Netflix Plans ‘Wednesday’ Spinoff As Streaming Enters Its Franchise Era
Sequels and prequels have already taken over the movie business. Now they’re coming for TV.
Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe
By Lucas Shaw
December 17, 2023 at 6:00 PM EST
Good afternoon from Los Angeles, and congratulations on making it to the end of the year. This is the penultimate newsletter of 2023; for the last one, I have asked a couple hundred industry experts to answer a few questions about the state of the media business.
I also want to know what you think. If you have time, please click this link. And if you have any special year-end tips, you can always email me at lshaw31@bloomberg.net (or message me on Signal). If you don’t already receive this newsletter, please sign up here.
Three you need to things to know
Disney activist investor Trian has proposed two new board members – including former Chief Financial Officer Jay Rasulo. (Rasulo once hoped to succeed Bob Iger as CEO.)
YouTube is the most-popular social-media platform among teens, followed by TikTok and Snapchat.
Epic Games won its antitrust case against Alphabet, the owner of Google. A few of my colleagues explain why this is a huge deal.
Streaming TV enters its franchise era
Netflix started talking about a second season of Wednesday within weeks of the show’s November debut. The series, based on characters from The Addams Family, is Netflix’s most-popular English-language show ever. It racked up more than 250 million views last year -- and still ranked as one of the 10 most popular titles in the first half of this year.
Before production begins on the second season, the company has also started talking about another Addams Family program, one built around Uncle Fester, played on the series by Fred Armisen.
As with any TV show in development, there is no guarantee the Uncle Fester show will ever happen. The writers have to figure out the story, the company needs to negotiate contracts with talent, and the schedules of the individuals must align. But Netflix is eager to establish a pipeline of Addams Family programs to build off the success of Wednesday.
It has a willing partner in Amazon, which acquired the rights to The Addams Family when it bought MGM and produces the show under that label.
After attracting tens of millions of customers with original series like House of Cards and Stranger Things, Netflix is now starting to resemble a more traditional Hollywood studio; it is making a lot more sequels, prequels and reboots based on existing intellectual property.
These include a potential TV show set in the world of the action-movie franchise Extraction, as well as two spinoffs of the popular show Peaky Blinders. One of those would be set in Boston during the middle of the 20th century, a couple decades after the original Peaky Blinders, while another would focus on Polly, the matriarch of the criminal Shelby clan.
Netflix is hardly alone. The film industry’s obsession with franchises is spreading throughout the TV business. Every major streaming service and network is developing multiple spinoffs, prequels and sequels of existing shows.
HBO, long a bastion of original storytelling, is now making spinoffs of Game of Thrones, a sequel to Sex and the City, TV prequels to the movies Dune and It, along with multiple shows based on DC comics. (Some of these fall under the umbrella of the Max streaming service.) Showtime, the home of Weeds and Dexter, is making spinoffs of Billions and Ray Donovan – and even more Dexter.
Disney, which birthed the idea of “cinematic universes,” is developing a new version of X-Files that would be produced by Ryan Coogler, the director of Black Panther and Creed.
To the veteran TV viewer, this may bring back memories of broadcast TV from five decades ago. In what may have been the golden age of TV spinoffs, the 1970s, producers like Norman Lear and Garry Marshall derived multiple concepts from single programs.
Lear’s All in the Family had several spinoffs, including Maude and The Jeffersons. Marshall’s Happy Days spawned Laverne & Shirley and Mork & Mindy. Marshall, who cast his sister Penny in the role of Laverne, joked that whenever the two walked down the street, people asked Penny for her autograph and him for a job.
For most of this century, TV has been where writers go to tell original stories. While movie studios devoted most of their budgets to comic books, animated films and sequels, premium cable networks like HBO and Showtime and ad-supported cable networks like FX and AMC funded a new era of auteurs.
There were occasional spinoffs: Breaking Bad gave us Better Call Saul. But Netflix and Amazon, in particular, precipitated an unprecedented surge in new TV shows; they didn’t own Marvel or DC, so they had to spend billions of dollars on new ideas to attract talent and viewers.
That calculus has now changed. Slower growth and higher interest rates have forced studios, streaming services and TV networks to restrain their spending and become more conservative in what they produce. Known hits are safer bets in a world where consumers have endless choices; you don’t need to spend as much money marketing when people are already familiar with a title.
Streaming services were already building franchises in the cheaper realm of reality TV, where Netflix produces multiple versions of Too Hot to Handle and Love Is Blind.
But the cost of producing prestige TV has skyrocketed, making streaming services and premium-cable networks less willing to take a risk on an original idea with episodes costing $15 million to $20 million each.
In an age when few series get a long run, spinoffs and prequels have also become an important way to extend a hit. Friends was on the air for 10 seasons. But these days, hits don’t last that long.
That is partly because they get more expensive. Wednesday star Jenna Ortega would cost millions of dollars an episode in season seven. With a spinoff, Netflix hopes to find a cheaper way to give all those Wednesday fans a reason to keep their subscription.
