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new-employeeamillion · 4 months

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Someone might ask me about this for next year’s QnA, but what the heck.

My immediate thoughts regarding the tentative Warner/Paramount merger.

I’m no business expert, but I’m educated enough to know that merging two already huge media companies will be a bad thing for workers. Remember what happened when Disney bought Fox 5 years ago? Content from both companies has become more homogeneous since then.

Just thinking about the idea that Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon could share the same parent company has me worried. They’ve already been dealing with identity crises since the streaming bubble took people’s attention away from cable, and if they both have the same executives controlling them, that’ll just make the situation worse. Think about how low their viewership has gotten in the past decade. If they’re both under the control of the same company, one or both of them will have the plug pulled. And with Cartoon Network Studios shutting down recently, I bet it’s going to be them.

I’m spitballing here, getting paranoid over a hypothetical outcome that only exists in my head right now, but if Cartoon Network is no longer a studio, channel or active brand identity by 2025 or 2026, that’ll make me really sad. Sure I don’t follow their new stuff as much as I review their old stuff, but I focus on their old stuff for a reason. It’s a symbol of the animation renaissance of the late 80s, 90s and early 2000s. The medium was in crisis before then, but an impassioned new wave of animators brought it back, with the help of a business tycoon and his channel that actually saw value in the art form. I can’t see that happening again when there’s less companies and less job opportunities for animators. Time isn’t always cyclical. This could very well be the end what we currently consider the Modern Era of Animation.

And the possibility of Warner Bros. owning SpongeBob has me even more concerned about its future. They could do one of two things:

-Cancel everything in the franchise as a tax write-off (can you blame anyone for thinking they’ll do that?)

-Dip even harder into movies and spin-offs, making Nickelodeon’s current strategy seem quaint

Here’s the thing. I wouldn’t be so apprehensive about movies (beyond the first two) and spin-offs if the main show was over already. I’m not saying Season 13 and 14 are bad and shouldn’t exist, just that Nickelodeon should only be doing one or the other, the main show or subsequent media. At this point, I’ve come to terms that SpongeBob is like Mickey Mouse and Looney Tunes, this animated mascot that’s outlived the creator and so will always be a symbol of the corporation it came from. But notice how with Mickey Mouse and Looney Tunes, their original serieses ended decades and decades ago. We’ve been getting spin-offs, film appearances and complete reimaginings for far longer than their original theatrical shorts were in production.

I’m fine with SpongeBob still being around as a mascot in 50 years like them, but not if the show is going to be in its 44th season and a virtually different production with different people behind it. There is the likelihood that Warner Bros. Discovery Paramount will look at the ratings it’s getting on Nick and put it to rest, leaving behind spin-offs and reimaginings. As harsh as it is to say, that’s the safest possible outcome, but I don’t think that’ll be what they do. They’ll either do even more to oversaturate the brand, or throw it all away like it’s worthless. Sorry if this spiel has been pretty cynical, but I have no reason to be optimistic if this goes through.

The only thing people are excited about with all this is all the crossover possibilities if all the NickToons and Cartoon Network Originals were owned by the same people. And while they seem tantalising, those old franchises were only so good because the creators were encouraged to compete, encouraged to experiment, encouraged to make what they wanted to watch, and encouraged to leave a lasting impact. If the merger goes through, that might not be the case. Crossovers are literally the only positive people seem to be gleaming from this, so fair enough. Have those happy thoughts, because you’re really gonna need them. A SpongeBob/Looney Tunes crossover will break everyone’s brains though, and I mean that in bad and good ways.

#warner bros #paramount #nickelodeon #cartoon network #spongebob

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thoughtportal · 10 months

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How Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav Became Public Enemy Number One in Hollywood

A series of maneuvers from the executive has angered the film community.

By Jason Bailey

July 3, 2023

Picture this: A captain of industry standing at the lectern at his alma matter, resplendent in his red-and-black graduation regalia—and getting booed. David Zaslav, president and CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery, was delivering the commencement address to Boston University, recalling how the late General Electric CEO Jack Welch once told him, “If you want to be successful, you’re going to have to figure out how to get along with everyone—and that includes difficult people.”

But instead of soaking in that kind of wisdom, some students were heckling Zaslav. Others had turned their backs to the stage. Now more were chanting, “Pay your writers.” Zaslav, a studio head, is often invoked as a villain by the striking Writers Guild of America.

