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Disney Gets New Streaming Lead as D2C Division Shake-Up Continues

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There have been some significant recent changes in Disney’s senior leadership, especially in its direct-to-consumer division. Brandon Blake, entertainment lawyer with Blake & Wang P.A., has the full story.                                                                               Brandon Blake New Streaming Head Joe Earley, the exiting president for Disney’s D2C interests, will now move to a new role as President of the Disney Entertainment TV Franchise and Content Strategy. Adam Smith will step into his shoes as chairman. This will leave him overseeing pretty much everything that falls under Disney’s D2C banner, including their products and engineering, ad technology, programming, partnerships, viewer experience, and the ever-more-important data and analytics. That’s across both Di...
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Is Superhero Fatigue Over? Momentum Builds for Next Marvel Release

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  As Avengers: Doomsday sees strong ticket sales three months ahead of its actual release date, and Spider-Man: Brand New Day continues to see box office success, are we headed for another superhero wave? Brandon Blake, entertainment attorney at Blake & Wang P.A., takes a look.                                                                          Brandon Blake $50M With Three Months to Go Domestic pre-sales have now passed the $50M threshold for Avengers: Doomsday . The film only releases in three months. It’s certainly an excellent start for the next Marvel installment, which will be competing for screen space with the third installment in the Dune franchise when it opens in December this year. Especially given that Dune is set to dominate IMAX screens, at least for its first weekend in ...
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Have We Reached a Price Hike Too Far for Streaming?

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  Despite a flurry of price hikes earlier this year, new data from Ampere Analysis suggests that we’re reaching the bounds of what customers are willing to spend on an individual platform. Brandon Blake, entertainment attorney at Blake & Wang P.A., has all the details.                                                                   Brandon Blake     Reaching the Limit We’ve already seen the big three of streaming, Disney, Netflix, and Prime Video, scale down the ambition in their price hikes. In the 2024/2024 period, pricing increases averaged 24% per subscription type, which has slid to 14% in 2025/2026. We’ve also seen significant uptake for ad-supported tiers to reduce the cost burden on households, although average increases at this tier have been $1.61, versus $1.21 for more premium tiers.  No...
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The Odyssey Claims the Title of Best-Performing R-Rated Movie

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  Knocking Deadpool & Wolverine off its number 1 spot, The Odyssey is now officially the best-earning R-rated movie on record, as Brandon Blake, entertainment attorney at Blake & Wang P.A., is here to share.                                                                   Brandon Blake Beating Deadpool & Wolverine It’s certainly been a year for setting and re-setting box office records, that’s for sure. As of Thursday last week, Universal Pictures confirmed that the Nolan-directed retelling of Greek legend had brought in $1.352B globally, stealing the title from its previous holder, Deadpool & Wolverine, which totaled $1.338B across its 2024 run. The Odyssey has had something of a historic run at the box office, and now claims a domestic cume of $516.3M, making it Nolan’s highest-grossing movie...
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It’s a Surprisingly Strong Hollywood Slate at the Chinese Box Office

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  With Spider-Man already performing fantastically for Chinese audiences, it seems The Odyssey is keen to make its mark on the Chinese box office as well, especially with a splashy IMAX release to back it. Brandon Blake, Entertainment lawyer with Blake & Wang P.A., has the full story.                                                                       Brandon Blake   Fantastic Previews With almost $7M in the kitty before the film was released, The Odyssey looks set for a strong Chinese run. The film was, of course, shot specifically for IMAX, but seeing such a strong surge of interest before the film’s official opening was probably one of the biggest surprises ahead of its first weekend.  Overall, the film accounted for roughly 7% of this past weekend’s business, an impressive feat in...
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The Pitt and Stranger Things Dominated Streaming in the First Half of 2026

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  With a new edition of Nielsen’s Gauge report recently released, one thing is crystal clear: domestic audiences are still in love with both Stranger Things and The Pitt. Brandon Blake, entertainment lawyer at Blake & Wang P.A, breaks down the current state of streaming for us.                                                                           Brandon Blake A 2025 Premier (Technically) Regarding Stranger Things , it’s technically a 2025 release. But given it aired on the last day of the year, that’s splitting hairs. It was Nielsen’s most-streamed title so far for the year, beating out not just fellow TV titles, but also movies.  It managed 23.26B viewing minutes across the period, also setting a single-week record of 8.65B minutes for its first week. While it fell off the top 10 cha...
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Peacock and YouTube Team Up

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  Building on the deal inked last year, Peacock and YouTube will now be expanding, adding Peacock bundling to YouTube Premium as well as some livestreams for sports events on YouTube channels. Brandon Blake, entertainment lawyer with Blake & Wang P.A., shares the news.                                                                           Brandon Blake YouTube and Bundling May Be the Next Hit It certainly seems like YouTube Premium is keen to make itself the next major entertainment bundler. Peacock will now be included with the $15.99 YouTube Premium service, beginning next year. With NBCUniversal itself preparing for a split from its parent company, Comcast, this could be a lucrative source of new subscribers for the streaming platform, which has only just managed to break even in the ...
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