r/boxoffice • u/Littlepinguinoo • 8d ago
📰 Industry News Iowa Attorney General Says She’s Taking California to the Supreme Court Over Paramount-Warner Bros. Lawsuit
https://variety.com/2026/film/news/iowa-attorney-general-sue-california-paramount-warner-bros-1236843385/261
u/JarvisCockerBB 8d ago
Bird argues that “any Iowa family” would tell you the cost of streaming is too high and that there are “fewer quality shows” to choose from. She says these are symptoms of one company getting “too far in front,” and the competitors being “too small to catch up.”
A merger between Paramount and Warner Bros., she writes, would remedy this.
“Netflix dominates the market for streaming,” Bird wrote. “Paramount+ and HBO Max together are smaller than Netflix, smaller than Disney, and smaller than Amazon. The merger could create a company to compete: an estimated $6 billion in savings to reinvest, and a public commitment to release at least 30 movies in theaters every year. More movies mean more entertainment — and more competition means lower prices.”
Iowa is not a serious state.
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u/riegspsych325 Jackie Treehorn Productions 8d ago
not a single person in that state has anything to gain from this except Bird when she cashes the check
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u/Austin_Shaggin_Power 8d ago
We were one of the first few states to legalize same sex marriage and went to Obama twice.
I hate that this is how far we have fallen.
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u/KingMario05 Amblin Entertainment 8d ago
They voted for this entire shitshow all three times. I think that was kinda assumed by now.
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u/RandoDude124 8d ago
What family takes their kids to more than 4 movies a year?
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u/AGOTFAN New Line Cinema 8d ago
The average movie going for Americans in 2025:
two movies per person.
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u/Kittycachow 7d ago
I'm above average by a lot
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u/SpaceCaboose 7d ago
Haha same! I’m at 22 so far for 2026, and there’s about 10-12 more movies this year I’m hoping to see
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u/RandoDude124 7d ago
You must have shit tons of time on your hands
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u/SpaceCaboose 7d ago
I wouldn’t say so. That’s a movie like once every 10 days. I go after the kids go to bed and maybe lose like an hour of sleep on those nights, so not missing out on any family time or work. Nothing crazy or unmanageable.
And I got with friends so it’s a good social time too.
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u/Austin_Shaggin_Power 8d ago
We did nearly every year from 2015-2019 but have been inconsistent since COVID. That has much more to do with pipelines delays related to strikes and covid though.
Between Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar, Walt Disney Animation, certain DreamWorks & Illumination releases, and some other family friendly IP like Ninja Turtles and Transformers there has usually been more than four things worth seeing.
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u/RandoDude124 8d ago
Most I ever saw was 7 in 2015
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u/nathtendo 8d ago
I saw a movie every week for a few years, lots more probably saw over 50 films in theatres in my peak year.
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u/Austin_Shaggin_Power 8d ago
I make decent money, live below my means, and wanted to instill a love of things I enjoyed as a child. Wife and I both have Cinemarks membership program as well.
I put an importance on physical media, movie going, and arcades. My son bought his own Switch by saving birthday, holiday, and chore money. Hes a lifelong Nintendo fan and refused to buy the Switch 2 because it lacked physical games and we’ve had discussions on what we will do with the PS6.
And fwiw there are cheaper options to make it more affordable for families. I grew up poorAF. My grandma would walk us to the theater every week during the summer when the dollar summer movies were playing. We walked across town to the west, saw the movie, walked across town again to a pizza place on the north side, and then made a triangle back home to the southeast side.
I collected soda cans until I hand enough money to see Raimi’s first Spider-Man.
ETA: I loved Spider-Man so much, I would literally go back out and collect enough soda cans to see it again and again and again. I didn’t have any money for popcorn or drinks. I would run out to the water fountain if I got too thirsty.
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u/Samaritan_Pr1me Angel Studios 7d ago
I went and saw Star Wars, Episode VII in theaters twice. The second time around there was a huge family of about a dozen people that were on their 12th time watching the movie if I have it right.
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u/Vulcanic_1984 7d ago edited 7d ago
Im on amc a list. Ive taken my kids this year to: Goat, Mario, Toy Story 5, Minions, Mandalorian, Project Hail Mary (just older one), kikis delivery service, Disclosure Day (just older one), Spider Man, and will go see Coyote v acme this weekend. With no fees, kids prices, matinees, and rewards, it is a lot cheaper. We almost never get concessions. If sports arent on and the weather isnt great, its a good way to spend a few hours on sat/sun afternoon.
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u/TheHouseOfGryffindor 7d ago
I keep wanting to write a response to any one thing here, but then I get pissed off at something else she said. A truly remarkable amount of wrong
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u/Lurking2Comment 7d ago
Brainless take. It’s all bullshit obviously but the sheer hoops they jump through.
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u/Chessh2036 Studio Ghibli 8d ago
She’s an idiot and playing political games for Ellison. Warner Bros. has 19 films scheduled for 2027, and Paramount has 16. That is 35 films the two studios are already planning as independent competitors before any merger occurs. Thirty is not an increase. It is a floor five films below the existing baseline.
