A few months ago, Disneyannounced plans to join the ever-growing field of streaming services with a platform of their own by 2019, effectively giving any and all Disney-produced shows on other streaming services a death sentence. One of Disney’s most coveted franchises is Marvel, and Netflix, in particular, has had a fruitful relationship with Marvel to produce shows like Luke Cage, Daredevil, Iron Fist, Jessica Jones, The Defenders, and the upcoming The Punisher.
But according to a newWall Street Journal report, all of those shows will be pulled from Netflix permanently once Disney launched its own platform. This also means any and all future Marvel shows to be developed will also air exclusively on the Disney streaming platform. Disney’s Chief Strategic Officer Kevin Mayer calls it “not an anti-Netflix move, but a pro-Disney move.”
Disney had already confirmed that it would be moving all of its Star Wars properties onto their own service when it airs, and now we can add the Marvel Cinematic Universe to the growing list of Disney content that will be migrating to the new platform. Disney has not yet commented if the shows that are already airing on platforms, like Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, The Punisher, or even Hulu’s new The Runaways, will remain on those platforms or eventually make the move to the Disney-only service too, but that would seem to be the logical next step.
It might be annoying to have to pay for yet another streaming service, but are you really going to say no to all of the Star Wars movies, the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe, plus all of Disney’s movie catalog, including the animated movies we all love? Whatever you think of the deal, whether it will work out for Disney or not, they must really believe in the idea because it will cost Disney a whopping $300-million-plus a year, The Wall Street Journal reports.
The Wall Street Journal also confirmed that Disney’s plan to buy 21st Century Fox was all part of their master plan to directly compete with Netflix. “We’ve turned our attention to the one platform seeing growth challenges,” Mayer said. “That’s the television platform.” Imagine if Disney launched a streaming platform that had all of Disney plus everything 21st Century Fox has ever created? Thankfully for those who aren’t so into big monopolies, that deal has now been killed.
Since the move is a clear-cut attempt to compete with Netflix, you can bet that the original streaming service will not take this lying down. Netflix plans to spend at least $7 billion on original content for 2018, which means it’ll have quite a head start on Disney, whose service will only premiere in 2019.
Until then, if all this Disney talk has you enticed, you can either start to save up so you can add yet another streaming service to your monthly expenses or you can start making a pro and con list to see which service you’ll feel comfortable letting go of.
