The Collapse of HBO Max 

So I was gonna detail the whole “batgirl” controversy much more, especially the taxes part, but it got a bit bogged down with speculation and rumors and other such things. The Batgirl movie was not cancelled for “tax deductions and write offs”. The government doesn’t simply reimburse a film’s production budget because it was wrote off. Since the studio is loosing a significant amount of money by not releasing the film, regardless of the whole tax situation, the reason it was cancelled was due to the content of the film itself. Now since I haven’t seen the film, I won’t say why I believe it was cancelled, but there’s quite a bit of speculation online. Could be the quality, political stuffs, anything. But yeah, it wasn’t taxes.

"Am I saying I could have done better? Yes, I do" Respect for admiting it

It's funny how one of the excuses they're using for cancelling so many shows is that they want to keep HBO an exclusive premium brand and they only want the highest quality shows. But at the same time, they're planning to merge HBO Max with Discoveryplus next year, with such premium exclusive content as Honey Boo Boo, the Duggars, and Toddlers and Tiaras. Also, they're trying to make $3 billion in budget cuts while their new CEO is getting a compensation package worth $246 million.

What HBO Max did to animated shows and creators is beyond absurd. There’s no way the amount of money they saved was worth the complete loss in public faith in the service

The level of incompetence needed to get to this point in WB’s demise (considering their library is stacked with content that people love) is truly something to behold.

If Dwayne Johnson ends up saving WB, he will be able to write his own check in Hollywood. They'll build a statue of him the size of the WB watertower at WB studios.

That is just sad. Warner went from being Disney's top competitor, to spit balling ideas in hopes something sticks. Reminds me of the whole Nintendo and Sega feud

The worst part of it all was how brilliant HBO max was at first. The way they split up their movies was really smart. Focusing on TCM and CN and Adult Swim and Looney Tunes and Studio Ghibli

The especially tragic thing is before all this HBO max was the best streaming service available

It’s been a 6 years since this channel became Tyler’s, but even after such a long time, I still can’t decide for the life of me whether this channel is serious or a complete shitpost lmao

The whole write off tax loss just doesn’t make sense to me as a tax accountant. Pretty common misconception people have that everything is a “tax write off”. No company in their right mind would go into in endeavor for a taxable loss. IRS losses are more strict than normal GAAP losses. You can’t deduct losses from lost sales or any of that only expenses already incurred. Even then, you’d be pretty stupid not to release it and recoup some of the money because you will deduct it either way. Tax write off argument is so stupid and the people that believe it need to research it themselves.

"isn't the amount that the studio is paying in residuals to the actors and writers way too much" hasn't really aged all that well...

What AT&T was trying to do was essentially vertical integration without any idea of how vertical integration actually works

WB has the best library and IP, next only to Disney. How did they manage to screw it up?

The CN executives are the same people who think having 30 straight episodes of Teen Titans Go every single day to this day is a good thing, yet they also were smart enough to see this as a terrible decision.

Too many streaming apps it’s overwhelming.. theyre better off selling or idk renting their shows to other bigger streamers like Netflix or Hulu

A couple of things here. The Batgirl movie cancellation had to do with a one time tax write off for assets acquired in the merger. That had to be done sometime before August so that has a lot to do with the abrupt timing (this write off is in addition to other depreciation). Zaslov (the new head honcho) is on the record as favoring unscripted content (aka reality TV like Honey Boo Boo) as opposed to scripted stuff (like West World, Raised by Wolves...etc). My thought is that he is vastly out of touch with his audience...VASTLY. Then there is the whole CW fiasco. Contrary to what anyone would say, these super hero shows that they cancelled en mass were wildly profitable due to the deals they had with Netflix for streaming rights after the season was broadcast. Netflix was paying BILLIONS (with a B) for those streaming rights, that doesn't even take into account many of those cancelled shows were close to airing long enough to get picked up in syndication (another no brainer cash cow). I can't look at that decision to mass cancel basically the whole network as anything but an ego thing that they just didn't want Netflix to have the content and better to cancel it than let Netflix pay you billions of dollars. I agree...I think I could do a better job running this mess.

It's such a shame that a company like Warner Bros. with a legendary library of films and shows as well as popular IPs has always been ruined time after time because of the terrible desicions of their parent companies. Honestly, a lot of this bullshit could've been prevented if they just stayed independent after realizing about the massive disaster that the AOL merger ended up being.

