☀️'Red One' Has Big 🎅💰 Mountain to Climb Ahead
WBD vs. NBA lawsuit ends / NBA ratings headwinds continue / NETFLIX + Zack Snyder, again
Evenin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LinkedIn here if ya like or email me at seanmcnultynyc@gmail.com), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on SUNDAY, November 17, 2024.
Where it was very considerate of the JETS to continue NYC football’s reputation this weekend with the GIANTS having a bye. Man, that was a tough ending. 😣
But today was really all about the CHIEFS getting handed their first loss this season, with the BILLS being the first team to score 30 points on the CHIEFS in 30 games. Also — no buffering issues for CBS!
PLUS: While I somehow had other plans on Friday night 🤷♂️, a fight with 78 punches vs. 18 punches across 8 rounds . . . yeah, think I got the gist here. Enjoy the $20 Million, Mike (at least Jake got paid about 2x that amount for doing 4x of the work in the fight).
PEPSI, META QUEST, DRAFTKINGS, EXPERIAN and of course CELSIUS were seemingly the big 💰 sponsors that NETFLIX roped in (although nice to see a more int’l sponsor in the ring with SPATEN 🍻), and Cobra Kai and Squid Game got the heaviest NETFLIX promo.
60M “households” watched the big fight globally, or about 21% of the global NETFLIX subscriber base engaged with the fight, so take that % as ya like (peak concurrent streams were 65M).
Zero insight as to how many were in the U.S. 👀 — so comps here are tough.
OVERALL: 60M is a little bigger than an NFL Conference Championship game (the games before the Super Bowl) — but those 2 games are U.S.-only, and go by a “viewer” number, not a “household” or “concurrent stream” number like this NETFLIX stat.
SO: Basically. . . a lotta people watched, and quite a few were vocal about freezing & buffering issues (especially in the pre-fight and undercard).
AND: That is probably the biggest takeaway from the fight . . . with about 5 weeks until the NFL Christmas games for NETFLIX to sort any tech issues out, games that will also be streaming globally (although likely with less truly global appeal).
WELL: The other takeaway from this weekend in sports is that Ari certainly had good seats to the other big fight this weekend — UFC 309 at MSG.
FINALLY: I’ll give the last word to Colin Jost here on Weekend Update last night: “Last night Jake Paul and Mike Tyson teamed up to defeat everyone watching.” 👏 (Some pretty great 🔥 takes on the Trump cabinet nominations, too.)
ALSO: TIKTOK is exploring the creation of QUIBI-like short episode scripted drama series. These are popular on the TIKTOK-in-China service DOUYIN, and also on some free services in India . . . but yeah, obviously not so much here to date, so you do you, TT.
WAKEUP BOX OFFICE POLL
My fellow 36% contingent were correct on Red One this weekend.
IN THIS EDITION
What WBD gets in the resolution of its NBA lawsuit . . . as NBA cable TV viewership troubles continue. Take a look at the latest numbers as AMAZON’s TNF success continues.
A very tired trope gets dragged back out again on Red One — folks, it’s time to end this. Plus a look at the latest specialty numbers and yet another new entry showing that there is a small, growing business in foreign pics at the U.S. box office.
NETFLIX gets back in the Zack Snyder business, but in a vastly different genre, as SONY gets the next project from a buzzy filmmaker and more.
📽 THE SILVER SCREEN
