please explain, not being sarcastic, I'm curious.
from my point of view, Netflix invests a huge amount of money on original movies and shows they deliver constantly at no extra cost, why does Disney get a pass?
It's just that the 2 companies fundamentals are completely different. Netflix have been working with a loss of money where as Disney ensure they are positioned to make profit.
Netflix is all about throwing as much shit at a wall as possible to see what sticks. Some of it works, the majority of it doesn't. When it comes to their TV shows, half of their originals are actual originals, the other half is just licensed from other countries to stream on Netflix in another country and generally people have no idea what is what. The majority of Korean shows and anime shows are just licenses and Netflix had nothing to do with production. There is a huge difference between making an original production from scratch and just licensing a show. Netflix have been in the red for 10 years or so and only just last year went black and this was primarily due to a pandemic year, if it wasn't a pandemic year they'd still be in the red.
Netflix have raised their price to allow them to throw more money at more shit. I think Netflix need to cool it with buying 140 different things for a single year and really double down on a lower number of productions that they have faith in. Less productions and higher quality.
Disney on the other hand is all about calculated decisions and ensuring they earn profits. Everything they release is greenlighted and funded by them or one of the studios they own. Even though they fund everything, not everything sticks of course, you can look at examples like Dumbo and the Lion King remake. You can see Disney actually put faith in productions and I feel that is very different than buying 60 films and 60 TV shows in a single year.
You can see that Disney make smart business decisions with Disney+ as well, they released the streaming service at a low price and for the first year it had very limited original content, even if the pandemic didn't hit there was still barely any original content for that first year. Disney had no idea how successful their platform would be or if it would be successful at all so they had low expenditure for that first year. Now they know it's more successful than they imagined and they have gone full force with original programing. As mentioned in this thread Disney increased their price and I think that is fair considering they are making the most expensive TV shows that have ever been produced, WandaVision for example costs more than the majority of an of the MCU films.
They have Loki, Hawkeye, Ms Marvel, What If?, Moon Knight, She-Hulk, Secret Invasion, Iron Heart, Mandolorian season 3, Boba Fett, Ahsoka, Obi-Wan, Andor, The Bad Batch and Turner and Hooch amongst other shows in active development.
The 2 streaming services have very different target demographics of course. Disney+ caters to the Disney/Pixar/Star Wars/Marvel fans whereas Netflix is trying to make everyone happy. You can compare Netflix to anyone though and see that they work very differently to the norm. Disney+, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Apple+, HBO Max, Paramount+, any of the network channels, any of the cable channels, they all focus on lower productions and try to ensure quality and profit. Netflix is the only crazy cowboy that buys/produces over 100 new things a year.
I'll stay subbed to Disney+ and Netflix but personally I am very rarely excited about a Netflix original film. Movies like Marriage Story and 6 Underground are very far and few between. Of course 6 Underground isn't a great film but it's a stupid fun film and the production quality is equal to the usual Hollywood fare, nothing else has come close from Netflix.
Going back to Mulan, Soul and Raya and the Last Dragon on Disney+, it's important to understand that these films were made for theatrical release and studios expect a return on a theatrical release, Disney+ was never in the equation for these films. Disney have been experimenting during the pandemic. Mulan and Soul were both financial failures and both lost Disney millions of dollars. Raya is going to have a wider theatrical release but it's still most likely going to lose Disney millions of dollars even more so if they don't charge the premium price on Disney+. I can understand people not wanting to pay the premium. I personally don't want to either but I will see Raya at the cinemas this weekend.
Warner and AT&T are an entirely different beast with their 2021 theatrical films, they are going to lose money on every one of those releases. The only way Disney or Warner would be making money on their theatrical titles via releasing them for free on their streaming platforms is if they gain enough new subs on release week to equal what they would make at the box office. This is not happening though, sure there are sub spikes when Mulan, WW84 and Raya are/get released but it's not enough to equal what they'd make at the box office.
I'm pretty sure Disney are close to making 1 billion a month with Disney+ so realistically they could release at least 1 Hollywood quality film a month at this point. Make a 200 million dollar film, there is still 600 million in profit there. But then you take into account the shows they make for the service and the lower budget films and those profits start diminishing quite quickly. WandaVision is a 225 million dollar show, basically 100 million in costs a month, that's 500 million in profits.
Even when they hit 180 million subs they still need to ensure they are making substantial profit. It's pointless if they are throwing out 50 productions a month and only making 100 million profit. They are a company, not a charity.
Sorry for the long rant.
