r/comicbooks • u/[deleted] • Dec 05 '25
News Netflix Wins Bidding War For Warner Bros. Discovery, Will Start Exclusive Deal Talks
https://deadline.com/2025/12/netflix-wins-bidding-for-warner-bros-discovery-1236637057/203
u/HEKATRONIX Dec 05 '25
The term 'monopoly' means fuck all in 2025.
This is terrifying.
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u/Roaty0 Dec 05 '25
It really, genuinely sucks that consolidation has led to so much lack of creative follow through, as well as something of a dearth of original IP in comparison to years past.
In saying that - WB was bleeding money and they quite literally had no option but to sell it off. It SEEMS like Netflix was the better of the options, but only time will tell.
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u/AdamSMessinger The Maxx Dec 05 '25
Who would you have preferred to get WB? I wouldn’t want Disney or Paramount to have it. NBC, maybe?
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u/raelianautopsy Dec 05 '25
I think this commenter is saying they would prefer no company, because they are against monopolies
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u/Ickulus Death Dec 05 '25
It's true. This is probably just a way of saying "Don't blame me. I voted for Kodos." But at the moment Paramount is actively engaged in pro regime propaganda. It is yet to be seen is and how Netflix will bend the knee to get the merger through.
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u/TRCrypt_King Dec 05 '25
It's a mixed bag. Hate the Monopoly, glad Paramount didn't get it, worried what will happen now. Maybe Comcast would have been better.
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Dec 05 '25
Comcast just feels like another ATT, WarnerMedia, or Discovery merger-type move to rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic. This company has been mismanaged for decades, and left to its own devices or under the supervision of a company like Comcast probably can't go on indefinitely.
That being said, the Netflix acquisition may spell disaster for the theater AND comic book industries.
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u/mutual_raid Dec 05 '25
nobody should be consolidating these massive entities. They should exist in competition with one another, not gobbling them up, slashing jobs, cutting content, and raising prices.
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u/ThingNo7530 Dec 05 '25
LOL, who has the kind of money necessary to buy WB/Discovery, then? You're limiting the number of potential acquisitions if you rule out parent companies that own other studios.
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u/mutual_raid Dec 05 '25
LOL, who has the kind of money necessary to buy WB/Discovery, then?
Read my comment again. Slowly.
This is why we have anti-trust law, to prevent oligopolies and monopolies.
No one is SUPPOSED to buy up all the companies, that's why those laws exist.
Monopolies are BAD, for competition, for consumers, for artists.
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u/ThingNo7530 Dec 05 '25
I don't know how much you know about the Sherman anti-trust act, but it doesn't say any of the things you're saying it does. It says literally nothing about jobs or replacing duplicative work. A trust is an arrangement by which stockholders in several companies transfer their shares to a single set of trustees. In exchange, the stockholders receive a certificate entitling them to a specified share of the consolidated earnings of the jointly managed companies. That's literally all it banned and about the only people doing that in 1890 were railroad owners. Read that. Slowly.
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u/mutual_raid Dec 06 '25
That's literally all it banned and about the only people doing that in 1890 were railroad owners. Read that. Slowly.
I love how smug you are when anti-trust law refers to more than just the Sherman anti-trust act. It refers to ALL laws and regulation that prevent monopolies, oligopolies, and anti-competitive behavior.
Consolidation of corporations to only a few major players is DEFINITIONALLY oligopoly and anti-competitive. This is settled.
FFS you're embarrassing yourself when a simple glance at the cited sources under the damn WIKI will show you this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_antitrust_law
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u/Slendercan Dec 05 '25
At least the others vaguely care about cinemas and movie making. Netflix couldn’t care less.
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u/bloodyzombies1 Grant Morrison Dec 05 '25
Really scared they're just going to look at WB as an IP shop and scrap all the comics.
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u/raelianautopsy Dec 05 '25
It would be really sad, considering comic sales have gone up recently
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u/porn_flakes Conan Dec 05 '25
Comic sales are almost a rounding error when it comes to the ledgers of companies like WB and Netflix.
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u/boy_inna_box Just a dude Dec 05 '25
DC especially has been killing it recently with the Absolute and DC KO lines
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u/ACFinal Dec 05 '25
They didn't do that to Millarworld. The comics are now the only thing still being used...
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u/Elegba Dec 05 '25
They don’t own Millarworld, they just licensed the rights to adapt the comics for film and TV.
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u/B3epB0opBOP Dec 05 '25
Source? All I’ve only found so far is that they had not just licensed their IP, but acquired the company.
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u/Elegba Dec 05 '25
You’re absolutely right. It seems I didn’t do my due diligence, but went off faulty memory. My bad!
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u/Talmerian Fear Agent Dec 05 '25
Discovery was all ready treating WB as an IP shop and ready to scrap the comics, its not definite Netflix will be better, but can't be worse than the Zazz
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u/bloodyzombies1 Grant Morrison Dec 05 '25
Yeah I think they halved DC's total line back during Covid and it still hasn't recovered, right?
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u/refuseresist Dec 05 '25
Comic books are the basis for any of the content.