But it’s also because of talent. Ortega doesn’t want to make seven seasons of Wednesday, no matter what the payday. She is a burgeoning star with the opportunity to do anything she wants.
Disney is selling to Netflix again
When Disney CEO Bob Iger wanted to convey to Wall Street that his company was getting serious about streaming in 2017, he publicly broke up with Netflix. Disney would no longer license its titles, Iger declared.
Iger couldn’t reclaim everything. He had sold Netflix the streaming rights to Grey’s Anatomy, for example, and that deal remained in effect as long as Disney was still producing new episodes of Grey’s. (The show is entering year 20!)
But Iger has changed his mind; Disney is selling Netflix 14 titles, including Lost and 30 for 30.
The once and former king of Disney has two motivations. For one, he needs cash, and licensing has always been a good business. Disney’s isn’t going to sell Netflix anything considered core to the company — no Marvel, no Pixar, no Disney animation, no Star Wars. But it will sell what it calls “general entertainment.”
Iger is also getting something he wants to boost his streaming services as he combines Disney+ and Hulu. As part of a deal, Disney will get to offer Grey’s Anatomy on Disney+/Hulu. It is a testament to the enduring popularity of Grey’s Anatomy that it is one of the 20 most popular titles on Netflix, year in and year out.
The danger for Iger (and everyone else) is that Netflix will just use these titles to extend its lead in streaming. Companies like Disney tried to starve Netflix of its old hits and force it to rely more on original series. Now Netflix can offer the biggest hits from the past and use its unrivaled audience to create new hits in the present.
The No. 1 movie in the world is...
Wonka. The latest adaptation of the book about an idiosyncratic chocolatier grossed $39 million in North America this weekend. It opened overseas first, and has now tallied more than $150 million globally.
Wonka is one of three movies Warner Bros. will release in 10 days. While Disney and Paramount sit out the end of the year, Warner Bros. is trying to give you a reason to go to the theater over the holidays. Wonka, Aquaman 2 and The Color Purple all speak to pretty different audiences.
Deals, deals, deals
Paramount Global is in play and Shari Redstone wants you to know it. Over the last week, news outlets have listed many potential suitors for the company, which owns CBS, Nickelodeon and Paramount Pictures. That list includes Apple, Amazon and Netflix, as well as billionaires Bobby Kotick and David Ellison.
Here’s the thing: Ellison is the only one who seems at all interested. Apple and Amazon know the federal government would try to block a deal, while Netflix has made it pretty clear it’s interested in the Paramount studio and lot (but not the whole company).
It’s starting to feel like Redstone and Paramount are trying to stimulate a market through the press. It’s worked before.
Sequels and prequels have already taken over the movie business. Now they’re coming for TV.
By Lucas Shaw
December 17, 2023 at 6:00 PM EST
Good afternoon from Los Angeles, and congratulations on making it to the end of the year. This is the penultimate newsletter of 2023; for the last one, I have asked a couple hundred industry experts to answer a few questions about the state of the media business.
I also want to know what you think. If you have time, please click this link. And if you have any special year-end tips, you can always email me at lshaw31@bloomberg.net (or message me on Signal). If you don’t already receive this newsletter, please sign up here.
Three you need to things to know
Disney activist investor Trian has proposed two new board members – including former Chief Financial Officer Jay Rasulo. (Rasulo once hoped to succeed Bob Iger as CEO.)
YouTube is the most-popular social-media platform among teens, followed by TikTok and Snapchat.
Epic Games won its antitrust case against Alphabet, the owner of Google. A few of my colleagues explain why this is a huge deal.
Streaming TV enters its franchise era
Netflix started talking about a second season of Wednesday within weeks of the show’s November debut. The series, based on characters from The Addams Family, is Netflix’s most-popular English-language show ever. It racked up more than 250 million views last year -- and still ranked as one of the 10 most popular titles in the first half of this year.
Before production begins on the second season, the company has also started talking about another Addams Family program, one built around Uncle Fester, played on the series by Fred Armisen.
As with any TV show in development, there is no guarantee the Uncle Fester show will ever happen. The writers have to figure out the story, the company needs to negotiate contracts with talent, and the schedules of the individuals must align. But Netflix is eager to establish a pipeline of Addams Family programs to build off the success of Wednesday.
It has a willing partner in Amazon, which acquired the rights to The Addams Family when it bought MGM and produces the show under that label.
After attracting tens of millions of customers with original series like House of Cards and Stranger Things, Netflix is now starting to resemble a more traditional Hollywood studio; it is making a lot more sequels, prequels and reboots based on existing intellectual property.
These include a potential TV show set in the world of the action-movie franchise Extraction, as well as two spinoffs of the popular show Peaky Blinders. One of those would be set in Boston during the middle of the 20th century, a couple decades after the original Peaky Blinders, while another would focus on Polly, the matriarch of the criminal Shelby clan.
Netflix is hardly alone. The film industry’s obsession with franchises is spreading throughout the TV business. Every major streaming service and network is developing multiple spinoffs, prequels and sequels of existing shows.
