Potiki

Probably saw how Puss and Minions sequels did compared to their original movies and figured that the market place is asking for franchise animated films.

Dividend is coming back by the end of the Calendar year (a vote will take place but I imagine it will go through), should be good news for the stock.

Toy Story, Frozen and Zootopia sequels/continuations.

Now three new segments: Disney Entertainment ESPN Disney Parks, Experiences and Products. edit used to be Studio Media Networks DTC Parks and Experiences Studio, Media Networks and DTC have been merged to one unit while ESPN has their own segment now. Also 7,000 job cuts

He's here The GOAT is back

If I do ever hear anything about that (or any of the other Star Wars series coming to physical) I will PM you However I feel like others would leak that before I even knew about it, so you would likely know before me.

Not going to make a habit of it so would be a very boring area of the internet lol. I imagine some of this will be alluded to during Disney's earning call tomorrow although I doubt it will be as specific. Probably something along the lines of "we plan to make use of our legacy revenue streams to fuel streaming growth" before going a little deeper into some small changes/strategic shifts.

I don’t usually like to do this or when I do I sometimes disguise it more as a guess (albeit an informed one) so take this with a major grain of salt especially as I have only been having a chat deeply with one person but looks like: Theatrical windows will largely be in 60-75 day range Disney+ will continue to have smaller original movie titles mainly in the Drama/Biopic, Sports and younger skewing children/family films and Hulu will have original Drama/Comedy (using 20th Century and Searchlight) Disney is hopeful for a good cadence of longer form TV from WDAS and Pixar, starting this year with Tiana and Win or Lose, will help fill gaps between movie releases for that audience (thus allowing them to go back to longer theatrical windows without too many complaints) More funding for ABC (Sports, News, Unscripted and Scripted), Disney Channels, Nat Geo, FX and Searchlight with an emphasis on dual revenue streams (Broadcast, Cable and Theatrical respectively then Streaming) although there will still be certain titles that are streaming only ESPN will be largely the same but more shared coverage between ABC and ESPN+ The first 3 points I’m more confident in as I know people at WDAS, Pixar*, Lucas* and DLA who pretty much have been hinting at such changes. A lot of this seems to be to speed up profitability/lessen losses in the next 12-18months for streaming (some of this has already been in place, starting to take shape for a while) but I imagine the theatrical window will stay similar even when streaming does become profitable next year. *Also been hearing very, very got things about Win or Lose and some early praise for Indy 5.

"In celebration of the success of the Lucasfilm series, The Mandalorian, Disney+ has announced that the series will make its broadcast television debut, introducing a special linear airing for the first episode of the series. The TV broadcast debut comes ahead of the premiere of the highly anticipated third season. As fans of The Mandalorian prepare to return to Mandalore in season three, debuting on March 1, Disney+ has prepared a nostalgic trip to the moment viewers were introduced to the adventures of lone bounty hunter, Din Djarin, with the episode that started it all. The special linear airing of the first episode of season one will be made available for viewers through simulcast across ABC, Freeform and FX on Friday, February 24, at 8 p.m. EST." source: https://collider.com/mandalorian-broadcast-television-debut/ Good way to possibly get a new audience for the show.

$135,120,000

True Lies will likely be a Disney+/Star+ show for the rest of the world. I know volume of stuff for outside streamers/networks is lower than Warner, NBCUniversal and Paramount but since 2020 Disney has still done a fair amount: That is a fairly decent list and they have others in development for outside studios. I agree with @Eric Crowe that the story is a bit overblown as Disney has continued to license non-exclusive rights to a bunch of other platforms and this is likely just more of that with maybe a big batch of ABC/20th Century shows coming up for renewal at Hulu (as mentioned in the Bloomberg article) which is why they wrote the article. The headline was a bit misleading/clickbait and mad it sound like a huge shift in strategy when Disney has been fairy consistent even with Disney+ and Hulu being strategy important. This deal happened in February 2020: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/lost-my-called-life-20-shows-coming-imdb-tv-disney-licensing-deal-1276578/ The Peacock/Hulu Modern Family happened in January 2021. I'm sure that plenty of smaller deals have happened as well. Internationally older shows are still shown on linear TV like The Simpsons even with new seasons coming to Disney+ in many markets, same with older shows like MASH which is on Disney+ but shown on linear as well (or local AVOD/BVOD) such as in Australia it on 9Now. The only titles that Disney are holding back on licensing/sharing are originals and even they increasingly are being shown on Disney Channel, Freeform, FX, Nat Geo etc. either as full seasons or a couple of episodes as advertising. This isn't a major shift for Disney out of nowhere, there are things that have been happening since the first months of Disney+ and things that have been slowly changing over the last 6-12 months even before Iger returned which is why using that an angle in the article is strange. I also can't see Disney licensing out a bunch of titles like MASH, Mixed-ish etc. to other platforms exclusively, particularly with an advertising tier here/coming, but maybe I'm wrong there.

