage cluttering up the screen. The also needed to make it look more like a movie and less like a video. It had a very camcorderish look to it that was not enjoyable. Then we get into the battles, if you are going to try and make a movie with live actors then you need to accept that your audience will expect you to stick with the normal laws of physics and they were ignored completely when it came to the cyborg fights. A claw that shoots out tethered darts that appear to have an almost infinite range and the ability to curve in mid air just came across as dumb.

Then of course you get into the PC crap. Lets throw in the Hollywood diversity quota so we get all the minorities represented, ignoring the fact that the entire cast should have been Japanese. Sorry but the only thing this movie had going for it was the story, the execution of that story sucked in every way.

That and the crappy marketing. I missed it at the cinema and just watched the film on streaming and loved it. I really hope it gets a sequel.

Also another thing that put me off was the fact that every previous Hollywood anime adaptation has been terrible. This is the first one that has hit the mark.

Stupid CGI eyes completely ruined it.

What's so stupid is that with the right face structure, makeup and contacts, a female can look like an anime character without CGI. There is a famous YouTuber who's made a career out of looking like one: https://www.thefamouspeople.com/profiles/images/venus-palermo-3.jpg. Hollywood could've found an actress with a round chubby face and large, round eyes and made her look like the main character using makeup to further enhance her features. It wasn't necessary to do the CGI thing.

One might say that any film that makes $400 million didn't fail to attract an audience. It may not have been a financial success due to a huge budget, but that's still a lot of fucking people who went to see it.

Why didn't it become a mega-blockbuster making $700+ million?

The biggest issue was probably lack of familiarity with the property. But it should have made that kind of money. It is, so far, one of the Top 5 films of the year in my opinion. Maybe even Top 3. It's a lot of fun and very well made.

1) The horrible reviews and whitewashing drama for “Ghost in the Shell” really poisoned public opinion on Western adaptations of anime.

2) People don’t like to try new blockbusters anymore unless they are already connected to a mega-franchise.

I haven't seen it yet and probably won't til it airs on tv. The commercials looked awful and the cgi too you didn't need to make her look animated.
America has a long way to go with live action anime movies