I've written this blog post out two different times and deleted it on both occasions because I have a lot of thoughts and I can't seem to make a cohesive string of words about it. I think it's because this is such a let down for me and I'm truly at a loss for words and it's so disappointing that it makes me not want to care about it at all. Idk y'all. 2022 has really jaded me in a way that I can't describe. Anyway. This is the third and final time I will try to wrangle my thoughts about this and if this is posted then I guess I thought this was good enough to share.
This week, there was news online about how HBO Max is going to be replaced by a new streaming service and somehow also be merged with Discovery Plus. This news was odd to me, HBO Max is still technically new, I remember the glory days of HBO GO. During the company's Q2 earnings call, Twitter user @azalben shared the graphics shown below which were pretty divisive but also read like satire. You know it's over when a corporate power point uses the word "synergy" unironically. There is news about the cutting of scripted content which is a huge bummer and the implications that television is primarily gendered is also a low blow. But this is also due to the data that these services are acquiring and maintaining about their user base. More on that in a second. Take a look at these two slides:
I've been a part of a lot of corporate meetings and have heard a lot of word salad jargon in my day working in corporate America, but I have never heard the term "lean back" in comparison to "lean in". Also, I don't know what a "genredom" is? What is happening here, y'all? Why are we making up words like this is a wattpad entry? Saying that fandoms are primarily male skewed is not quite correct, (teen girls running fandoms were the reason I got into Sherlock and discovered my Hogwarts house! I also learned what SuperWhoLockian meant because of female-led fandoms!) but I can understand that this power point includes info from user data, something streaming services have been tirelessly studying and analyzing. As a female identifying person, I hate to admit that I haven't ever watched Discovery Plus, but I was very much let down by the season finale of Game of Thrones, does that mean I watch "male skewed" television?
Also this week, this news:
With the nixing of Batgirl, a 90+ million dollar movie already in the can, it seems odd that HBO is cutting something off that would be considered "female skewed." They are probably going to use the film as a tax write off according to this article:
Warner Brothers CEO David Zaslav defended his stance on cancelling Batgirl when citing that they are "not going to put a movie out unless we believe in it." Zaslav focused on the company's DC properties and emphasized their content strategy narrowing in on Superman, Spiderman, and Wonder Woman. They would like to take the approach Disney had such success with in their Marvel Studios plan. Zaslav repeatedly talked about the quality of how the DC movies should be moving forward, insinuating that Batgirl just wasn't up to snuff. He also said that he cannot justify the economic case to spend so much money on a film that is just going directly to a streaming service. I don't know, I'd have to disagree. Stranger Things and Bridgerton, although both are series, have done fantastic on streaming, and I think it's worth noting that we are still technically in a pandemic, and I don't know anyone in my wide circle of friends who is comfortable with going back into a movie theatre due to Covid. Zaslav says they are aggressively "course correcting" by bringing major budget movies to theatres, and I think that is a huge mistake. But the numbers don't lie, they would be making more money by opting out of straight to streaming content. But, to be very frank, even the biggest comic book fan I know is getting tired of the endless universes that DC and Marvel are continuously spinning. I for one am so lost with all the spin off Star Wars things happening over on Disney+, and I think we all just really want something new and something fresh, not something that is a spin off of a spin off of a spin off.
Here's the thing, I don't know if we can always predict success by crunching analytics on a spreadsheet. Sometimes the risk of putting something out that has no track record or prediction of success ends up winning in the end. If we calculated the numbers to predict the box office success of films, we would've never had Star Wars, Jaws, Ghostbusters, or Deadpool. When you get figure heads talking about investment for maximum returns, it becomes clear that they are only in it for a few reasons, and putting out unique and diverse content isn't one of them. Perhaps in the age of the algorithm, taking those rag tag risks simply do not exist anymore. Also, let's retire the word "content" because I really hate it.
Anywho, these are just some thoughts I have, and I'm sad to see these kinds of decisions be made. It reminds me that the entertainment world is business first, creativity maybe second or third.
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