The Disney/Fox Deal: Questions and Consequences

Nah, they will put it under Marvel studios, but they will market it as something different.

When it comes to the Fox TV channels, Disney probably isn't going to just wholesale cancel everything. That would be idiotic, especially since Disney would have to immediately refill the schedule. Although, I wouldn't be surprised if Warner Bros just "randomly" decided to stop producing Gotham and Lucifer.

Disney has ABC for in-house stuff, and Fox produces a lot of TV as well, so that stuff is probably at least relatively safe. Fox also airs stuff produced by third parties, but ABC does too (the Good Doctor is a Sony Pictures TV production for example). I think as long as it doesn't create a bizarre rights snarl, they won't really care that much.

Not Three Laws compliant.

Most of the TV channels aren't even part of the deal. The production companies are. It is on Murdoch to decide what to do now.

With the deal, I'm dreaded to think what atrocities the Murdochs will bring in the future, who are now solely focus on the news network business.

So, its come to this: The Simpsons, Futurama, Alien, Predator, Avatar, the international rights to Titanic, Blue Sky Studios (including the Ice Age series and The Peanuts Movie), and Fight Club are all about to join the Mouse House...

I'll have to see how all this plays out, I guess.

Edited by MrScout101 on Jan 12th 2019 at 10:10:05 AM

On the bright side, this would possibly mean X-Men and Fantastic Four are no longer Exiled from Continuity.

"Possibly" nothing, Disney is totally going to unexile them from continuity.

edited 14th Dec '17 4:18:15 PM by TargetmasterJoe

The X-Men (and Deadpool somewhat) are better off disconnected from the MCU.

edited 14th Dec '17 4:39:58 PM by Karxrida

If a tree falls in the forest and nobody remembers it, who else will you have ice cream with?

I agree

Where there's life, there's hope.

"One of the things we hear Snider (Chairman and CEO of 21CF) is telling staff is that it’s going to be business as usual over the next 12 to 18 months."

"20th Century Fox is expected to oversee their 2018 and potentially their 2019 release schedule on their own during this time."

http://deadline.com/2017/12/20th-century-fox-town-hall-film-side-in-sadness-uncertainty-fear-with-news-of-disney-merger-1202227143/

Would be funny if they released a Doom movie and started a new X Men universe to spite Marvel.

Mileena Madness

I can just see Bart writing lines:

"We were not taken over by an evil corporation."
"We were not taken over by an evil corporation."
"We were not taken over by an evil corporation."
"We were not taken over by an evil corporation."

edited 14th Dec '17 5:47:15 PM by Noah1

Never underestimate the importance of an open mind and compassionate heart.

@Karx: I think a good idea is having him come in and out of the MCU continuity at will, as befitting his tendencies.

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20th Century Fox was actually doing this sort of thing long before Disney. According to my university movie theatre (only one screen), you can only show their movies if each showing on a single screen in a day is of the same film. Which is why they often don't show Fox films - it simply wasn't economically feasible for such a small theatre. This is less applicable to Disney films, which often make enough money to justify two showings of the same film in a night for them, but

I'm with a lot of the posters on the first page of the thread - this deal is very worrying. Too many major corporations already have too much power; not only does this discourage competition and open communication, but it puts people at risk of being abused in a number of different ways. In my mind it seems highly unethical.

I don't give a damn if we're going to get good Fantastic Four movies now or whatever, in my mind the only good thing about this is that National Geographic might not be in the hands of a climate change denier anymore.

I am really surprised by this news. Next thing you know, all these mass-media mega-corporations will eventually merge into one.

edited 14th Dec '17 10:12:33 PM by AHI-3000

I don't see what the cause for concern is here.

Yes, as a general rule, a large corporation buying up another large corporation is worrying, as it reduces competition, which leaves both employees and consumers with fewer alternatives if the corporation starts abusing them. But looking at the media landscape now, I have hard time seeing how a lack of competition is even close to being a problem.

Thanks to advances in technology, the entry barrier for producing a film and distributing it to a wide audience has never been lower. And audiences have never been more spoiled for choice than they are now, in the era of peak TV.

"It takes an idiot to do cool things, that's why it's cool" - Haruhara Haruko

Yeah, I agree. You know what is really a concern for me? The loss of net neutrality in the US, because that one is really screwing the market in favour for the big companies. But Fox and Disney together they aren't bigger than Time Warner or Comcast, so they are hardly becoming an unstoppable behemoth (and I have rather Disney owning those assets than Comcast).