HBO, long a bastion of original storytelling, is now making spinoffs of Game of Thrones, a sequel to Sex and the City, TV prequels to the movies Dune and It, along with multiple shows based on DC comics. (Some of these fall under the umbrella of the Max streaming service.) Showtime, the home of Weeds and Dexter, is making spinoffs of Billions and Ray Donovan – and even more Dexter.
Disney, which birthed the idea of “cinematic universes,” is developing a new version of X-Files that would be produced by Ryan Coogler, the director of Black Panther and Creed.
To the veteran TV viewer, this may bring back memories of broadcast TV from five decades ago. In what may have been the golden age of TV spinoffs, the 1970s, producers like Norman Lear and Garry Marshall derived multiple concepts from single programs.
Lear’s All in the Family had several spinoffs, including Maude and The Jeffersons. Marshall’s Happy Days spawned Laverne & Shirley and Mork & Mindy. Marshall, who cast his sister Penny in the role of Laverne, joked that whenever the two walked down the street, people asked Penny for her autograph and him for a job.
For most of this century, TV has been where writers go to tell original stories. While movie studios devoted most of their budgets to comic books, animated films and sequels, premium cable networks like HBO and Showtime and ad-supported cable networks like FX and AMC funded a new era of auteurs.
There were occasional spinoffs: Breaking Bad gave us Better Call Saul. But Netflix and Amazon, in particular, precipitated an unprecedented surge in new TV shows; they didn’t own Marvel or DC, so they had to spend billions of dollars on new ideas to attract talent and viewers.
That calculus has now changed. Slower growth and higher interest rates have forced studios, streaming services and TV networks to restrain their spending and become more conservative in what they produce. Known hits are safer bets in a world where consumers have endless choices; you don’t need to spend as much money marketing when people are already familiar with a title.
Streaming services were already building franchises in the cheaper realm of reality TV, where Netflix produces multiple versions of Too Hot to Handle and Love Is Blind.
But the cost of producing prestige TV has skyrocketed, making streaming services and premium-cable networks less willing to take a risk on an original idea with episodes costing $15 million to $20 million each.
In an age when few series get a long run, spinoffs and prequels have also become an important way to extend a hit. Friends was on the air for 10 seasons. But these days, hits don’t last that long.
That is partly because they get more expensive. Wednesday star Jenna Ortega would cost millions of dollars an episode in season seven. With a spinoff, Netflix hopes to find a cheaper way to give all those Wednesday fans a reason to keep their subscription.
But it’s also because of talent. Ortega doesn’t want to make seven seasons of Wednesday, no matter what the payday. She is a burgeoning star with the opportunity to do anything she wants.
Disney is selling to Netflix again
When Disney CEO Bob Iger wanted to convey to Wall Street that his company was getting serious about streaming in 2017, he publicly broke up with Netflix. Disney would no longer license its titles, Iger declared.
Iger couldn’t reclaim everything. He had sold Netflix the streaming rights to Grey’s Anatomy, for example, and that deal remained in effect as long as Disney was still producing new episodes of Grey’s. (The show is entering year 20!)
But Iger has changed his mind; Disney is selling Netflix 14 titles, including Lost and 30 for 30.
The once and former king of Disney has two motivations. For one, he needs cash, and licensing has always been a good business. Disney’s isn’t going to sell Netflix anything considered core to the company — no Marvel, no Pixar, no Disney animation, no Star Wars. But it will sell what it calls “general entertainment.”
Iger is also getting something he wants to boost his streaming services as he combines Disney+ and Hulu. As part of a deal, Disney will get to offer Grey’s Anatomy on Disney+/Hulu. It is a testament to the enduring popularity of Grey’s Anatomy that it is one of the 20 most popular titles on Netflix, year in and year out.
The danger for Iger (and everyone else) is that Netflix will just use these titles to extend its lead in streaming. Companies like Disney tried to starve Netflix of its old hits and force it to rely more on original series. Now Netflix can offer the biggest hits from the past and use its unrivaled audience to create new hits in the present.
The No. 1 movie in the world is...
Wonka. The latest adaptation of the book about an idiosyncratic chocolatier grossed $39 million in North America this weekend. It opened overseas first, and has now tallied more than $150 million globally.
Wonka is one of three movies Warner Bros. will release in 10 days. While Disney and Paramount sit out the end of the year, Warner Bros. is trying to give you a reason to go to the theater over the holidays. Wonka, Aquaman 2 and The Color Purple all speak to pretty different audiences.
Deals, deals, deals
Paramount Global is in play and Shari Redstone wants you to know it. Over the last week, news outlets have listed many potential suitors for the company, which owns CBS, Nickelodeon and Paramount Pictures. That list includes Apple, Amazon and Netflix, as well as billionaires Bobby Kotick and David Ellison.
Here’s the thing: Ellison is the only one who seems at all interested. Apple and Amazon know the federal government would try to block a deal, while Netflix has made it pretty clear it’s interested in the Paramount studio and lot (but not the whole company).
It’s starting to feel like Redstone and Paramount are trying to stimulate a market through the press. It’s worked before.