I truly feel sorry for all of the animation studios that got screwed

Some days I look on in despair as Disney acquires everything . . . But then I look at Warner Bros and I realise why. Whole industry is run by idiots who are paid way too much and don't know what they are doing.

I hopped off the hbo train when they separated themselves from boxing. I know it wasn't just the suits at hbo that came to that conclusion (promotions, investors, front/back end finance) but to throw over 40 years of quality boxing programming in the can was a huge blow to the network. Some might not agree, but as a fight fan, it was cool to know you was getting prime fights throughout the year. It's always been many places to watch fights. Boxing is the only sport that came on almost every night of the week. 🥊🥊🥊🥊 and we enjoyed it all, from Tuesday night fights, to the bigger shows. Edit: hbo just had that certain charm and detailed vision when it came to presenting the fight game. They just hit different 🥊🥊🥊🥊

HBO Max back catalogue of HBO shows, Warner and MGM classics, Cartoon Network and so on, is a truly fantastic one. They have the most well-rounded catalogue of all streaming services

Cartoon Network had produced good shows that are classics and now I find myself fearing what might happen to all of that.

This is by far the best explanation I've heard on the matter so far. Very well done

Love the Max Headroom clips strewn in the video. Very fitting.

The fact that Uncle Grandpa is the only show that survived from Discovery's raid on Cartoon Network shows in HBO Max is equivalent to Kirby escaping from the World of Light in Smash Ultimate. Uncle Grandpa is the living embodiment of the average Florida man.

With one of my favorite shows (Infinity Train) being removed from HBO max, its ONLY distributor, I feel like this stunt is hopefully going to cause a revival of online piracy, which is seriously the only way to watch the show Infinity Train.

This is why every time John Campea praises these moves by David Zaslav, I KNOW he's buggin & just impressed to see an exec welding THAT much power to undo the mistakes WB made with HBO Max that he was the biggest movie industry YTer taking a loud vocal stance against

The worst thing about this is that we were SO CLOSE to a revival to western animation. Welp, guess it's back to indie. Edit: Man, this has destroyed me more than I thought. I mean this is my DREAM, I've always wanted to be in the animation scene for all my life. Now I don't know if western animation will be around when I go job hunting. God damn it, I don't even feel mad anymore, im just numb.

It’s really sad what’s has been going with HBO Max Animation lately (And with the entire Western Animation industry). I know they can create amazing cartoons, even the best ones ever made. They have all of the resources, the budget, all of these amazing and talented artists and animators and yet they choose not unlock that potential of this incredible medium because Hollywood sees it as something dumb, just for babies. Animation deserves better treatment than this 😔

What a mic drop at the end! Loved it!

I love how in the editing part "La chica de ipanema" (The girl from Ipanema) sounds in Lo-fi, its awesome. Also, nice analysis

Message to Media Corporations. "Shitting the bed is not better than not shitting the bed." Trying asking what will attract people to your yard. Not what will trap them in your walled garden. That is an abusive relationship. It's why people hate you.

I have to disagree about the animated shows on HBO Max having low viewership. Infinity Train was one of the most highly viewed shows on service. There’s no good reason for it to have been removed.

As a huge WB fan, this actually breaks my heart to be honest 💔

I feel like Disney is just waiting for the moment to swoop in and buy Warner Bros out and further expand their monopoly

I’ve said it many times regarding HBO Max and I’ll say it again, considering that the many higher ups under Zaslav were not happy with this, most notably CN’s higher ups who said that what Zaslav did was a horrible idea, they should simply campaign to get rid of Zaslav. Roy E. Disney did such a thing when he was sick of Eisner’s BS and look where it got the Walt Disney Company during the 2010’s. It worked with Disney so why not do it with WB? Other than that, if I was Zaslav, I would’ve just tried to get many of those HBO Max exclusives to be given reruns on cable, like on HBO’s channels, Discovery Family, Cartoon Network, TBS, etc. instead of pissing off everyone. Also have upcoming HBO Max originals maybe moved to premiere on HBO itself.

It really is amazing when a multi-billion dollar company becomes so incompetently managed that it doesn't seem like an exaggeration to say that you could pick someone off the street at random and believe they could do better.

This is madness! I am used to certain films or TV shows having their deal with a streaming service expiring, but I never expected it to happen to original streaming content just because "not enough people" watched it. This is an unprecedented crisis for people who subscribe to streaming services and people who make content for them. I have never seen any streaming service that strapped for cash that they had to delete some things! September 18, 2022, 4:16pm

I'm rolling! Well done sir. Subscribed.

