The Disney/Fox Deal: Questions and Consequences

Free Guy?

They are right, btw. The budget strikes me as very high for a nearly unknown property. That is a higher budget than the first Planet of the apes had.

I still want the Nimona movie to not die.

This. I heard somewhere that filming will start in the summer, so we'll see.

Edited by OldLadyNightMan on Apr 19th 2019 at 11:40:34 AM

I doubt that it will if for no other reason than it most likely being already in production. remember, it takes around three years to do an animated movie.

Because it's really hard to break even, much less make a profit on an adult animation. They just don't have nearly as wide an audience since it's not catering to families, and animation is generally horribly expensive.

Edited by megaeliz on Apr 21st 2019 at 10:37:44 AM

Sausage Party made back its budget five times over.

Plus, Disney is right that $170 million is too high. With this kind of budget the movie would have to make around 400 million just to break even, 500 million to be a success. That is barely what HTTYD 3 has made so far, and that's a well known property which got excellent reviews

> Sausage Party made back its budget five times over.

Well no wonder,19 million is a drop in the bucket compared to the budget of most animated films

I wonder if one of the consequences we are going to see is some of the smaller media companies getting taken over by bigger ones, in order to compete with Disney.

Take Viacom/CBS for example, with Disney absorbing Fox, Comcast buying Universal and AT&T buying Warner Brothers and with giant tech companies like Amazon and Apple getting into the entertainment business, I wonder how long Viacom/CBS will be to be competitive against these giants. Paramount is the weakest of the major studios and it seems like cord cutting is hurting Viacom's cable channels. It seems like they would be the next candidate to get gobbled by a bigger player.

Also, I know CBS and Viacom are technically different companies, but they are both controlled by the Redstone family, to a degree and I think separate or apart, they are likely too weak to take on these media giants, I could see the Redstone family merging CBS/Viacom and selling it someone else.

Also Sausage Party was cheap because the production underpaid and mistreated its crew. (See “work conditions”.)

Edited by Tuckerscreator on Apr 19th 2019 at 10:04:43 AM

Sausage party made less than the budget they had planned for Mouse Guard. For one, the kind of animation they want to do is cheaper than what was apparently planned for Mouse guard and two, in order to keep it that low, they screwed over the animators, big time.

Viacom is reportedly looking to buy Lionsgate; there have also been talks of merging with CBS again.

Lion's Gate seems like it's in trouble too, Paramount has 6% of the movie market share and Lion's Gate has 3% of the market share, that would still put them at a disadvantage. Even a merged CBS/Viacom would not make them nearly as big as Disney. Universal/Comcast, Warner Brothers/AT&T, not mention Netflix, Apple, Amazon, etc. There is a chart that goes into this:

https://www.recode.net/2018/2/2/16901150/amazon-buying-cbs-deal-viacom-amzn-media-merger

(I do not agree with the premise of the article persay, but the chart is useful).

That chart says, even if CBS, Viacom, and Lion's Gate merged, they would still be a small player on the scene, I think one of the bigger players will scoop them up eventually. Heck Viacom is playing nicer with Netflix to get more of its content online because they lacked a streaming plan for a long time.

IMO, Paramount should just buy MGM instead. They have a huge film library and a ton of well-known IPs.

Keep in mind that Ted Turner acquired MGM's entire pre-May 1986 film library after a short-lived merger between MGM and Turner Entertainment, then Turner was acquired by Warner a decade later and those rights with it. Most of MGM's films (including well-known "classic" films like The Wizard of Oz, Singin' in the Rain, Ben-Hur, and A Christmas Story, as well as the Tom and Jerry cartoons) are owned by Warner, not MGM.

In short, just about any reason a studio would want to buy MGM (except maybe the James Bond movies, although it would probably be more profitable to snap up EON Productions instead and then cut MGM out of the arrangement) is already in WB's hands.

Edited by TrashJack on Apr 19th 2019 at 3:31:55 PM

On the other hand, Paramount & MGM have worked together for years now.

So, what's the status on digital and physical distribution on sites like iTunes and Amazon and Movies Anywhere? Is that kaput, as well as their music, or will I still be able to buy/stream all Disney-owned content I already bought?

I have a question too

Does Disney now owns the rights to 1994’s thumbelina?

If so, is it possible that her movie will be in Disney plus?

I doubt it. The movie was made before Don Bluth gave up his own studio and started to work under Fox, and it was distributed by WB. I have no idea who bought/got the rights after the studio went bankrupt.

Only the last two (three if you count Bartok) Don Bluth movies are also automatically Fox movies.

Don't mean a thing. Selling a show through digital sites isn't the same as streaming it. As far as physical media goes, it'll continue to be more of a niche market than a dying platform, contrary to what the mass media says. You'll still be able to buy Captain Marvel on Blu-ray/DVD if you prefer that over streaming, and that's not changing anytime soon.

Edited by Mario1995 on Apr 20th 2019 at 2:33:14 PM

Yep. I mean, you can still buy C Ds right? Hell, you can even still buy vinyl or even tapes if that's your thing...

Multiple Fox films getting axed at Disney.

The West Side Story remake is moving forward, but Alan Horn wants to remove all smoking from the film (Disney has a strict no-smoking policy for their movies).

Additionally, the follow-up to The Hate U Give, On the Come Up, was dropped because, in addition to Fox 2000 shutting down, The Hate U Give ended up losing Fox $30-40 million despite being made on a $23 million budget (with an additional $30 million in marketing costs). WTF?

How much smoking was there in the original West Side Story, anyway? It's been a while since I've seen it, but I don't actually remember anyone smoking.

As for The Hate U Give — I'm sorry, but yeah, that actually makes sense. The film had a $23 million production budget, but that doesn't account for advertising and marketing and other non-production costs. The film made a worldwide gross of only $32.2 million, so it didn't even make double it's budget. It sucks, but some films just don't make enough to justify another film. (See: Serenity.)

EDIT: If the marketing budget was $30 million, that means it lost $21 million, excluding the percentage that the theaters themselves take (which is probably why the loss is higher — that gross is how much they actually received).

Edited by alliterator on Apr 24th 2019 at 10:28:28 AM

For clarification, On the Come Up was sent to Paramount, not axed altogether.

Doesn't look like Blue Sky's Nimona is getting the axe, so that's a plus...for now.