He tried to press on with his story, continuing to quote Welch: “Some people will be looking for a fight.” The booing continued.

Zaslav later issued a statement thanking BU for the invitation, and insisting, “as I have often said, I am immensely supportive of writers and hope the strike is resolved soon and in a way that they feel recognizes their value.” But while BU President Robert Brown publicly apologized for the incident, blaming it on “cancel culture,” many observers saw it as a victory for the striking writers.

David Zaslav has become the face of a rocky and controversial new period in Hollywood. Few people who weren’t industry insiders even knew his name two years ago, when Discovery merged with WarnerMedia to become Warner Bros. Discovery. Zaszlav had been CEO of Discovery Communications since 2006, where he oversaw the transition from, in his words, “no longer a cable company, (but) a content company.” What that meant, from his critics perspective, was Discovery’s transition from educational programming to low-effort reality programming—which seems to be a much more lucrative business model.

There were, of course, considerable challenges awaiting the CEO of the new Warner Bros. Discovery conglomerate, whomever that might have been. Essentially every studio has taken fire the last few years. (Scarlett Johansson went nuclear on Disney!) Warner Bros. had, like most motion picture studios, struggled considerably during the pandemic. And then, in late 2020, before AT&T spun it off and Zaslav was brought on to lead the company after its merger with Discovery, Warner Bros. decided to simultaneously stream their entire 2021 theatrical slate on the HBOMax streaming service. This upset filmmakers, including those whose films were impacted by it, as well as theatrical chains that showed the movies. Christopher Nolan, whose enormously profitable relationship with WB began back in 2002, was reported to be so pissed that he took his new film Oppenheimer to Universal out of frustration with the company’s handling of his 2020 feature Tenet.

After a grueling pandemic, some are wondering whether the right person for the job of healing the wounds and reestablishing relationships with filmmakers might not have been Zaslav, the guy best known for shepherding the likes of Naked and Afraid, Dr. Pimple Popper, and My 600-lb Life. But, to be fair, figures from the world of reality TV are often seen with suspicion, if not outright snobbery, by those responsible for scripted fare. And Zaslav's most visible moves have been as a businessman.

One oft-referenced move: Zaslav announced that two nearly completed films that had been greenlit and produced under the previous regime—the DC superhero story Batgirl and the family-movie sequel Scoob!: Holiday Haunt—would not be distributed on the platform or released in theaters. Instead, they would be essentially used as a tax-write down. “We’re not going to put a movie out unless we believe in it,” Zaslav said in an earnings call, responding to a question about Batgirl. “We’re going to focus on quality. DC is something that we think we could make better and we’re focused on it now.” A WBD spokesperson told The Hollywood Reporter, “The decision to not release Batgirl reflects our leadership’s strategic shift as it relates to the DC universe and HBO Max … We are incredibly grateful to the filmmakers of Batgirl and Scoob! Holiday Haunt and their respective casts and we hope to collaborate with everyone again in the near future.”

Eagle-eyed subscribers subsequently noted that several other Max originals, including the Seth Rogen comedy An American Pickle and Robert Zemeckis’s remake of The Witches, had been quietly removed from the service, in a further attempt to save money. The service proceeded to remove several dozen series from its library, from HBO originals like Westworld and Vinyl to family programming like The Not-Too-Late Show with Elmo to animated series like Infinity Train. Even episodes of Sesame Street weren’t safe. (Westworld and other programs were moved to free ad-supported streamers like Tubi and The Roku Channel.) Several other streaming services, including Paramount+, Starz, Showtime, Disney+, and Hulu, have followed suit, disappearing their underperforming originals.

Meanwhile, the merger of the HBOMax and Discovery+ services continued apace, with HBOMax rebranding to “Max,” removing its most prestigious and identifiable piece of branding, and as result, playing down its history of high-quality, high-profile scripted programming. It didn’t help that, on the “details” tab for film and shows on the service’s new interface, the writers, directors, and producers were initially lumped together, in no particular order, under the nebulous designation of “creators.” A joint statement from the Director’s Guild of America and the Writer’s Guild of America West criticized the “unilateral decision by Warner Bros. Discovery to change the long-standing individual credits of directors and writers in the new rollout of Max.” Max quickly promised to “correct the credits, which were altered due to an oversight in the technical transition from HBO Max to Max.” The company called the terminology a “mistake” and began rolling out revised credits around a month later.