HBO MAX really seemed like it was gonna be a top dog streaming service. Unlike Netflix it actually has real classic shows and movies I liked growing up. Shame they are giving up on it so easily.

This man understands that existance and adversity- are one and the same.

During the Pandemic it was perfect to put movies on streaming services but as soon as recovery occurred they should've made movies theaters exclusive once again

Content wise HBO MAX has been top tier when it comes to streaming services. It's maddening to see the service-and the overall legacy of the Warner, HBO, and DC Comics brands-so devalued by the CEO of a company that produces actual garbage. I also find it absolutely hilarious that Zaslav would announce a grand 10 Year Plan to "fix" the DC ip and then greenlight a sequel to the 2005 'Constantine' film. That was a film that was not a "hit" during its original release. Wasn't a critical darling. Was notable for being nothing like the source material. And ultimately barely broke even at the domestic box office. Like, whut?

David Zaslav really wants to compete with Bob Chapek for worst CEO of a major entertainment company

One aspect that seems unnoticed is that Warner since AOL was in huge debt, AOL sold it for that low because it was more profitable to them and get rid of that debt With streaming services they can get a stable income, just not what companies expect (which is ALL the existing money in the world) Zaslav's decisions for sure are petty, but mergers have an intended purpose, even the ones that at face value don't make sense This isn't an excuse because why should I defend a multi million company? But it's an understanding as to why they f**k up so regularly

For me it’s quite the contrary. While they have removed many of the unpopular animated shows, hbomax and Wb are the only one keeping variety of serious, well written, adult themed shows in the present day. Many of the others like Disney+ , Netflix and Amazon are just garbage.

HBOs first sign of struggle was passing off “Masters of the Air”. The third mini-series in the Band of Brothers family of shows, a series that very much helped kicked HBO into the big game. The success of the show at the time was huge during a turbulent time for “premium” channel services. This now is Apple TV’s first major project and will likely make some significant impact in their streaming service subscription count (they agree, as they’ve spent nearly $250 million on it). This decision was made in 2019, or at least finalized in 2019 which likely means it was made much earlier. Anytime a entertainment company starts to dump off its flagship content, especially such highly acclaimed content, it becomes evident there’s likely some deep flaws occurring.

HBO was consistently my favorite streaming app through the pandemic. even if just for watching reruns of Mr. show and flight of the Conchords it's worth it for me.

I think I can condense what's happening in WB down to 1 word, and the word is: panic.

Great accurate reporting on the WB dumpster fire. You got a new sub.

I don't pay attention to a lot of this stuff so I am shocked Warner Bros is in such a bad position and was really surprised when I saw they were merging with discovery. It is quite incredible the position they are in now and I am curious if this was will cause such a giant from before to fail.

I cant wait for when the time comes in a few years when we all come back to this video and wonder how he guessed the WB Chipotle merger so far in advance

Great video, I enjoyed it especially being reminded how AT&T overpaid for this. There is no money in these streaming services, more to say accurately, there is no profit in streaming. Paramount+ and even Disney+ are losing billions a year. Unless they cut down on cost heavily (mainly limited new content), the only way HBO Max can make a profit is by getting to 400-500 million subscribers and increasing the service to maybe $50 a month. That's not going to happen, because if they jack up the price, it's just cable again and HBO Max would lose subscriptions by the millions. No profit in streaming.

"WarnerDiscovery is going bankrupt" -People who don't understand what cleaning house is

I for one, am all for streaming services dying and becoming 1 or 2 just like when it was only Netflix and Hulu. I hate how many streaming services there are now. Its the same as the cable I stopped paying for

