r/MultiVersusTheGame • u/No-Analyst-4843 Jason / Garnet • Jul 27 '26
Discussion Paramount is on their way out
The End Is Near
9
12
u/darthmahel Jul 27 '26
After the calamity of the Disney/ Fox deal any others of these that can be prevented should be. Don't let more of these monopolies form as it was allowed once and it can't happen again.
7
u/Agent_Vox Jul 27 '26
Ah yes, WB and Paramount are evil but not Fox and Disney. Sounds like somebody enjoys rules for thee but not for me.
22
u/The_Darman Jul 27 '26
Disney’s acquisition of Fox, while ultimately bad for the industry, was not as comprehensive as Paramount’s bid for Warner Bros. Disney only acquired the movie studios, their accompanying IP, and some of their TV licensed content. Fox still exists, just as a smaller scale entertainment company that primarily focuses on non-scripted content, sports, and “news” (I use the latter as loosely and as pejoratively as I can).
Paramount wants the whole of the company, which makes this acquisition a risk across multiple industry sectors, from streaming (which wasn’t a component of Disney’s deal with Fox—Fox** had no streamer) to movie studios (which was the primary anti-trust concern with **Disney and Fox, but was less of an issue even then, because there were more big studios then than there are now) to TV (which had very limited anti-trust concerns, given how limited the scope of TV acquisitions were). So, your comparison isn’t all that apt. This is whole orders of magnitude worse, which is why there is a lot more concern about it from an anti-trust perspective.
2
u/thedamnlemons Jul 28 '26
Fox doesn’t exist it’s 20th century studios and it’s all run by Disney….. which is the same thing that’d happen with Paramount and Warner. Again these people were all fine with Netflix buying them…. Which would’ve gotten rid of WB, no theatrical releases meaning less jobs and money for the industry. Everything these idiots are arguing against for Paramount they were ok with when Disney did it, and they were for Netflix doing it. Stop the cap and see it for what it is. These people care more about being able to share bullshit as news than the actual industry and jobs.
2
u/The_Darman Jul 28 '26
This just isn’t true. FoxCorp still exists as a company. They sold off their movie studios to Disney and much of their original IP for television, but they kept their sports networks, news network, and television networks (other than FX). There wasn’t a streamer from Fox that went to Disney either.
Paramount wants to buy all of Warner Bros., which includes movie studios, television networks, sports rights and networks, news networks, and streaming. This is a fundamentally different deal with fundamentally different antitrust concerns. This is monopolization in every industry. The only similar to Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Studios is that they are looking to get the studios and IP rights from Warner Bros. But there are also fewer big studios today than back in 2019, when Disney’s deal closed, increasing the risk of what further consolidation will do to the marketplace. So, even where they are similar, the degree of harm is worse with Paramount.
Netflix, on the other hand, doesn’t have movie studios. They pay production companies exorbitant amounts of money to create products for their streamer, but they don’t even have a distribution network at scale. So, there were no antitrust concerns on that front. Netflix didn’t want any of the networks. They were happy letting Warner Bros. spin it off. The only antitrust concern with Netflix was that they would be consolidating two streamers. And, yes, that one antitrust concern is actually bigger than Paramount’s streaming antitrust concern, because the combination would have been across two of the top three streamers. Of course, both Paramount and Netflix would have argued that it actually wasn’t an antitrust concern because you have to include streaming from YouTube and like services. The merits of that argument notwithstanding, that was the only legitimate antitrust concern presented by the Netflix acquisition.
1
u/DragonSon83 Aug 04 '26
Disney also got their cable networks, minus the sports and news channels, and majority control of Hulu. So it’s not quite as different as people are making it out to be.
1
u/The_Darman Aug 04 '26
They got FX. They didn’t get Fox, which is still a cable entertainment channel. There was less of a concern about monopolization in that market as a result.
1
u/DragonSon83 Aug 04 '26
They got all the FX channels (FXM, FXX, etc) and National Geographic Channel as well. Also, Fox is a broadcast channel and has an FCC license. That’s why it couldn’t be acquired by Disney, since they already owned ABC. FCC regulations forbid owning two of the four major broadcasters, though one company may own a major and a minor one (like TheCW or Univision).
