Netflix boss says the streamer 'saved' Hollywood, a very obvious lie

Summary

April sees record-breaking box office month, A Minecraft Movie on track to hit $1 billion.
Netflix’s Sarandos claims cinema viewing obsolete, says Netflix ‘saves Hollywood’ by securing audiences.
Healthy theatrical blockbusters often turn into streaming hits, strengthen Netflix’s position in the market.

April has been a record-breaking month for box offices, with A Minecraft Movie currently on track to be the first film this year to reach $1 billion, and the R-rated Sinners notching the biggest opening weekend for an original film since 2019’s Us. It has been a busy time at the multiplex as movie fans of all ages have seemingly found something to watch, with healthy ticket sales helping to boost not only theaters but the film industry as a whole.

However, if you ask Ted Sarandos, the co-CEO of

Netflix
, the real magic of the movies is nowhere near a theater.

The executive, who spoke recently at a Time 100 event (per The Guardian), implied that the very concept of seeing films in cinemas is obsolete, saying “I believe it is an outmoded idea, for most people.” He then added that Netflix is “saving Hollywood” by securing an audience for films at home because that’s the only place people really want to watch films.

I think anyone who

watched The Electric State
would disagree that Netflix is “saving” anything.

Snark aside, Sarandos choosing now to say this seems especially strange, as strong box office performance helps Netflix in the long run. When movies are successful in theaters, folks naturally want to revisit them at home. 2024’s Moana 2 is a perfect example of this. After scoring the biggest theatrical opening in Walt Disney Animation Studios’ history, the film was released four months later on Disney+, and notched a colossal 27.3 million views globally on Disney+ in its first five days of streaming, making it the third-largest animated theatrical premiere of all time on Disney+ (per Disney)

I don’t understand Sarandos’ logic here in trying to create a narrative about the future viability of the theater experience, especially when box office numbers are so healthy and data shows that big theatrical blockbusters almost always turn into surefire streaming hits.

Granted is just the latest in a string of

weird statements from Netflix executives
, so maybe Netflix is just trying to keep themselves in the news cycle. I’m here typing about it so in that way, perhaps this latest, clearly untrue statement was actually effective.

Amazon’s shady Prime Video practices are paying off big time

Amazon pulled a fast one on Prime Video subscribers in 2023 and it looks like it paid off in a big way.

Max gets a new account add-on feature

If you’ve got a friend with an Ultimate Ad-Free Max plan, now is the time to hit them up

MAX

Subscription with ads: $9.99/month
Premium Subscription: $19.99/month

After cracking down on password sharing last year, Warner Bros-Discovery has announced a new feature that will allow Max subscribers to add additional users outside their home for $8 each.

Though Max isn’t the first streamer to offer this kind of feature, it is the only one I’ve seen that charges a flat fee no matter what tier the primary user is on that gives the extra user all the benefits found on the primary account. So, for instance, if the account owner is signed up for an ad-supported profile, the added member will stream titles with ads as well, but if they are subscribed to a top-tier Ultimate Ad-Free plan, the additional user will get ad-free viewing as well as 4K resolution, all for the same $8 that someone added to the lowest tier would pay.

This makes this an honestly pretty good deal for folks who are looking to subscribe to Max and have friends who are subscribers to the highest Max tier.

Free streaming is becoming a threat to Disney+, Netflix and Max

Plus a new deal on Sling TV, The Last of Us gets a part 3 and more.

Andor returns to Disney+ for a binge-able final season

Get ready for three hours of Star Wars every Tuesday.

Disney+

Andor

Release Date: 2022 – 2025-00-00
Network: Disney+
Showrunner: Tony Gilroy
Directors: Susanna White
Writers: Dan Gilroy

Stellan Skarsgård

Luthen Rael

One of my most-anticipated shows of the year is the final season of Andor, and after a long three years Disney+ finally dropped the first three episodes this past week. As expected, the series has made a major jump forward in time, and is dealing with some heavy subjects that have seldom been explored in the Star Wars galaxy.

However, as with the first season, the series is following a bit of an unconventional release schedule, with three episodes dropping at a time. This means next week, episodes 4–6 will drop on April 29, Episodes 7–9 will then hit the service on May 6, and the final three episodes will debut May 13. It’s an interesting mix between Netflix’s erstwhile binge-all-at-once strategy and Disney+’s weekly releases but it seems to be keeping this show’s momentum moving in a very positive way, and I for one, can’t wait to see what surprises are in store as we head full steam ahead towards the events of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

Tariffs will make streaming more expensive, and sooner than you think

Plus this week’s Pocket Pick is a recent box office flop that could be given a second life on streaming!

The Last of Us finally goes there

If you made it to last week’s episode without spoilers, congratulations

HBO/Max

The Last Of Us

Release Date: January 15, 2023
Network: HBO
Showrunner: Craig Mazin
Directors: Craig Mazin, Peter Hoar, Jeremy Webb, Ali Abbasi, Mark Mylod, Stephen Williams, Jasmila Žbanić, Liza Johnson, Nina Lopez-Corrado
Writers: Neil Druckmann, Craig Mazin

Bella Ramsey

Ellie Williams
John Hannah

Dr. Newman – Scientist #2

When The Last of Us was surprisingly renewed for a third season a few weeks ago, I was worried that this meant that HBO would be padding out the beginning of The Last of Us 2 game in order to give fans more time with star Pedro Pascal’s grizzled version of Joel. However, I was more than happy to be wrong as this week’s episode saw Joel meet his fate in pretty graphic fashion.

Though a lot was changed in terms of the structure of how this iconic game moment went down, I was happy to see that the folks behind this show weren’t afraid to go for broke during this scene, and the performances by not only Pascal but also Bella Ramsey and Kaitlyn Dever were truly top notch this week. I was definitely a little skeptical going into this season that this show would be able to maintain the quality of season 1, but thus far it seems my fears were unfounded, and I’m happy to report that The Last of Us season 2 remains one of the best shows on TV.