I think what kills me the most about all the animated shows getting axed is two-fold; -First, They made ***no*** attempts to renegotiate *anything* with *anyone*, to the point where literally the actual staff on the shows, the ones being paid these supposed expensive remittances, only found out with everyone else. No one even thought about renegotiating the high rates, and just hit "delete" on a lot of shows that were loved by their viewers and staff alike. To give you a perspective on just *how* horrible of an idea this was, multiple staff from these shows have outright openly committed piracy to keep them watchable. Like, they just deadass actually made and shared massive Google drives full of all the episodes, and didn't obfuscate anything. Now, there certainly was some "FUCK YOU HBO" energy to this whole thing, but pretty much everyone, both openly and in private, was far more concerned with keeping the shows watchable. *These people were openly willing to commit actual crimes to keep these shows watchable without having to go to risky pirate sites.* They cared about that WAY more then they cared about the money. If the execs up top has even just sent out a single feeler to see if renegotiation was on the table, they could have avoided this whole fiasco and only removed a few shows at best, *and* have someone else to point blame towards for said removal. Instead, not only did they burn bridges with thousands of creators, lose 20 billion in market cap, and tank their reputation, but now all these creators are airing out the horrible business practices and abuses they were subject to while making these shows, both further tanking the reputation of the company and making it harder for them to do this in the future. -Speaking of reputation, Secondly, though these posts are all gone now, HBO Max was actually trying to pivot itself into "The animation platform" once GoT ended and they needed a new cash cow. They recognized that general audience and mature animation was a massively underserved Niche in the west, and that the anime industry was on the decline, leaving a massive hole full of money and dedicated fans out in the rain, so they decided to basically embrace this new niche first by tapping into nostalgia about the DCAU and Animaniacs, and then by moving focus onto their popular existing animated properties like Adventure Time and Steven Universe. They went into this Niche hard and fast, and actively pushed that Warner Bros was moving back into animation, and moving back hard. Between Netflix canning most shows past season 2, Disney+ not really caring much about new animation outside of what they were already making, Hulu just not having much animation, and Nickelodeon being too kid focused, there was actually a real sense of hope among animation buffs for a while. Hell, under the Harley Quinn episodes on the pirate site I used, some people said they were only on the site to use the forum-like comments and the community, and were watching animation legally for the first time in literal years, and actually paying for the service. Animation, which has the biggest piracy """problem""" of any media, where even successful projects like Netflix's She-Ra reboot """lose""" a lot of viewers to piracy, was actually getting more actual new subscriptions on their platform then ever before, because they actually seemed to be investing in the success and giving people what they wanted, finally. They weren't gonna pull a Netflix by canning a show after 2 seasons if it wasn't stranger things levels of successful, and they weren't gonna trash a show because they purposefully made it fail because of internal politics like Disney did (RIP every successful Disney show sent to Disney XD to die a horrible death because of "low ratings" on a channel that not even a million people had access to one one cable service when they got multi-million views on the main channel. Wander over Yonder and Gravity Falls deserved so much better.) It seemed like, for once, instead of the animation community having the rug pulled out from under them once the studios felt like it, people could trust HBO Max would actually care about animation. And then they pulled the rug out and deleted thousands of hours of animation so quickly some people were in the middle of episodes when they were deleted. Aside from that one episode of uncle grandpa that stayed up for an extra 30 hours, the animated shows vanished just as quickly as the genuine good will they spent four years building did. I have genuinely never seen a community go from outright praising a corporation to actually planning on vandalizing the execs homes and cars in such a short time span. That is how this move lost them 20 billion and counting. And they fucking deserved every bit of it.

As an Animation lover hurts.

Thanks for the video essay. HBO Max doesn’t stream in many countries outside of the Americas. In NZ, they license their content to Sky Television and TVNZ, who host Warner Bros content on their own streaming platforms. Not enthusiastic about what streaming service Warner Bros Discovery plans to launch internationally. They have made too many blunders.

0:10 I did not expect Goldie the clown driving a dreamworld car to be in this!

They took arguably the best streaming service and trashed it

This might be different but them cancelling Raised by Wolves was so tragic as it was one of the best, different shows I’ve watched. Got my friends roommates of very different personalities to get so invested, it was a show lots of people could get into seemingly

Okay but HBO Max isn’t dying. It’s still one of the most used streaming services

Slowest collapse in history, apparently. 🙄

They have so much potential. Someone with more than two braincells and the Batman IP alone could be more profitable than them. For the sake of my childhood memories, I hope they fix the mess they've made.

It’s almost like Warner Bros is a cursed treasure. It’s great that you own this extensive fortune of shows, ip’s, etc., but at what cost?

Warner Bros. is quickly becoming the Sears of entertainment.

didja get a new mic or something? sound a bit different ya do. lovely video, can't wait for the collapse. have a good'un.

I just hope DC finds a new home. 50+ years under Warner's ownership has seen some really good times, but, the bad times far outweigh the good. Truth is Warner's never really known what to do with DC. I'd like to see them under leadership that does.