The most star-studded criticisms of Warner Bros. Discovery came in mid-June, when the company cut loose five of the most senior executives at Turner Classic Movies—“the people who’ve been the architect of the brand for decades,” according to one insider. The cable network is beloved among cinephiles—and high-profile filmmakers. Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, and Paul Thomas Anderson quickly released a statement noting that “Turner Classic Movies has always been more than just a channel. It is truly a precious resource of cinema, open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And while it has never been a financial juggernaut, it has always been a profitable endeavor since its inception.”

The writer's union is striking for better wages and working conditions, and many of these fights are simply about how to split up a financial pie that has been radically changed by the pandemic and tech. But Zaslav's critics say it's more than that, expressing a fear that the financial machinations reflect not just shrugging indifference but outright hostility to the creative side of cinema. That's not a very novel line of attack: Netflix, for instance, has drawn comparable fire. But that company's CEO, Reed Hastings, doesn't seem to attract quite the same vitriol. Fair or not, with Zaslav, the criticism has gotten personal.

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kylesvariouslistsandstuff · 1 year

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Quick Word on the Strike

Say it ain't so... A little over 15 years after the WGA strike of late 2007-early 2008, we have now entered *another* strike.

Whenever I'm not espousing animation opinions and hyperfixations on here, I'm actually writing stories and making comics.

It takes "writers" to tell the story, visually, among many other kinds of artists who get the short end of the stick in this capitalist hellscape. The strike is really exposing where people fall on this whole issue, and the utter indifference and even outright contempt some have towards the people that work their collective bums off to make your entertainment in the first place.

A lot of that is why I've really dialed back how I used to be online about animated features that I didn't think were up to my expectations. It's easy to rag on writers for... Well... Writing, that you don't think works. Most of the time, from my perspective and just simply listening to what filmmakers have to say, it's people making decisions that they think are the right ones at the right time, not knowing if they'll land some 1-2 years later. You certainly won't get that kind of honesty and perceived human mistakes with *AI*... I shudder at the current techbro circlejerking of this nonsense, and the consequences it could have on us artists, writers, and creatives... And we were already seeing some bleak stuff unfold in the industry pre and post-outbreak eras of COVID-19.

And especially in animation, too... What with mergers outright killing projects and whole studios (Disney shuttering Blue Sky in early 2021, and nearly killing NIMONA), favorites, and other completed things being thrown into a black hole - never to be seen again because they're now "tax write-offs". I don't care if that's how the business works, okay, it's inherently garbage that someone's hard work... Something someone worked years and years on... Can't be seen by the public because of green paper and abstract phony concepts. When a work of art is made, it's for the whole entire world, and that's all kinds of wrong to me. Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav is essentially the poster-boy for this kind of thing, having done this to FINAL SPACE, a largely finished BATGIRL movie, and an entirely-completed SCOOB! prequel called HOLIDAY HAUNT. No work of media should have to be locked away in perpetuity, or in even some cases, erased from existence.

Which is why I also try to appreciate everything that actually *does* get out into the world, even if it's not to my liking. I notice some animation fans here and there vent their not-unfounded frustrations on things that aren't to blame. "Oh come on, and yet BIG MOUTH gets another season?" That's still a show that keeps people employed, and keeps roofs over their heads, food on their tables. Animators, writers, artists, etc. aren't living in posh mansions. They're always on the line...

(I realize BIG MOUTH is ending after its 8th season, but you get the idea, right?)

So... We shall see what this all means for live-action stuff going ahead, considering the big hit a lot of tentpole movies and TV shows took during the 2007-08 strike. The strike is often cited as the reason something like QUANTUM OF SOLACE underwhelmed, or why TRANSFORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN got such terrible reception in comparison to the first film (which got a more middling reception). As for animation writers, they already have it rough, so I can only imagine what kind of toll this will take on the crews and their projects going forward... But one thing's for certain, it's absurd that these conglomerate CEOs get richer and the writers have to strike in order to make things somewhat right. They deserve so much better. Don't give me that "it's how it goes" mumbojumbo, that's just an excuse to be okay with stuff that needs to be changed. Such indifference is the source of many other problems in this world...

Not to sound melodramatic, but human creativity is a beautiful thing to me... and often times, the business side of it gets too big for its britches and ruins what should be a universal thing, the universal language of telling stories. And that people have to turn that creativity and love of making art into something that merely keeps them alive. Barely, so... Yeah, it's all kinda messed up when you step back and look at it clearly for a second...

