Netflix wins WB. What now?!
And James Cameron's plan if Avatar 3 flops
Netflix has won the bidding war to acquire Warner Bros
In case you weren’t aware, Warner Bros Discovery put itself up for sale earlier this year. Paramount, Comcast, and Netflix all put in bids to buy WBD. Last night the trades reported that Netflix won and will now enter exclusive talks with Warners to buy the 100 year old movie & TV studio and the HBO Max streaming service.
Netflix offered around $28 a share for WBD mostly in cash. The merger will of course be subject to government approval both in the US and internationally. Netflix has said if it won WB, it would continue to put the studio’s movies in theaters.
OK those are the facts, so now let’s talk about all the probable and possible ramifications. First of all, mega mergers are bad for consumers and workers. They lead to monopolies and less competition that can raise prices and generally offer customers fewer choices. Netflix could close HBO Max and just move all that content into Netflix. Fewer studios also offer creatives fewer places to go to pitch shows and movies, meaning a lack of diversity in what gets made. And of course, redundant departments are shut down, leading to thousands of people losing their jobs via layoffs.
But also with Netflix, many people in the industry are worried that CEO Ted Sarandos eventually won’t put as many WB movies in theaters. He’s said in the past that theaters are outdated, and on Friday he discussed shortening theatrical windows. Movie theater owners are of course freaking out about that.
It will also be interesting to see what Netflix does with WB’s TV studio. WB produces a lot of shows for all the different streamers. For example, Ted Lasso is on Apple but made by Warners. Netflix historically has never licensed out it’s shows like that. So will it continue that business?
There’s also the question of DC and HBO. Right now they operate as mini studios inside the studio. James Gunn and Peter Safran have creative control over DC, while Casey Bloys runs HBO as he sees fit. Will Netflix continue to let them do their thing Or will they subject those divisions to their algorithm-based programming decisions?
If the merger goes through, and it’s still an IF because of local and international regulators, a lot of what will happen isn’t good. But also there are a lot of open questions. If you want more reliable info on this situation, you can follow me, but I’d mostly recommend reading Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, Deadline, Bloomberg’s Screen Time newsletter by Lucas Shaw, and listening to The Town podcast.
James Cameron has a backup plan to end Avatar if the new movie flops
The third Avatar movie Fire and Ash hits theaters on December 19th — and it could be the last one. You see, James Cameron has always intended to make a 4th and 5th Avatar film and he even shot some of the 4th movie already. But in a recent interview with Matt Belloni on The Town podcast, the director revealed that finances might get in the way.
“I have no doubt in my mind that this movie will make money. The question is, does it make enough money to justify doing it again?”
Fire and Ash has a reported budget of $250-300 million dollars, so it would need to gross at least half a billion dollars to turn a profit. So Belloni then asked Big Jim he’d be willing to walk away if the movie flops, and Cameron said, “Yeah, absolutely, sure. If this is where it ends, cool.”
Now that said, the director does have a contingency plan. He explained that he intentionally wrapped up nearly every storyline in Fire & Ash, but quote “There’s one open thread. I’ll write a book!” Makes sense to me.
He then went on to say the one thing he won’t do is give the franchise to someon else. “I don’t think there’d ever be a version where there’s another Avatar movie that I didn’t produce closely.” Personally, I think this movie is going once again make at least a billion dollars and he’ll definitely be making Avatar 4 at least.
What the hell did Paul Dano ever do to Quentin Tarantino?
Because the director just took a steaming hot dump all over Paul Dano’s face for absolutely no reason at all.
In case you missed it, last week Quentin Tarantino went on Bret Easton Ellis’s podcast to list his 20 favorite movies of the 21st century. QT put Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood at #5 And he explained it would have been higher, if not for “one giant flaw:” Paul Dano — and then he really went after the guy.
Quote, “[Dano] is weak sauce, man. He’s a weak sister. Austin Butler would have been wonderful in that role. [Dano is] just such a weak, weak, uninteresting guy.”
Never mind the fact that Butler was 16 at the time, but point taken I guess. Anyway, Brett Easton Ellis tried to defend Paul Dano, arguing that any actor would have been overshadowed by Daniel Day Lewis in that role,
But Tarantino fired back, “So you put [Lewis] with the weakest male actor in SAG? The limpest dick in the world? I’m not saying he’s giving a terrible performance. I’m saying he’s giving a non-entity performance.”
Ellis then asked if Tarantino has ever liked Paul Dano and the director said, “I don’t care for him. I don’t care for Owen Wilson, and I don’t care for Matthew Lillard.” Damn, just throwing out strays left and right.
Shane Gillis could make stand up history next year
Seven years after getting fired from SNL, Shane Gillis is going to headline one of the biggest stand up shows in history.
A little over a decade ago, Shane Gillis was doing open mics and tiny stand up shows in Harrisburg Pennsylvania. Then in 2019 he got hired to be an SNL cast member, but was fired before his first episode,. Now he’s scheduled to play one of the biggest stand up shows ever.
Deadline reports that on July 17 2026, Gillis will play a massive home state show at Lincoln Financial Field, home of the Philadelphia Eagles and the audience will likely be more than 60,000 people. If that many people do indeed buy tickets, Gillis will break a US record.
The largest attendance for a single ticketed show by an American comedian is Kevin Hart’s performance at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, which drew 53,000 people in August of 2015. It certainly seems like Gillis could break that record.
Meanwhile, the biggest stand up show of all time, according to Guinness was German comedian Mario Barth’s July 2008 show at the Olympiastadion in Berlin which drew 67,733 people total. Can Gillis top that?
Well, Ed Sheeran once played to 77,000 people at Lincoln Financial Field So maybe it’s possible? We’ll see. Bottom line, Shane Gillis is very popular.
The theatrical window question is gonna be the real test here. Sarandos has always talked a big game about loving theaters, but Netflix's actual track record is pretty spotty with limited releases and barely any marketing support for their theatrical stuff. If they start treating WB's slate like they treat their own originals, that's a massive L for the theatrical experience and honestly for the films themselves.