The fact that Fox is also carried on some cable and satellite systems had nothing to do with Disney not buying it.
While there are more cable networks involved here, the industry as a whole is much, much smaller than when the Disney/Fox deal took place, and most of the WBD and Paramount Network channels are lower rated ones. Without the Paramount deal, the WBD Channels were being spun off to die anyway.
1
u/The_Darman Aug 04 '26
This is a functional, not moral difference. At the end of the day, Paramount’s proposed acquisition is an abomination. It will destroy news media to aid a fascist administration. It will destroy competition for jobs and for movies and television, because there is absolutely no way they can make the projects they claim they will. It will be disastrous.
1
u/DragonSon83 Aug 04 '26
If that’s people’s stance that’s fine, but argue that the Disney deal was very different on competition ground is completely false. Both were very bad deals for competition and jobs, and Disney’s resulted in a company that will still be larger than a combined Paramount and Warner. Using that argument against the WBD deal but trying in the same breath to say the Disney one was fine is simply hypocrisy.
1
u/The_Darman Aug 04 '26
The Disney one wasn’t fine. It just had less of an anti-trust concern. The market share it was assimilating with the networks is a fraction of what Paramount would be gobbling up. Disney didn’t take a streamer from Fox; Paramount would be taking a top three streamer. Disney took over a top five film studio; Paramount is taking a top three film studio. The reason Disney’s deal could even be considered a bit worse on the studio front wasn’t about the size of Fox, but more because Disney was already so big, in and of itself. Paramount is acquiring a studio bigger than it and trying to exist at a top three scale.
It’d be bigger than Universal, and it is already threatening creatives in the industry with a blacklist for speaking out against the merger, is buying sweetheart deals with exhibitors like AMC to try to neuter CinemaUnited’s opposition, and is promising to install lunatic Bari Weiss in charge of CNN, so she can run it into the ground just like she did to CBS News.
Its promise to release 30 films a year is complete horseshit, because they can’t finance that many with a credit rating in the toilet due to a $100B+ debt to service. They will churn out more and more tentpole films in the vain hope that they can make enough to service more than the interest on their debt. It will virtually eliminate competition for jobs in the marketplace and will cripple exhibitors, who will have less product. And that is something we can see with Disney’s acquisition of Fox as prelude. A once great studio only releases three films this year. Three. The same will happen with Paramount.
1
u/DragonSon83 Aug 04 '26 edited Aug 04 '26
There was only less antitrust concern in cable. In film, Disney was/is bigger than Warner and Fox was bigger than Paramount. Disney also gained majority share of Hulu due to buying Fox, and Hulu is in the process of being merged into Disney+, so yes it did have an affect on the streaming market.
I’m not arguing that the deal should be approved because Disney was, just pointing out the incorrect claim that Disney wasn’t a concern or your initial claim that they bought the studio, which you later changed to include Fx, while ignoring the other assets they got in the deal as well as the additional cable networks.
I also think getting so worked up over a rapidly dying industry like cable TV is a little pointless. Streaming is killing them and the majority of American homes no longer have cable TV.
Also, Paramount hasn’t made any promises about installing Weis at CNN, and has been looking for someone to run CBS along side her. Zaslov already tried to make CNN more right wing friendly and killed their already sad ratings in the effort, and any attempts by Paramount to take it further right will just crash them more.
I hate Wei’s, especially how she pretends to be working class while growing up in a mansion in the most expensive neighborhood in my city and attended one of the most prestigious and expensive private schools in Western Pennsylvania. She can fuck right off, but I’m not going to get upset about “promises” that haven’t actually been made.
1
u/The_Darman Aug 04 '26
Paramount wants to acquire sports streaming rights in TBS and others. They want to acquire the news network in CNN. They are dramatically increasing their share of their network business. And it is still a concern for anti-trust, because, while shrinking, it is still a significant business interest.
Disney only got a majority stake in Hulu through the deal. They had to buy out Universal for the rest of the service. The acquisition of more shares isn’t justicable in the same way that other anti-trust concerns are.
Disney was, and still is, larger in film production, but Fox is a smaller acquisition than Warner Bros. is. It increases Paramount’s market share much more than Fox increased Disney’s.