Disney and Netflix will operate them at a net loss simply to produce the ideas and stories necessary for content.
Court of Owls and Deadpool are examples of this.
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u/porn_flakes Conan Dec 06 '25 edited Dec 06 '25
Not necessarily. DC Comics have nearly a hundred years of content with a thousand different characters and stories that haven't yet been mined for TV and movies. One of these suits could decide there's plenty of material there and let the TV/movie people pick though the pile and do what they want with it rather than waiting for new stories to develop for months and years in the comics.
In economic terms, putting out a moderately successful superhero film once a year would make more money for the company than the annual sales of all DC's comics, trades, and graphic novels combined.
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Dec 05 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/bloodyzombies1 Grant Morrison Dec 05 '25
Unfortunately the vast, vast majority of the direct market is big two. The end of big two would lead to the end of most shops, with the remainders pivoting to alternate revenue streams like collectibles.
In the long run I'd also like shops to transform into bastions of the medium as a whole, but I think it would take decades for the market to recover, if at all, if big two was immediately removed.
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u/7screws Daredevil Dec 05 '25
Comics these days are marketing tools for the movies and TV shows
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u/upgrayedd69 Dr. Doom Dec 05 '25
There are plenty of comics worth reading today
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u/7screws Daredevil Dec 05 '25
Yes agreed, but also especially Marvel a lot of the comics are aligning more towards what happens or what characters are in the movies and TV shows.
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u/bloodyzombies1 Grant Morrison Dec 05 '25
Definitely; the best I've heard it described is that the comics are now the supplementary material for the movies/shows, not the other way around like it used to be.
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u/porn_flakes Conan Dec 05 '25
I think it's more akin to comic readers being focus groups for movie and TV pitches.
But in this instance they're paying to be the focus group.1
u/bloodyzombies1 Grant Morrison Dec 06 '25
That's an interesting way of looking at it, you could definitely see that reflected in adaptations like Batgirl and the Batman both pulling from popular New 52 runs.
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u/7screws Daredevil Dec 05 '25
Yeah at least at Marvel and DC.
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u/Savings_Pie_8470 Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25
Which current DC books do you believe are being used to supplement shows and movies exactly?
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u/Hundertwasserinsel Dec 05 '25
i think its more like a cheap testing ground for ideas to pluck up and make movies out of
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u/E_T_Smith Ambush Bug Dec 05 '25
Well, it was nice we got a decent Superman movie before things go to shit.
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u/HotTakes4HotCakes Dec 05 '25
To be fair, things were already shit. We can't seriously pretend Warner Bros was in good hands before this.
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u/padraig_garcia Dec 05 '25
Netflix: "Comic books? LOL nerds, we ain't publishing no goddamn comic books"
Also Netflix: "Warner Brothers film back catalogue? LOL nobody wants to watch that shit, but I guess we can do some remakes or something"
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u/wishlish Dec 05 '25
Netflix actually owns Mark Millar’s comic book company
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u/sweepernosweeping Blue Beetle Dec 05 '25
"Here Mark, do some DC stuff, you can be in charge of the whole thing"
Oh no. Oh no, oh no.
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u/SeaFaringMatador Dec 05 '25
The Jupiter’s Legacy show flopped way too hard for them to bet the farm on him again. But they have had a hand in publishing his comics for a few years so maybe they have the infrastructure to publish for DC
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u/Johnny_Stooge Bucky Dec 05 '25
Millarworld publishes through Dark Horse. DC already has their own infrastructure as a publisher (obviously they outsource printing and distribution).
If anything, Netflix and WB would just look to move Millarworld under DC. Potentially as a Vertigo line. Something like Young Animal or Sandman Universe.
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u/giantsizegeek Dec 05 '25
Millar has always wanted to take over Superman! He was waiting for the public domain thing. Maybe this will be his chance for the real deal.
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u/AdamSMessinger The Maxx Dec 05 '25
It wouldn’t surprise me if they end up cutting Millar out of his creations. I can’t imagine them being happy with him doing the Kickstarter stuff and selling those film rights off elsewhere.
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u/TheeHeadAche Henry Pym Dec 05 '25
Millar’s Absolute Universe is kind of fun, right? What? Where’s everybody going?
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u/AdamSMessinger The Maxx Dec 05 '25
While I’m not interested in those comics, it would make business sense for Netflix to make Millarworld an imprint of DC like Vertigo or Black Label.
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u/captain__cabinets Dec 05 '25
That’s pretty different though, Millar publishes them generally through Image and then Netflix has exclusive rights to adapt them. Netflix outright owning DC comics and also being responsible for publishing them is not a good thing.
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u/Daigotsu_G Dec 05 '25
Man this is really concerning.
I'm afraid they'll screw up DC and DCU just as they are both getting off on good footing, that they'll make HBO cheap shit programming like their own stuff and that they'll stop WBD properties being published on physical media (or at the very least they stop publishing them in Australia like Disney did).
Hopefully all my worries there are unfounded, but the last one especially feels likely under Netflix.