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robotnuts · 2 years

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RT's been the latest victim of David Zaslav's ongoing campaign to destroy everything good Warner was doing before the merger with Discovery.

ive seen a few things to this tune shifting the blame completely to warner bros and i dont blame anyone for thinking thats whats going on but i'd urge everyone to read through kdin jenzen's twitlonger and mica burtons recent tweets as well- rt has been garbage as a company for a while and no merger on earth could have forced them to write the n word on their whiteboards and then ignore mica's HR complaints about it

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popculturebuffet · 2 years

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Hello all you happy people. It's time again to watch for the Watchmen , with only three issues and three months left till midnight. It's been.. a heck of a ride and it's hard to believe it's almost over and we'll be moving on to ducks what were iron armor next year, because apparently these yearly patreon quests of kevs are never not emotionally jarring. So come with me under the cut as we continue our final days towards Armageddon and giant squids as Dan is forced to hand hold an extreme right wing man through stopping the apocalypse. So another tuesday for them.

Two Riders Approaching is a great issue, and while like many before it it feels like a way to move the plot gears, unlike past gear turning issues it has a bit more character. While I'm still bummed we didn't get a spotlight issue for dan that covered his history and motivations in the same way as most of the main cast (minus adrian) , I still think this issue and "brother to Dragons did a good job showing who he is as a person. Now WHY Dan didn't get a spotlight

There's no clear reason. Maybe they just had better stories, maybe there wasn't enough time, maybe they considered hte one where he can't get it up unless he's in a costume one and called it a day. I dunno. This one does show Dan on the job, genuinely doing his best to unwrap this mystery before the end of the world, with the sorta help of the mumbling MAGA man with a plan. And several conspiracies about jewish space lasers he'd love to share with you. We do cut to some other things going on as we go. First stop…

As he's heading into a hidden bunker compliimplating armageddon. One of his companions is G. Gordon LIddy, and just the thought of LIddy having any sort of postion of power or influence is more terrifying than the threat of nuclear armageddon. I also assume since Nixon couldn't bring his wife with him they let him bring the next closest person in his life, his beloved Cocker Spaniel Checkers

At any rate we cut back to our dynamic-ish duo as Your Gonna Hear Him Rorshach brings up that it's sad "Mrs. Juspick" coudln't join us.. because apparently he shows his graditute for prison breaks by twisting the knife. Just kidding he has no gratitude for anyone or anything.

Anyways our heroes go to get his costume, with Row Row Row Your Shach Gently Past Sanity saying the methodical take down of them all was too easy and they must be careful in the future. Dan understandably pipes up

And points out that's part of why he's iffy about this side quest. They only have a WEEK till the end of the world at most to figure out whose behind this plot, stop them and hopefully HAVE some sort of future by stopping them and he's at a loss as what to do epsecially since again time is ticking away. Rorshach mumbles something abotu how "some of us have always lived on the edge Daniel. " like he's on an episode of doomsday preppers. One upside of the waking nightmare that is the warner bros discovery merger: we MAY just get an episode of doomsday preppers on shach adam here.

Shachers left some stuff under a floorboard Lane Kim style, specifcally a spare uniform and his rambling manefesto: "ALL WOMEN ARE WHORES:WHY THIS WORLD IS FUCKED by RORSHACH" with a foreword by frank miller. His landlady shows up understandably afraid for her life… and then he confronts her, mad about her claiming he came on to her sexually. I mean I do GET where he's coming from: Faking sexual assault or harassment is just about the lowest fucking thing you can do to someone, and while that someone is Rorshach shit like this makes it harder on people who've LEGITAMTELY been harassed or assaulted to have their claims heard without dudebros piping up "well she's a lying bitch bro". She could've still sold her story without it.

That said i'm still sympathetic to her as while she could've left that part out, it's unknown if the news guys ASKED her for it to spice it up or she needed it to get money, money to feed her handful of children that I can't blame her for taking. Also she had to deal with Rorshach as a tennant and that.. can't have been easy. Like i'm usually not sympathetic to landlords, but the smell of beans and him not bathing for months on end had to be toxic by the time he was arrested. The fact his response to give her a look that internally just screams (Chucky)

And call her a whore in front of her children kinda proves my point. What she did ws horrible and he's right to be angry but I can't help but sympathize with someone he was about to brutalize or murder had she not pointed out her kids didn't know and were right there. This DOES give him the rare human moment of walking away, deciding not to repeat the kind of crap he'd been through as a kid and recognizing that this woman is not his mother and is actually trying to keep those two worlds separate for more than just not wanting to loose money.