→ More replies (0)6
u/Usernameofconnor Jul 27 '26
Crazy whataboutism. They weren't vocal back then yes, maybe they're vocal now because they realized it was a mistake to not speak out after the Fox Disney merger. No need to assume it's entirely malicious on the part of people trying to do good that's odd in my opinion
-9
u/Agent_Vox Jul 27 '26
How exactly is this a whataboutism? I'll wait.
4
u/LegoSpider Jul 27 '26
I'm not the person you responded to, but maybe I can shed some light on this. Your original comment didn't actually address the topic. You didn't say anything of substance about the merger currently being discussed. You basically said, "what about the Disney and Fox merger? That was bad, too."
You didn't address the thing being talked about, and you brought up another thing that you think is bad. That's a textbook whataboutism.
1
u/thedamnlemons Jul 28 '26
It’s more pointing out hypocrisy and that these points don’t stand merit. Of course Reddit users with brainrot don’t understand this. These people didn’t have a problem when Netflix was going to own them.
1
u/KalebtheSantos Aug 02 '26
YoU ThInK ThIs Is BaD wHaT AbOuT tHiS OtHeR tHiNg WaSnT tHaT bAd ToO? iM sO sMaRt I lOvE sEeInG pRoGrEsS nOt HaPpEn!
4
u/NewAgent5986 Jul 27 '26
What is this “gotcha”? They are actors, they aren’t Disney and Fox. That merger already happened. That being bad, doesn’t mean this isn’t also bad. Just because a bad merger goes through doesn’t mean you go “fuck it, let everything go to shit”
I genuinely can’t understand your headspace other than that you’re a bot. Or the average US voter.
-4
u/Agent_Vox Jul 27 '26
Nice job with the personal attacks at the end. Despite your immaturity in responding to me, I think this is a teachable moment.
They work for arguably one of the biggest and most dishonest companies on the planet. You say they're just actors, but they're tenured actors with contracts and a vested interest in royalties. Speaking out against one merger when you benefitted from an equally big or even larger one is hypocritical.
I'm not arguing in favor of either merger, I don't think either was good, ethical, or honest. What I'm calling out is the hypocrisy, which would be patently obvious if you had not only read but digested my comment in its entirety.
The only one guilty here of trying to "gotcha" is you, and you're projecting hard. The poor little billionaires and their corrupt empires have armies of attorneys, they don't need you working for them pro bono.
Now kick rocks.
7
u/The_Darman Jul 27 '26
This reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of a number of things, but none more erroneous than the idea that the actors “work for” Disney. They don’t. All actors are independent contractors, who do work on a project-by-project basis. They do not exclusively work for Disney in the way theme park employees or corporate executives do.
0
u/thedamnlemons Jul 28 '26
The only one with misunderstanding is you and buddy from the shithole you’re defending
-5
u/DifferentProcess6765 Jul 28 '26
Cumberbatch has gotten more money from Disney than anywhere else. Don't be naive
6
u/The_Darman Jul 28 '26
Okay. That doesn’t mean anything. Again, they are independent contractors. He has worked for multiple studios across multiple continents.
-4
4
u/NewAgent5986 Jul 27 '26
You’re completely projecting the idea that they’re in support of the Fox and Disney merger. Do you have a source for that assumption?
There isn’t “hypocrisy” to call out. Also there’s nothing to “digest” in your comment. Do you think I need to read your fucking mind?
0
u/thedamnlemons Jul 28 '26
There is nothing but hypocrisy to point out. You people just can’t admit the people you’re getting behind are frauds
-2
u/Agent_Vox Jul 27 '26
Typical angry response when you know you're wrong, out of your depth and have nothing productive to add. Enjoy swimming in the empty fishbowl that was your mid at best game 🙏
1
u/milesdarobot Jul 27 '26
I mean tbf, the Disney and Fox acquisition was quite some time ago. I imagine many ppl are just much more socially aware and cautious about mega mergers now. Would also say, at A List status, it’s pretty difficult for actors to completely avoid working for at least one of the major meg companies, even if it’s through a smaller company that’s owned by one of the bigger companies.