Plus, this is about more than just movies and theatre chains - who, btw, can always run another movie if they don't like the condition from Disney or Fox. Or just ask for more money for those movies while telling the audience "not our fault, complain to Disney". If you see this in the context of the streaming services on an international level, there is a true danger that Amazon and Apple will take over the market down the line. That was one of the reasons why I wanted Disney and Netflix to team up. Now Disney is going in without Netflix, and I hope that Netflix can survive under such circumstances, but the point is that in this segment we need more competition. And yes, I get it, a lot of people would prefer it if there is no competition at all and we could get all content which has ever been created from one streaming service. But that would be an actual monopoly.

Which reminds me...I am wondering, I know that there are movies which are public domain for one reason or another, but is it possible for movies to eventually enter public domain automatically the way it happens with books?

Regarding the X-Men franchise (including Deadpool), my guess is that as long as they're making money, the Mouse will keep them as a separate universe from the MCU.

A Marvel Studios reboot of the Fantastic Four is inevitable, though. Once Thanos is defeated in Avengers 4, Marvel's going to want to have Doom and Galactus available for Phase 4 and beyond of the MCU.

I know that fans don't want to hear it, but the X-men franchise has underperformed compared to the MCU movies. Disney stands to make much more money out of it by rebooting it into the MCU one way or another (still think that they will go the alternate universe route). The only exception is Deadpool, who is an absolute over performer.

I think Disney will take their time. Let the X-men franchise at fox peter out (maybe an X-23 movie if they like the script but I doubt that Gambit has any future), let the TV shows have their run, do as many Deadpool movies as possible. I mean, the MCU is pretty much set up to 2020 anyway. and then, when everything is said and done, they will introduce the F4 for phase 4 and whatever they have in mind for the X-men (still think that they will go the alternate universe route, because it is the one which allows them all the freedom in the world).

And deadpool, well, if his movies are still going strong he can just break the fourth wall and hop over to their x-men verse.

edited 15th Dec '17 3:07:04 AM by Swanpride

There are recent rumors of the next Ant-Man movie to introduce the concept of multiverse in the MCU. If true, it would come at an incredibly convenient moment.

I'm gonna put that in the "believe it when I see it" column, mainly because I have a hunch about where those rumors came from. Ant-Man ended on the implication that Janet was trapped in what the comics know as the Microverse, a subatomic reality that you fall into if you shrink down too far.

Since the second film is supposed to be about going to find her, it'd be really easy for someone unfamiliar with the comics to hear the concept of the Microverse and jump from that to "Scott and Hope visit a parallel dimension! Marvel's introducing a Multiverse!"

But it's not a parallel dimension in the Multiverse sense. Not any more than the Dark Dimension from Doctor Strange is. It's a different plane of existence, but not one where you'll find an Evil Captain America leading Mecha-nazis to take over the world from High Commander Peter Parker or some shit.

My Tumblr. Currently liveblogging Haruhi Suzumiya and revisiting Danganronpa V3.

Actually, if you adjust inflation the early X-Men films were extremely successful by today’s standards. X2 and X3 made 300+ million domestically by today’s prices like Deadpool. People tend to forget that ticket prices were cheaper back then.

I’m not sure why you think the X-Men being in the MCU means more of an audience. Adjusted inflation shows that Homecoming had a much smaller audience compared to the Raimi films and just a little above the first AMS.

edited 15th Dec '17 8:18:47 AM by ManOfSin

Not immediately but eventually, yeah. The Franchise is overdue for a reboot anyway.

btw, when I talked about Marvel edging towards the multiverse, I wasn't thinking about Ant-man but about Agents of Shield. I think they are testing the waters there.

Bob Iger talks more about the Marvel properties

“Basically Fox — 20th Century Fox Studios — has some interesting tentpole opportunities, we obviously are going to continue to support that,” he said. “What they’ve done obviously with Avatar, and what they did with Deadpool, X-Men, Fantastic Four, Planet of the Apes is another one. We’ll stay in that business. Not all of it will be branded anything other than what it’s branded today, as a for instance. How much we will create under that banner, we’re still uncertain. It’s going to take a while from a regulatory perspective. They’ll continue to develop in that period of time and at such time as we close this deal and have control, we’ll take stock and really look carefully at what their slate looks like going forward and how many movies it would make sense to make.”

edited 15th Dec '17 8:43:28 AM by ManOfSin

That last part sounds unintentionally ominous.

"and at such time as we close this deal and have control"

edited 15th Dec '17 8:43:50 AM by lalalei2001

The Protomen enhanced my life.