We cut to Ozymandis who is pulling in to his winter fortress and reuniting with his kitty bubastis. He does the very normal thing of.. watching 80 thousand tvs at once, channel change every hundred seconds. This shows both his ability to focus… and how fast his mind works. He instantly picks up a sexual subtext due to the heavy undercurrent of war, citing the baby boom as a similar incident, and has his employees buy up shares of pornographic companies in the short term and baby food and other baby stuff in the long. It also subtly hints that Adrian expects the world NOT to end… and that whatever he's planning involves stopping it.

Back to our odd couple who are understandably bickering. Daniel from the smell, Shackles hadn't thought of the smell that bitch, and Shach from danny boy daring to… use a crime computer to look for some sort of connection instead of randomly assaulting people. Danny serious question: why did you think you needed him again?

Dan eventually lays into Roshach honestly asking you know how hard it is being your friend…. before backing off and apologizing

Shockingly we get ANOTHER almost human moment from Mickey Roarshach as he apologizes fo rhow hard he's been, admits daniels a good friend and Dan splits the diffrence deciding the old team needs to go beat up some thugs or something to feel normal because that's a thing healthy people do. Shockingly Roshachs strategy of "beat up people till we luck into who we need" actually WORKS this time, and it only takes two filithy bars to find the guy who ired the guy who tried to kill adrian: we only get a company, Pyramid Deliveries. Hmm i think I may know our culprit now

Dan nearly looses it after finding out about hollis and it really grips at the heart: he nearly sinks to Roarshach's level. HIs smelly smelly level. Shach TRIES to be helpful byu pointing out if they find the solution to hte mask killer it might mean vengance. Dan gets that A) this is clearly unconnected and B) NOT THE TIME FOR THAT.. .but recognizes soon after this is the closest Rorshach can give to actual condolences and continues the ivnestigation

Meanwhile two of the people kidnapped for that thing prepare to escape on a boat only for it to explode

Also we ge tmore of the tails of the black freighter. Pirate man kills two people to hid ehis plans… for what he sees as the greater good. Hmmmm.. foreshadowing.

For what's next.. well techncially the explosion was next because the schmuck writing this forgot to include the tales bit earlier. So our heroes head to Adrian's office. Too bad his dad's probably dead in this realtity. We could've seen them dodge some lasers and find some shit destroying lasers and monologues about teenagers in fur suits. At any rate while Rorshach rambles into the void, can relate and that worrie sme a lot, dan gets actual work done and finds out the horrifying truth: Adiran is behind it all!

… Yeah while I went into this having read the complete series before, and thus knew this, even then it's not an actual suprise. Like at this point most of the other culprits have been ruled out, and while yes he was attacked… it's something that could easily be faked. Like it was obvious an issue or two before this it was Adrian. We don't know QUITE why yet, though there is a clue as Dan and Radio Shach find a chart detailing a war in a decade that seemingly came early. But given the lack of suspects combined with the fact that with Laurie ruled out Adiran was the only one healthy enough out of the known cast to throw someone out a window, and it becomes shockingly obvious. The reason it's usprising is that the entire story is build around a mystery.. that gives you plenty of clues but not enough suspects. It IS a tad hard to figure out at first blind, as Dan, Laurie and Adrian are all valid suspects all with the connections to pull this off.. but Adrian was alwasy the prime suspect.

Our heroes prepare to confront Adrian at karnak, his artic fortress because he's clearly going full republic serial villian despite his protests next issue, with Rorshach dropping off his journal at Right Wing News Co… where it gets put in the crank file. WE end this issue on our heroes… crashing into the arctic as Archie wasn't built for it and while time is of the essence dan didn't think to maybe you know, prepare for that before heading off into the frozen north. He did pack his thermal gear. Our heroes approach as Adrian assures his kitty everything's all right. Kind of a weird way to end this but a great way to ratchet up tension as we prepare for the climax. In a month. We also get some various press stuff from adiran's company. It's all fairly neat especially the toy proposal which he mostly rejects, wantin ga shift to more gi joe style stuff as superheros haven't been popular here.

So with that this issue comes to a close, the clock moves one tick closer to midnight and this story is about to reach one of it's most iconic moments. I'd like to tell you i did next months review 30 mintues ago… but I did not so come back next month for that and thanks for reading.