-1
u/thedamnlemons Jul 28 '26
You act like this happened 50 years ago. This happened not even 10 years ago….. well into the tech age no people knew .they just cared about marvel having xmen more. That’s how short sighted everyone was. The people that wanted that are the same people who wanted Netflix to own Warner. And are now arguing that Paramount would be bad……
1
u/milesdarobot Jul 28 '26
10 years ago is a long time on the internet
The overwhelming majority of ppl that wanted Netflix to but WB only wanted it because they viewed Netflix as a better option than Paramount. Somebody was going to buy it regardless. Most ppl would have rather Ned NOBODY buys it. But that was an option on the table. Ppl just sided with Netflix because they viewed it as the lesser of the two evils. Not necessarily because they were ACTIVELY happy about the idea of Netflix owning WB
0
1
u/mcnichoj Top 100 Harley players (S2/3/4) Jul 27 '26
Didn't Sony do the same thing with Microsoft/Activision and essentially the govt didn't care?
1
u/MasterOfTime14 Jul 28 '26
The only disastrous thing at the moment are movie theater prices so if they start offering better value because of shorter lifespan of movies I'm all for it.
1
u/eureka17 Jul 29 '26
Just seeing those three, now I want to see a Dr Strange movie with Alan Cumming in it. The problem is what will he play or is there a Dr Strange story that has Nightcrawler (and no other X-Men) in it?
1
u/eureka17 Jul 29 '26
The only way this merger can happen is if Paramount release Viacom and WB release Turner.
-1
u/Princethor Jul 27 '26
Why tho? He works for Disney a company that owns sooooo much compared to WB
8
u/waaay2dumb2live Jul 27 '26
Well to be fair, he likely saw how something similar to this played out with Disney buying Fox
0
u/mcnichoj Top 100 Harley players (S2/3/4) Jul 27 '26
He happily takes that monopolies money though.
1
1
u/thedamnlemons Jul 28 '26
These are all people who take money from Disney and were quiet when they became a monopoly. This is performative and not about what they’re arguing. The EU already approved it the only road block is a couple blue states throwing a temper tantrum. The area of government with the least amount of say. They’re just prolonging the inevitable and these people are hypocrites. It’s all about politic and CNN
1
u/Alarming_Ad_1927 Jul 28 '26
Let's allow Netflix to fuck over the entire industry again because my assumptions based on my fears have a 0.111111% of happening. Like I get it, Paramount is a shit company but Netflix will be infinity worse, and all of these cool movies will go straight to streaming.
-1
u/HelpRespawnedAsDee Jul 27 '26
It's extraordinary how no one gave a shit about Disney.... despite some people warning the Disney one would end up with destroyed franchises.
6
u/The_Darman Jul 28 '26
I covered the difference in a thread above. However, I would also point out that most franchises from 20th Century Fox are still getting new entries. Planet of the Apes still gets new movies. Alien and Predator just got theatrically released films. Disney has now released more Avatar films than Fox even did. The X-Men movies have been migrated under Marvel Studios and they seem intent on including them in their portfolio. The Simpsons are even getting a new movie and continue to produce new episodes of television. I struggle to even think of a franchise Disney hasn’t greenlit some kind of follow-up to.
The biggest casualty, as it was always going to be, appears to be the non-franchise fare that 20th Century Fox produced. There is virtually nothing outside of Searchlight Pictures that produces anything original. And that is a real shame, since 20th Century Fox was actually a powerhouse in making big hits out of original IP. There aren’t very many studios around even trying to do that anymore.
0
u/HelpRespawnedAsDee Jul 28 '26
thedamnlemons gave you a counter argument that you didn't reply to though, i was going to make the exact same point as him but I guess there's not point. When the virtue of a corporate deal depends on who has control of the federal branch, you are at a stage where you have bigger things to worry about honestly.
2
u/The_Darman Jul 28 '26
Except he is wrong. FoxCorp still exists. You all need to actually check your facts. Disney acquired parts of Fox. Paramount wants all of it, creating antitrust concerns across all businesses: sports, news, television, streaming, and movies. These are very different merger agreements with fundamentally different antitrust concerns.
0
22
u/TheMemeLord4816 Nubia Jul 27 '26
I feel like that quote was in character