Image credits: DeviantArt
We are in the midst of a streaming arms race and Netflix turned a cold war hot.
On the 5th of December 2025, Netflix, the streaming superpower, and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) announced a merger valued at $82.7 billion. Netflix was set to buy HBO, HBO Max, Warner Bros. Film and TV studios and the 110-acre studio lot in Burbank, California, established a century ago.
Since December this has been a story in flux, and now on the 26th of February a head-spinning twist has occurred just as I finished writing this article…sigh.
Netflix has backed out. Paramount now appears set to win this saga.
But WBD merging with another film studio does not mean one plus one equals two. This is the loss of a studio and with-it jobs and the diversity of our media. This also means the combination of CNN and CBS news under the billionaire Ellison family’s control.
And yet still nothing is entirely certain. As such, I reckon I should catch you up on both the timeline of events and the resistance against the deal.
Here’s what you need to know:
December: Following the Netflix deal announcement on the 5th, Paramount struck back with a hostile bid, offering WBD shareholders $30-per-share in cash on the 10th. Seven days later WBD formally rejected Paramount’s bid.
January: On the 7th WBD rejected Paramount for the sixth time since mid-September despite billionaire Larry Ellison and Middle East sovereign wealth funds involvement.
David Ellison (CEO of Paramount) bites back the following day stating, “our offer clearly provides [Warner] investors greater value and a more certain, expedited path to completion.” Ellison believes his close relationship to Donald Trump would shorten the process of regulatory antitrust bureaucracy which Netflix’s deal had found itself mired in.
Paramount then sued WBD on the 12th whilst also planning a proxy fight in the WBD boardroom by nominating a suite of directors who would drop the Netflix deal.
On the 20th Netflix switched from a cash-and-shares proposal to an all-cash deal, matching Paramount’s proposed method of funding.
February: Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos went before the US Senate antitrust subcommittee to defend the deal, not very successfully. Democratic Senator Cory Booker, said “With either merger, another corporation will have that increased control over what we see, what we hear and what news we consume.”
On the 16th, a new slate of headlines appeared: “Warner Bros. Is Said to Consider Reopening Talks With Paramount.” This followed Paramount offering to cover the $2.8 billion fee paid to Netflix if WBD terminates the deal.
Netflix and WBD gave Paramount seven days to make one final offer, and I asked how long can the pendulum keep on swinging? The answer was only 10 more days.
On Thursday the 26th of February Netflix released a statement on their decision to withdraw. The deal is “no longer financially attractive,” and that it “was always a ‘nice to have’ at the right price, not a ‘must have’ at any price.”
Paramount’s deal will now face U.S. and European regulators. The same level of public concern and scrutiny as occurred when Netflix seemed the certain winner, appears to be already emerging. Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, on Thursday, called Paramount’s proposed takeover an “antitrust disaster.”
Concerns over the “megamerger,” have been raised by artists, workers unions, politicians, and cinema owners since the initial announcement in December.
Republican Senator, Mike Lee warned, “consolidating two major employers within the same market inevitably has an impact on, and can significantly weaken, competition for that labour.” There would be a definite loss ofjobs with a reduction in the number of movies and shows produced no matter the deal.
Europe’s Union Internationale des Cinémas (UNIC), which represents exhibitors across 39 countries, issued a statement regarding this: “cinemas…rely on one product for their viability: films. And to ensure they can attract and successfully serve the widest possible audience, that flow of content needs to be consistent and diverse, with an exclusive period of release…”
The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) was reportedly “building a war room to oppose this merger.” Netflix contested that actors’ residual pays (which many depend on between jobs) would not be slashed. SAG-AFTRA was not so confident in Sarandos.
Labour organisations representing directors, producers, casting directors, and writers have also expressed concern, with the Writers Guild of America conclusively saying, “this merger must be blocked.”
It’s “no secret that [Netflix] want to replace theatrical,” director James Cameron said in an interview with Deadline. The merger might have been the final blow to theatrical release windows already suffering from long-Covid. Pre-pandemic the average was 90 days. Now it is around 45 days and sources state Sarandos wants a “consumer friendly,” 17-day release.
Consumer friendly must mean alienating yourself.
Rather than bothering to have a communal experience in the cinema, you can settle for a one-on-one with the telly and “tudum,” where an algorithm scrounges up the same dusty content you saw the night before.
However, Paramount previously said they would release 30+ films, theatrically, annually following the merger potentially putting to rest some concerns raised over the Netflix deal.
Netflix’s motivations were hardly a secret. They craved IPs, the most valuable currency in our cookie-cutter, franchise, sequel dominated screen culture.
In an email from Netflix to its subscribers following the merger announcement the emphasis was on “bringing some of the world’s most beloved franchises like Harry Potter, Friends…Casablanca, Game of Thrones…together with Stranger Things…Bridgerton and K-pop Demon Hunters.” Three of which are not even franchises!
Sarandos spun this deal as an unprecedented global opportunity for filmmakers to access these IPs, but the question remained: what happens to artists and movies that are original and singular such as WBD’s 2025 releases Sinners, Weapons and One Battle After Another?
On top of jeopardising current production, the merger threatens the preservation of film history. Turner Classic Movies is in a tough spot. The cable channel has a library of classic films from Singin’ in the Rain to those underseen and forgotten, all of which are then contextualised by filmmakers, academics, and critics. Eighty percent of its staff was fired during the Discovery-Warner merger in 2022, with the channel only being saved by Scorsese, Spielberg and Paul Thomas Anderson.
Would we be so lucky for Paramount to rescue the channel again? Or as seems more likely, will this century-old back catalogue fade into the sea of “content” on Paramount+? Unlike Netflix whose earliest film in 2025 was shockingly The Sting from 1973, the studio does have a precedent for preserving film history, being the oldest existing major film studio in Hollywood tracing its history back to 1912.
Paramount, as with all film studios, are not what they once were though. Can David Ellison, billionaire, friend of Trump, be trusted as the King of Hollywood…time will tell. One thing is certain. The industry’s focus in this age of corporate consolidation is purely on the money, and not necessarily the art.
For workers, the back and forth of share prices has not been their main concern, employment is. Whether when this merger comes to fruition, will they still have their work? This is breaking news, and so I cannot say. Watch this story closely. The landscape of cinema is changing.
There is always a human cost to conglomerate warfare.
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