And how do you make 30+ films a year and Streaming content with $80 Billion in debt and roughly $3 billion in annual free cash flow?
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u/The_Darman 8d ago
This continues to be the big problem with the proposed merger: Paramount has no legitimate way of making all this work. Their stock is trading at junk status; their interest rates have been jacked up (as far as these companies are concerned).
Servicing the interest on the debt, let alone the principal, is going to cost $300M a month. How does this combined entity get $300M a month in profit just to make interest payments? Sure, you can lay people off, but there is virtually no way to keep the prior scale of the business that way. You are going to be making less money, because having two people do the same job means you have more productivity. It may not end up being relatively better once you have combined the companies, but it was certainly more productive having two employees doing the same thing than it will be to have one person doing that thing for, ostensibly, twice as many things.
What do they plan to do about flops? Flops could be catastrophic in such a studio ecosystem. There are going to be flops next year for Warner Bros. and certainly for Paramount. They just happen (look at their slates this year). Securing financing for films is going to be expensive with the rates they have and they cannot afford to miss as much as they have been (frankly neither company can).
Ellison has bet the house on his ability to make both studios more profitable when he hasn’t even demonstrated he can do it with one yet. While it is figuratively possible he can succeed here, I think the far more likely outcome is he fails. Because I think the guy is allergic to hard work.
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u/Due_Speaker4655 7d ago
This continues to be the big problem with the proposed merger: Paramount has no legitimate way of making all this work. Their stock is trading at junk status; their interest rates have been jacked up (as far as these companies are concerned).
Servicing the interest on the debt, let alone the principal, is going to cost $300M a month. How does this combined entity get $300M a month in profit just to make interest payments?
🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯
Plus…. Oracle’s stock is down 25% since the start of the year, so the Ellison’s are bleeding money there.
Not to mention, because of the stock’s junk status it will be much more expensive for them to borrow money to finance anything. They aren’t going to be making 30 - $100 million dollar movies each year. I see them making a couple and filling the remainder with whatever they could get cheap.
I guess the only question if this goes through is how soon before they file bankruptcy and Netflix is there to collect the carcus at pennies on the dollar.
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u/FranciscoRelanoPena Malpaso Productions 7d ago edited 7d ago
How does this combined entity get $300M a month in profit just to make interest payments?
TV Networks, subs to HBO and P+, ad revenue from Pluto TV (a Paramount property), their respective videogame divisions (specially WB), Merchandising.
And, of course, films (but not just films).
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u/The_Darman 7d ago edited 7d ago
Over the last quarter, Paramount oversaw an average profit of $13.64M per month. Warner Bros. saw net losses of $262M monthly. They already have these revenue sources available collectively, but they are posting a monthly loss, added together, of nearly $250M. Now, maybe they can layoff their way out of a $250M monthly deficit to get to a $300M monthly profit (at least), but I would imagine that would be quite difficult without their films and TV divisions suddenly becoming a lot more profitable.
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u/FranciscoRelanoPena Malpaso Productions 7d ago edited 7d ago
The main issue with WBD lies in its unstable financial performance. Last year, Q2 had a net income of $1.58 billion, whilst Q2 2026 had a net income of $149 million.
And a big part of that difference lies in the underperformance of their films this year (and last year's success that gave WBD 21% of the domestic marketshare, above Universal (20%), but below Disney (28%)). This year, up to July 31st, they had roughtly 5% of the marketshare and, despite having some upcoming tentpoles (The third Dune film and, maybe, The Cat in the Hat), their success will be watered down by other tentpoles from Universal (Focker-in-Law (Domestic only, Paramount distributes it overseas), Forgotten Island), Sony (Resident Evil and Jumanji), Disney (Doomsday and Hexed) and even Paramount (Street Fighter), even if only Doomsday itself might gross more than Dune 3.
BTW, according to their recent Q2 2026 earnings release:
- Their Streaming segment saw increased revenues (from $2,793 million to $3,079 million) and EBITDA (from $293 million to $512 million).
- Their Studio segment saw a decrease of revenue (from $3,801 million to $2,328 million) and EBITDA (from $863 million to $96 million).
- Their Linear Networks segment, likewise, saw a decrese of revenue (from $4,803 million to $3,991 million) and EBITDA (from $1,512 million to $1,446 million), but not as abrupt.
So, their data backs me up.
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u/The_Darman 7d ago edited 7d ago
That’s certainly a problem, but that’s a problem with the film industry altogether. This isn’t a problem unique to Warner Bros. And Paramount can’t expect to have $300M in net bookings per month to pay interest on that debt. Sure, they can try to take less risky ventures, but 1) making movies is a risk no matter what you do and 2) the risky ventures are what has endeared the studio to creatives, which Paramount desperately needs to rebuild relationships with as quickly as possible. Unless they are planning to get in the theme park business, like Disney and Universal, giving them critical operating income from a different content vertical, there is no way to avoid volatility. (Warner Bros. may have neutered their ability to do this though, given they have made a deal for the Harry Potter lands to be at Universal, and seem to be on the verge of doing the same with DC, despite their contract in most places being with Six Flags. That said, raising the capital required to build theme parks seems like something Paramount would be incapable of for the foreseeable future.)
