Apple’s Billion-Dollar Bet on Hollywood Is the Opposite of Edgy

Lucas Shaw for Bloomberg:

However, Apple isn’t interested in the types of shows that become hits on HBO or Netflix, like Game of Thrones—at least not yet. The company plans to release the first few projects to everyone with an Apple device, potentially via its TV app, and top executives don’t want kids catching a stray nipple. Every show must be suitable for an Apple Store. Instead of the nudity, raw language, and violence that have become staples of many TV shows on cable or streaming services, Apple wants comedies and emotional dramas with broad appeal, such as the NBC hit This Is Us, and family shows like Amazing Stories. People pitching edgier fare, such as an eight-part program produced by Gravity filmmaker Alfonso Cuarón and starring Casey Affleck, have been told as much.

So, a whole lotta 'meh'.

Meet the internet’s go-to inside source for film’s booming trailer culture

There is definitely a huge part of online film culture that is centered around trailers. I personally would love it if studios would put more effort into making the trailers a part of the story, like the ancillary material that is being released for Blade Runner 2049. These not only deepen the story, they lure you into the world. But, as much as I prefer those, a movie theater isn't going to run a seven minute short film set in the universe of an upcoming film as a trailer — not without some form of consideration from the studios. Until that changes, the two minute spoilertastic trailer will remain the norm.

Star Wars Director Drama: How J.J. Abrams Jilted Paramount for Episode IX

Paramount just can't win.

Rotten Tomatoes ratings don't hurt box office returns, study says

From John Horn's interview with Yves Bergquist—a data scientist who studies the entertainment industry at University of Southern California—for The Frame. 

I think the elephant in the room is innovation. We're in the post-Game of Thrones, post-Breaking Bad world of entertainment, where studio executives know that they need to innovate in the way that they tell film stories. And a lot of my research is focused on finding out mathematically where in the film they can innovate and where they have to stick to the canons. The main issue with this is, 'How do we innovate in a film that is a billion dollar or two billion dollar bet?' If we innovate too much, it's going to miss its audience. If we don't innovate enough, it's going to be boring. So there's this median point which, believe it or not, we can actually calculate mathematically, and that's where a lot of my research is going.

The whole piece is five minutes, and worth a listen.

Hulu to Spend $2.5 Billion on Content in 2017

There's an arms race in digital content. Apple's rumored to be entering the game, with $1 Billion set aside for original content. But Apple's $1 Billion and Hulu's $2.5 billion, are paltry sums compared to Amazon's $4.5 Billion or Netflix's $6 Billion. While there might never be a streaming "winner", no one wants to be the loser.

Cord Cutting Is Accelerating Faster Than Expected, Research Firm Says

Anyone suprised by this news has been in denial for awhile.

Marvel and Star Wars movies will be exclusive to Disney’s upcoming streaming service

It's the way of the future. Just watch as each major media conglomorate launches and maintains their own seperate streaming services. This is why Netflix and Amazon (and now Apple) are throwing so much money into content. Hollywood won't want to share, so they'll need their own.

Apple, Amazon Join Race for James Bond Film Rights

As much as MoviePass wants to be the industry disruptor, the big disrupter right now is all the tech money pouring into content.

As a Bond fan, I'm also interested (and, to be honest, a little worried) by these lines in Tatiana Siegel and Borys Kit's pice for The Hollywood Reporter:

“In the world of Lucasfilm and Marvel, Bond feels really underdeveloped,” says someone familiar with the bidding process.

And:

Some observers feel that the franchise, by only limiting itself to theatrical movies, remains vastly under-utilized by 21st century standards...

The bidding war for Bond just got more interesting.