These seem the most important paragraphs. Disney has already been licensing some of the Hulu shows (non-exclusively) to the Amazon AVOD service (think it is called Freevee at the moment) and also Modern Family was shared with Peacock so likely more of that. Unsurprisingly less movies will be shifted to streaming (as has been the case since Turning Red) as theatrical (although still challenged) is at a level in which getting to the $800m-1B range that Disney was used to in 2015-2019 isn't as difficult as the last few years particularly as China is back as a market, Disney have more TV Series ready to go than 2020/2021 and the 20th Century deal with HBO Max is almost finished which should give Hulu/Disney+ a boost of Pay-1 (streaming after theatrical release) titles.

Slightly disappointed that whatever Japanese studio (according to that map we got ) was meant to have a short (unless they were including the already released season 1 shorts) got bumped but apart from that the lineup looks great and as @Porthos mentioned if we get a stop motion short that would be incredible! Studio Mir and Cartoon Saloon are probably the other 2 I’m most looking forward to watching. But all of them sound interesting enough and being shorts I will for sure watch them all.

Alliance Entertainment’s Mill Creek Entertainment Announces New Home Entertainment Licensing Agreement with The Walt Disney Company MINNEAPOLIS, January 30, 2023--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mill Creek Entertainment, a division of Alliance Entertainment Holding Corporation ("Alliance Entertainment"), a distributor and wholesaler of the world’s largest in stock selection of music, movies, video games, electronics, arcades, and collectibles, today announced it has signed a home entertainment licensing agreement with The Walt Disney Company. In the multi-year agreement, Distribution Solutions, a division of Alliance Entertainment Holding Corporation, will distribute hundreds of select physical (Blu-ray and DVD) live-action film and television properties from the ABC Signature, 20th Television, Hollywood Pictures, Touchstone Pictures, and 20th Century Studios content libraries. "This significant partnership further builds on our studio’s substantial offering of home entertainment products that appeal to collectors and fans alike," said Jeff Hayne, Senior VP of Acquisitions and Production of Mill Creek Entertainment. "Mill Creek will assume the role of vendor of record on certain existing titles." "We are excited to have signed a licensing agreement with The Walt Disney Company. This incredible partnership is a testament to Mill Creek’s solid reputation as a premier resource for major studio content providers," said Ben Means, President of Mill Creek Entertainment. "Titles will benefit from our vast network of physical and e-commerce retailers, including several where we have proprietary fixtures for DVD and Blu-ray™ products." "Disney is a leader in the video industry, and we are humbled that they chose Alliance to maximize the sales of hundreds of their film and television properties," said Jeff Walker, CEO of Alliance Entertainment. "We have built three great divisions to produce the video industry’s best sales channel to drive sales of physical video product by incorporating the skills of Mill Creek for licensing and production, Distribution Solutions for retail and bulk distribution, and Alliance Entertainment for one-stop sales and ecommerce fulfillment." source:https://finance.yahoo.com/news/alliance-entertainment-mill-creek-entertainment-130000873.html Good news for Psychical Media fans.

The East Asian Lunar New Year don't occur during a Full Moon but a New Moon (when the moon is not visible)

Looks like WBD will start copying Universal's model for some releases: "House Party is on a 17-day theatrical window until PVOD, and 45 days until hitting HBO Max." source: https://deadline.com/2023/01/box-office-mlk-gerard-butler-plane-m3gan-house-party-1235218675/

Great episode; the action, politics, story implications, everything was great! Hopefully a sign of things to come

Firstly it isn’t really a joke. Back early last year Disney came under heavy scrutiny originally (before changing course) for giving money to Florida Republicans who were trying to make life worse for LGBT people in the state without speaking up on the issue/stopping funding, Universal was doing the exact same thing but had very little pushback from LGBT groups and their allies.

source: https://puck.news/23-semi-surefire-hollywood-predictions-predicaments-and-preoccupations-for-2023/

Yep, although they didn't have the number 1 movie of either year both were Sony (Bad Boys and Spider-Man) Disney had $2.9B in 2021, Sony was number 2 with $2.4B. Disney had $1.26B in 2020 ahead of Sony at $1.18B. sources: https://deadline.com/2022/01/2021-worldwide-box-office-studio-rankings-hollywood-market-share-covid-spider-man-no-way-home-1234905569/ https://deadline.com/2021/01/hollywood-movie-studio-global-rankings-2020-global-international-box-office-analysis-2021-outlook-1234665561/

To be fair all of the comps are for franchise films so not ideal, would have been great to have Smile but unfortunately Eric didn't track that. Hopefully it has stronger walkups/last couple day sales due to it being an original film.

Pretty much this plus the new tribe in The Way of Water takes heavy inspiration from indigenous culture with Moko (face tattoos) and naming drawing heavily from Maori traditions and language whilst involving Maori actors. If you want to compare over indexing probably have to look at the LotR trilogy (for a locally filmed big name Hollywood series) and Moana (also heavily related to Maori and other Polynesian culture) vs. Straya and other markets to get a sense of what Way of Water and the other 3 sequels might perform in NZ.

Will be more interesting to see how the film performs Saturday/Sunday, both Domestic and Internationally, due to it's runtime. I'm not ready to be negative about the prospects of Way of Water until at least Saturday with Sunday estimates, it isn't a fan driven franchise the same way DC, MCU and Star Wars are.