#watchmen #nite owl #dan dreiberg #rorshach #alan moore #dc comics #adrian veidt #ozymandis

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isagrimorie · 2 years

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So why, then, did The CW clean house this season? The blame isn’t squarely on network CEO Mark Pedowitz. Broadcast’s longest-tenured network topper reports to a board comprised of execs from Warners and CBS Studios, who for years have played a vital role in programming decisions. For example: While Dynasty has had the distinction of being broadcast’s lowest-rated scripted series for years, revenue from the reboot’s international sales and the Netflix deal kept it on the air for far longer than its linear numbers deserved. So after five seasons of living life on the bubble that included a wild history of casting changes, why did time run out on Dynasty and so many other CW favorites?

Blame streaming. And mergers. And The CW’s impending sale.

Warners and CBS Studios — now overseen by newly merged Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount Global — ended the Netflix output deal in 2019 to help boost their respective streaming platforms, HBO Max and Paramount+. Foreign sales, too, have dried up as those rights need to stay in-house as both platforms continue their global expansion in a bid to compete with Netflix and company in the streaming wars. That’s a loss of billions of dollars in revenue, making shows like Dynasty, for example, no longer profitable.

Without those two revenue streams, and amid new corporate ownership, the free lunches are officially over as both of The CW’s corporate parents are in active sale talks with station group Nexstar and other potential buyers.

(snip)

While The CW is expected to look considerably different next season — expect more low-cost foreign acquisitions and unscripted programming — the network’s most-watched originals are all returning. The CW gave early renewals to seven of its eight returning shows, all of them among its highest rated. Sources say Pedowitz wanted to bring back the Greg Berlanti-produced DC Comics dramas Batwoman and Legends of Tomorrow but Warners no longer wanted to pay the leases on the studio space, which expired May 1, and prompted April 29 cancellations. Plec’s Legacies was also said to be a financial decision made by the studio.

Legends and Legacies, along with Charmed, In the Dark and Roswell, New Mexico all were part of the Netflix output deal.

(snip)

And before anyone can start a petition for the unfortunate shows that met their early demise this week, keep in mind that HBO Max and Paramount+ can’t save those lucky shows that were able to stay on the air as long as they did because they were part of the Netflix deal. Sorry, Legacies, Legends, Dynasty, Charmed, In the Dark and Roswell, as Plec said, “Today we mourn.”

Corporate greed destroyed CW. Paramount Global and Warner Bros wanted to compete with Netflix so badly that they made CW (a network they owned) unwind their Netflix deal.

I had wondered for the longest time why Batwoman was on HBO Max instead of Netflix and found out it was because CW ended their output deal with Netflix. I knew then CW was in trouble -- true enough a year after I learned about it, CW announced it's being put on sale.

Another thing I learned about HBO Max's/Warner Bros Day and Date release in 2020 and the outrage it caused among filmmakers is that Warner Bros putting their 2020-2021 movies on HBO Max meant the filmmakers/studios couldn't shop around their movies to other streaming platforms and would actually make less money. Because going straight to HBO Max meant WB would just be paying itself and at a lower cost too.

This is basically what happened with CW, CW used to have a sweet output deal where they just churn out shows regardless of ratings because Netflix and foreign markets would pay handsomely for the shows. The moment Paramount Global and Warner Bros decided to compete with Netflix and turned their eye on CW, was the moment CW was toast.

Because Paramount Global and Warner Bros were never going to pay CW the kind of numbers Netflix was willing to pay.

(Mind you, this was before the market corrected itself and Netflix's stocks fell to more reasonable figures-- which unfortunately triggered Netflix going around like a headless chicken because they've just been focusing on acquiring customers and not retaining them. Again, corporate greed).

This also means, unfortunately, as much as my heart wants it, there are no saving Legacies because Paramount Plus and HBO Max are the reason why Legacies was canceled in the first place. Netflix is also having its own problems, so there's a very slim chance for a save from there.

It's also a bitter pill to swallow knowing the reason why Legends of Tomorrow and Batwoman were canceled was that Warners couldn't be bothered paying the lease on studio space. That's it. The whole reason.

Warners. Didn't. Want. To. Pay. Studio. Space.

#tv: batwoman #tv: legacies #tv: legends of tomorrow #legacies cw #batwoman #legends of tomorrow #article #streaming platforms

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agentbeeswrites · 1 year

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This is going to be a rant about shows being cancelled and the state of streaming services and media.