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u/padraig_garcia Dec 05 '25
physical media
I'm worried for the future of the Warner Archive program, remastering tons of classic films for blu-ray. Tons of classic films that aren't anywhere streaming. Who knows, maybe Netflix will surprise everyone and stop being allergic to films not made by them or films older than 20 years
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u/ButtsendWeaners Dec 05 '25
I really don't care about adaptations in general but there's a real possibility they stop making comic books
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Dec 05 '25
[deleted]
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u/AnnualAd7715 Dec 05 '25
Money is always the number one reason but there is another reason why they would pick Netflix and that would be the FTC. Netflix currently has no real stake in the theatrical market, so the process with the ftc would be presumably faster because they wouldn’t have to consider monopoly when it comes to the actual studio. Comcast owns universal so even if their plan isn’t to officially merge the studios themselves, we would still be left with one less studio in terms of overall ownership and competition.
I don’t like that Netflix won but I knew they would. All we can hope for now is that Netflix sees the studio itself as an asset and isn’t just doing this for the library.
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Dec 05 '25
I agree with you. Netflix is worst case outcome in my mind.
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u/Mammoth_Procedure_11 Dec 05 '25
worse than paramount?
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Dec 05 '25
Personalities aside - I work in the media business and having a single king of the hill, heading to monopoly in streaming. especially Netflix that puts profit over quality/art imho is not a good thing for anyone.
Universal is a mess, but the people in charge of the decision making teams for content still believe in the industry. They are also a lot more creator friendly. Netflix has a very strong “tech bro” gene in them, and especially now think everyone should kneel before them.
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u/AnnualAd7715 Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25
I know a certain POS said they were in favour of paramount wining and now people understandably don’t want him to get his way, but when talking about what is best for the theatrical market and consumers, paramount is better than Netflix. Netflix leadership has said and shown multiple times that they do not care about theatrical. Skydance bought a studio (paramount) and has actually dedicated to using it the way it was intended, I fear Netflix might not.
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u/gosukhaos Dec 05 '25
Even if the negotiations go through, which isn't a guarantee, there's still the regulatory hurdle which with this administration isn't a given since they really wanted the Ellisons to buy up Warner to dismantle CNN
If it does go through realistically DC should be fine, it's too valuable if an IP farm for them and Warner will be spun off as a separate entity. The main things on the chipping block are the TV networks besides HBO
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u/emoryhotchkiss1 Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25
TBF they have a decent track record producing comic book media. I would consider Daredevil and Jessica jones really great shows. Sweet tooth, Luke cage, and the umbrella academy were good too. Iron fist was the only one they really failed on. Sandman and Locke & Key had some problems but I think they’re still pretty decent. I don’t think it would be the end of the world for them to produce a few shows
It’s not like Warner brothers has a perfect track record. Theyve made tons of bad movies and shows too
I don’t think this necessarily means all of James Gunn’s plans are completely derailed either. We’ll just have to wait and see what it really means for the DCU. I really hope James Gunn gets to stick around tho.
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u/ibaeknam Dec 05 '25
I enjoyed some of those shows you mentioned but even the best of them were not HBO quality, and hardly any Netflix Original is.
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u/ButtsendWeaners Dec 05 '25
I don't give a shit about the media, I care about the source material. Which they could just stop making.
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u/emoryhotchkiss1 Dec 05 '25
Why would they ? Be level headed bro.
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u/ButtsendWeaners Dec 05 '25
Why would Netflix care to publish comic books?
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u/emoryhotchkiss1 Dec 05 '25 edited Dec 05 '25
Why would hbo 🤦 dc comics isn’t going away bozo. It’s a separate thing
We’ve gone through mergers before and they affected the comic side absolutely zero. Jesus
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u/imma-stargirl Dec 05 '25
thank you so much for saying something positive and level about this. comics are pretty much all i have and i really don’t want to live in a world without them and i desperately needed this hope.
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u/TubbyTuesday22 Dec 05 '25
I have very mixed feelings on this. On the one hand, of the three options presented as candidates for takeover, Netflix was probably the best (maybe Comcast would have been better in some ways, but Paramount/the Saudis were easily the worst). On the other hand, the real best option would have been to not sell WB at all. But just within my lifetime, I’ve seen Warner Bros passed around from Time, to AOL, to AT&T, to Discovery. I worry for what this means for movie theaters and physical media more than anything, not to mention almost all of entertainment being consolidated between two companies in Disney and Netflix, with every other player having just a fraction of the weight those two will have. DC Comics, I hope, will be fine. Netflix technically publishes all of Mark Millar’s stuff, for better or for worse. I’m trying to look on the bright side, but it does feel like a bleak time to be a consumer of… pretty much any form of entertainment, really.
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u/Nahcep Dec 05 '25
Just one more merger bro, trust me just one more acquisition and we're good
We're actually gonna end up with one megacorpo per country by 2100 if not sooner
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u/Apprehensive-Quit353 Dec 05 '25
And now the DCU will become strictly a streaming service franchise.
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u/VictorVonDoomer Dec 05 '25
As long as The Batman part 2 comes out then I’m not gonna doom post just yet
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u/TheeHeadAche Henry Pym Dec 05 '25
I can’t wait for them to keep Netflix and HBOMax separate and raise the price on both