☀️SONY’s 16-Month Banger Drought Continues with ‘28 Years’
NORTH ROAD in merger talks / ’27 🎥 slate gets more pics / NETFLIX buys SONY shark pic
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, January 18, 2026.
Where it’s nice to see Trump keeping his campaign promise to (likely) increase prices for Americans on some European-made goods until we get Greenland . . . but he’s now turned his sights to TV scheduling!
Yes, meet the latest Trump Executive Order with non-existent dubious legal backing to prevent the College Football Playoff/CFP from expanding and scheduling additional playoff games that no one needs against the annual ARMY/NAVY football game on the 2nd Saturday of December.
The game generally gets around 7M to 8M viewers. Yes, that game airs on CBS — why do you ask?
PLUS: NBCU will livestream some daytime Winter Olympics events in about 150 AMC THEATRES locations.
OH: Bari Weiss/CBS NEWS is airing the formerly punted “Inside CECOT”/ El Salvador jail conditions 60 Minutes piece tonight — ya know, in the episode that airs against a huge NFL playoff game on NBC, with no game on CBS earlier in the day to promote it either.
ALSO: A piece on the Minnesota ICE infiltration, where there are 6x more ICE officers in the Minneapolis than police officers in the city.
SO: Who had February 2026 in the office pool for when CHATGPT would start showing ads? The $20 and $200 a month versions will not have them, but the free and $8 a month users will see them.
YAH: Gotta love Trump buying debt in both NETFLIX and WBD in December via bonds worth between $500k to $1M in each company, although the disclosure was made at the end of last week, in between freeing twice convicted felons.
WAKEUP BOX OFFICE POLL
Well, an MLK weekend to forget . . . as the bears score their first win of 2026. Kudos to the 16% for reading the box office falloff after opening weekend on the 28 Years pic this June correctly.
🎥 THE BOX OFFICE
Hollywood’s been dropping the ball on MLK weekend.
Since Covid / starting 2022, we’ve had:
3 whiffs — 2023 was Plane (and M3GAN week 2), then Wolf Man/One of Them Days last year and 28 Years Later 2 this year. None cracked $15M openings.
2 hits — Both PAR IP revivals: Scream in 2022 and Mean Girls in 2024 with Beekeeper.
Not great for the day that’s really supposed to kick off your industry’s business in earnest for the year ahead.
2027 has an untitled BLUM placeholder, and PAR’s Children of Blood and Bone fantasy book adaptation.
So, here’s what we got across the board . . . from the SONY slump to the Avatar drop, to the youth hits of Christmas still scoring. Young people and the movies, who knew?