I'm mad about Warrior Nun being canceled. I'm mad about First Kiss. I'm mad about Gentleman Jack, Legends of Tomorrow (and the whole lot of DC shows), The Owl House, Charmed. Older canceled shows like One Day at a Time, Dark Matter, Wonderfalls, Sweet/Vicious, the Hulu & Freeform Marvel shows (The Runaways, Cloak & Dagger), Teenage Bounty Hunters, Adventure Time, Steven Universe, Wynonna Earp. Carnival. Warehouse 13. STUMPTOWN! I'm never going to stop screaming about the tragedy of that one. There are tons more. I don't have hours to list them all.

It sucks when a good show gets canceled. It sucks when you look for more content, and all you can find is the same show starring the same kind of tough, cishet, white dude that's in its seventh season and has three spinoffs. There is never an abundance of queer content. It feels like there is when we get lucky enough to have multiple shows in a year, but it's nothing compared to cishet content.

Things began to change with Netflix a few years before COVID. I want to point to COVID and blame it for everything, and it certainly did have a big impact on production costs, but the fact is that Netflix (specifically) has been reluctant to have any show last for more than two or three seasons because then it has to pay everyone more. They'd rather cancel and start up a new show.

There's a problem with streaming services and access in general, though. You've probably started to watch an older show on Netflix (one that they license) and found that it would be leaving the service at the end of the month. It might be available on another service, or it might not be available anywhere.

And then there's the issue of licensing.

If you have a physical copy because the company who produced it included selling physical media in the deal or budget for the show, you can always rewatch it and relive the good times. But if it's a streaming-only show, there's a very low chance it will ever be legally sold on physical media.

Remember the Marvel shows on Netflix? I want to own more than one season of Jessica Jones. Guess how many seasons were released on disc? If you guessed "one," then you are correct. Even Daredevil only had two seasons released on disc, and it was a breakout hit.

Remember Wynonna Earp? IDW used Kickstarter to fund the box sets. They didn't even go through a major distributor.

I'll never see Sweet/Vicious on disc. I'll never own She-Ra on blu-ray. The Runaways, Cloak & Dagger (I know it's not queer, but I love that show, ok?), Sense8, Arcane, Dead to Me, Derry Girls, Paper Girls, ALOTO, Gentleman Jack - I'll probably never be able to buy any of them legally.

Yes, I know that the first three seasons of SPOP were released on DVD. Where's the rest of it? Where's my blu-ray release?

The best and worst thing the digital age has given us has been streaming services. You have a huge library of content at your fingertips that can be taken away at any moment.

Just look at the shit show that is HBO Max after the Warner/Discovery merger. Shows are getting cut from that service faster than I can keep track of. Shows that may never see the light of day again (or ever, in the case of per-release properties) because WB/D holds the rights and is shoving them into storage in an attic. We are watching shows become lost media.

I'm getting tired of my shows being canceled. I'm getting tired of them being locked behind one particular service in a landscape where every company has to have its own platform. Streaming was supposed to be the alternative to cable, but they're squeezing us for more and more and giving us less and less for it.

But I'm tired of there being fewer and fewer legal ways to consume content offline. Even in the 90s and early 2000s when shows were cut down at alarming rates, we still had physical media. For example, Shout Factory was well known for putting out obscure or classic shows and movies with a big enough fan base.

(Note to self: buy that Facts of Life set before it disappears for another 20 years.)

We may need to go back to smaller companies making their own content. I don't know. It feels like the streaming wonderland is collapsing, and I don't know what system will rise from the ashes.

I used to joke that knowing me was getting to experience a list of shows that were canceled before their time. It's still true.

#show cancellations #streaming media #lost media #physical media #queer content #it's complicated and frustrating

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fromkenari · 2 years

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idk who to share this with but i want to mentally prepare people. apparently taika leading the next star wars movie has changed things significantly at hbo, which is FANTASTIC for taika and i’m so happy for him and his career. but it put ofmd on the chopping deck and made the close decision a whole lot easier. regardless i love this fandom and will continue to remain and celebrate what we have!