Soon enough it'll be "The Collapse Of WB And Every Other Studio"

I always liked the idea of going straight to streaming as a way to differentiate even though I primarily like theatre. I think they should have reduced the price compared to theatre prices. Basically allow people to "renting" for the first week

Im a big fan of HBO max. It has so many good shows and movies, having the whole DC brand is a huge appeal to me. It really is a shame to see what Warner Discovery is doing to it. But these problems go back further than when they merge. Warner Bros botched the DC cinematic universe badly haven't really been able to recovery since.

"Am I saying I could have done better? Yes, I do" The executives in high positions in big enterprises are not dumb, they are unscrupulous. This case is just a small example that the mentality of these powerful people is still the same of the 2008, because they know that their bad practices don't have consequences for them, neither financially nor criminally. And, as last resort, there is always government money to save the companies when things go too bad. The bill goes to the poor to pay.

KnowledgeHusk: “I don’t think they will, but some people do…” Me: “but some people scooby-doobie-doooo!” I will see myself out now.

I can see why HBO Max is collapsing and great video man :]

As someone who works in finance for an entertainment company I great appreciate the correction in the edit. Sometimes people mention they get a tax benefit like it magically makes the numbers work, tax benefit or not it's still bad for business to waste $90M to save $30M in taxes. I would add another benefit to not releasing it, is keeps the BS clear in future years. Content gets expensed over years so expensing it all now will make 2023+ better.

Office politics in the corporate sector never fails to destroy value and enrich top managers

"Bold, Brash, and cost a lot of Cash."

Literally went to watch Harry Potter yesterday on HBO Max only to find it was shipped to only be found streaming on Peacock. This explains it, well here's to the Rock and GRRM to saving an entire 99 year old corporation. Hope it works out for them

I noticed a lot of movies that used to be on HBO Max, and are still listed as being available, aren't anymore since becoming MAX.

Projects get cancelled when new people take over, so that the people from before who started those projects don't get the credit and the new people can't be blamed if it bombs. This seems the most likely explanation for Batgirl getting canned. Edit: this is why I shouldn't comment before finishing the video.

When the services merge I want to see the statistics of "scripted good" vs. "honny-boo-boo shit" when it come to watching, even when it come the Discovery-only stuff the audience will pick something better if given a choice. At least Zaslav treat the theaters better than Chapek.

Man, WB is my favourite studio. They consistently make the best movies every year and now it's come to this.

I'm so pissed Close Enough got cancelled. I genuinely loved the show and was looking forward to it going a long way. I've been following it since it was announced for TBS. I'm still so pissed.

Like I said in the other video is really fucking crazy how HBO Max destroyed itself overnight.

Why do I feel that House of the Dragon is the only thing keeping HBOMax alive?

i miss your wacky cartoons i know its time consuming but i loved them

10:48 thank you for starting the graph at 0

I just personally hate lost media. I don't care if Batgirl is bad I just want to be able to decide that for myself

i love how executives and higherups keep proving over and over again they're in postion because they have the money and not that they're smart or anything

This was quite interesting!

That end punchline was the best!

I really can't think of a time in my life when WB WASN'T in financial trouble tbqh

I feel bad for Warner Brothers, literally destroyed by corporate greed.

We went from the HBO app, to HBO Go, to HBO Now HBO Max now it’s Max. The name HBO is more recognizable. As far as branding and the old slogan ‘It’s not TV, it’s HBO’ this is brand recognition. Switching the name to Max was just dumb in my opinion.

I feel like Dune Part 2 and a general Duniverse is their best hope for a major blockbuster film that brings in new crowds. I'm worried though that they'll put the squeeze on Denis Villeneuve and the VFX artists and we may not get Denis's vision.

I do really appreciate you putting this in a video and yeah it's absolutely ridiculous what they did to the animated shows that are basically stuck in limbo. Both the creator of close enough and I think Infinity train basically hinted on Twitter that if you want to see the seasons that were locked on to there that you should just pirate it. I mean I'd be more than willing to buy a box set of both shows I enjoyed them and we watched Infinity train recently before they took it down... It really boggles my mind

Even with all this mess. HBO Max still has a better film selection than any other major streaming service out there. Maybe they are losing money hand over fist, but hey I have an incredible watch list on that platform.

Love that a HBO max ad ran on this video

That's one of the most brutal, honest, videos I've ever seen. I literally LOL'd. Merged with Chipotle. Hahahaha! Damn funny stuff !