Hi. I don't know what your point is here. Taika was attached to a Star Wars movie prior to the May 4th announcement. They don't even have a script and neither does OFMD Season 2. I'm not going to blame Taika who has been a gift to cinema and TV. Also, he already had a project lined up for Warner Brothers, a script he wrote with the manga writer for Akira and proclaimed there would be an all Asian unheard-of cast with no whitewashing. Then, he got Thor 4, which is all it was known as at the time. Additionally, he was writing a Live-Action script for Flash Gordon (which had previously been planned as an animated movie) for 20th Century Fox which was bought by Disney and is now known as 20th Century. Not to be forgotten, he has a screenplay and is set to direct a Live-Action adaptation of The Incal. He also has two more TV shows announced, Time Bandits and We're Wolves. Time Bandits has seemingly been dumped for now and We're Wolves is to replace Wellington Paranormal which is already wrapped for the series after Season 4. He also has What We Do In The Shadows and Reservation Dogs which are airing the fourth season and filming the second season respectively. Furthermore, I don't know if you noticed but the reason OFMD is having a hard time has nothing to do with Taika or Star Wars and everything to do with the Warner Brothers Discovery merger and their lack of action on announcing a renewal of OFMD. In fact, at their UpFronts today, they did not announce any renewals, they just showed an HBO Max montage reel (which if you know anything about UpFronts, that is not normal) that included Our Flag Means Death that is literally all they have done. Some of the OFMD actors are already moving on because of the inaction of Warner Brothers Discovery. The creator David Jenkins doesn't even know if they are going to get money so he can write a second season. So, I want you to think for a moment about why you are blaming Taika and Star Wars (of which he has already been a part of thanks to Jon Favreau) and not Warner Brothers Discovery.

#taika waititi #you come into my house #you're going to learn #out of curls

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msclaritea · 6 months

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Paramount Stock Dives On Wall Street Analyst’s Downgrade – Deadline

Paramount Global shares fell nearly 9% midway through the trading day after veteran media analyst Jessica Reif Ehrlich delivered a harsh verdict on the stock.

The BofA Securities analyst downgraded the stock to “underperform,” or sell, in a blistering note to clients whose headline declared that shares are “hard to buy if it’s not for sale.” Her move is known in financial market circles as a “double downgrade,” meaning Reif Ehrlich all at once took her rating down two notches, from “buy” to “underperform,” bypassing “market perform” (neutral).

Elaborating on the headline of her note, Ehrlich explained that her previous optimism about the stock was “predicated on Paramount’s inherent asset value in a potential sale. Despite receiving credible bids for several different assets (e.g., Showtime and BET), it does not appear any significant asset sales are on the horizon.”

The news followed Paramount’s upbeat earnings report last week, which boosted its shares thanks to the company’s revelation that peak streaming losses had occurred in 2022. The stock was at $12.57, up from its 52-week low of $10.51, which was established last month. Losses in the streaming division narrowed during the third quarter and the company added 2.7 million Paramount+ subscribers, though the company remains challenged by shifts in advertising and linear TV viewing.

In its presentation to investors, the company highlighted one M&A deal that closed after the Sept. 30 end to last quarter: the sale of book publisher Simon & Schuster to investment firm KKR for $1.62 billion. It has also held talks in recent months about potential sales of stakes in BET and preschool brand Noggin, but neither set of talks yielded a deal. It also fielded a bid for Showtime but deemed it insufficient.

Ehrlich’s revised 12-month price target for Paramount shares is $9. Although that is substantially lower than her prior outlook of $32, Ehrlich noted that it represents “a modest premium” to the current share prices of media peers Warner Bros. Discovery shares, though it is below Disney’s level.

“Given the secular challenges in the traditional media ecosystem, we were surprised to see Paramount walk away from these potential buyers for various assets,” Ehrlich wrote. “While we recognize management should try to extract maximum value, shares of Paramount are down over 40% since May 1. Our concern is the longer it takes to execute potential asset sales, the less value they could ultimately garner. This, coupled with the challenging macro backdrop, persistent secular headwinds, negative free cash flow continuing into 2024 and Paramount’s elevated leverage levels (nearly 5x our 2024 estimate) create an unfavorable medium-term outlook.”

Selling assets, she added, are “the most clear-cut way for management to drive shareholder value.”

Left unaddressed in her note was the larger M&A question that has dogged the company for years, which is whether it can continue making a go of it as it is structured or whether a merger is inevitable. The complicating factor in the case of Paramount is its ownership structure. Non-executive Chairwoman Shari Redstone runs National Amusements, which controls Paramount’s shares.

I love the comments under this article that put the blame for all of this where it belongs; money hungry Wall Street and the perennially uncreative buy invasive Tech industries.

#PARAMOUNT #HOME OF SCIENTOLOGY IS GOING DOWN

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