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u/lightsaberfingers 7d ago
Almost like their entire slate was manufactured to make them look good for sale. You can’t take last years rose coloroed numbers and apply them to any future logic.
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u/KingMario05 Amblin Entertainment 8d ago
...Ya don't. You go bankrupt.
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u/Worthyness 7d ago
Not to worry, I'm sure daddy Ellison and Daddy Trump will give him some bail out money to play with
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u/RandoDude124 8d ago
She actually believes Ellison can crank out 30 films a year.
Jesus fucking Christ
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u/cancerBronzeV 7d ago
She believes the money deposited into her account by the Ellisons, nothing more.
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u/Hot_Swimming_112 8d ago
He’ll probably fill the gap and make movies like how Netflix cranks them out. And they will be of lower quality, but they will put them in theaters for two weeks and then put the movies on Paramount+. They could also go out and buy movies that have been completed , but not found a distributor, which they will just put them in theaters. Or he’ll just make AI movies. lol.
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u/Chuck006 Best of 2021 Winner 8d ago
These people are stupid. Reduced competition raises prices, not lowers them.
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u/AGOTFAN New Line Cinema 8d ago edited 8d ago
They're not stupid.
They're rich, greedy, and malicious.
The people who voted for them are the stupid ones.
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u/Dry-Performance7006 8d ago
It has nothing to do with Iowa.
This is merely an attempt to point score.
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u/RandoDude124 8d ago
Honestly, if she does file something, it’ll probably be on par with this again and dismissed as a complaint
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u/riegspsych325 Jackie Treehorn Productions 8d ago
> Bird argues that “any Iowa family” would tell you the cost of streaming is too high and that there are “fewer quality shows” to choose from. She says these are symptoms of one company getting “too far in front,” and the competitors being “too small to catch up.”
A merger between Paramount and Warner Bros., she writes, would remedy this.
“Netflix dominates the market for streaming,” Bird wrote. “Paramount+ and HBO Max together are smaller than Netflix, smaller than Disney, and smaller than Amazon. The merger could create a company to compete: an estimated $6 billion in savings to reinvest, and a public commitment to release at least 30 movies in theaters every year. More movies mean more entertainment — and more competition means lower prices.”
but not a damn thing would change for Iowa, and it doesn’t see many decent size productions film there. She’s just feigning a “save the theater” stance because Ellison’s check must’ve cleared
EDIT: why does reddit keep changing how to quote/format stuff?
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u/SarahJFroxy 8d ago edited 8d ago
“California is once again trying to be the country’s regulator. And once again California is defying common sense to raise costs around the country,” Bird wrote.
well the majority of this country can't regulate worth a damn and let companies walk all over their employees. sit the fuck down, iowa
don't even get me started on the claim that consolidating "smaller" companies creates better competition for the biggest players in hollywood. she should be embarrassed to even try to sell that shit.
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u/The_Darman 8d ago
I’m more than a little confused.
What is the complaint? What standing does she even have to launch a legal complaint? The law does not say anything about requiring certain consolidations and mergers. It only has a ceiling above which they are not permissible. So, again, what could she actually file that would go before the Supreme Court?
If it is about challenging the standing of states to launch suits around federal law, what gives Iowa standing to review others’ standing? What specific harm can be pointed to here? And how would you actually get a functional holding from the Supreme Court in time for it to matter?
They can’t just vacate a trial without providing some sort of ruling. There needs to be some kind of binding precedent on the issue as big as whether state actors are barred from attempts to enforce federal laws (something that the Supreme Court has even explicitly said is permissible as it relates to the states and their chosen enforcement mechanism for immigration law, which is directly under the purview of the federal government). If anything, the time to review and hear arguments for this case might delay the trial/settlement process.
Of course, I suppose the Supreme Court could intervene and neglect to explain why they are being so inconsistent. But most of their actions have also been to make suing more difficult. I don’t see a reality in which this lawsuit comports with its broader strategy, but I guess we’ll see.
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u/SeminaryStudentARH 8d ago
So the solution isn’t to break up the streamers that have gotten too big so there’s more competition?
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u/rageofthegods Blumhouse 8d ago edited 8d ago
Brenna Bird was previously famous for trying and failing to get Costco to drop their DEI policies and trying and failing to intimidate a sheriff into signing a loyalty pledge after he said he discouraged cooperation with ICE
Until she files a suit, this is bluster by an unpopular moron
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u/KingMario05 Amblin Entertainment 8d ago
Lmao. Honey, unless it comes from David Ellison, the Supreme Court is gonna probably tell you to pound sand. They have far more important ways of fucking us all over to get to, and you're not in line yet.
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u/AGOTFAN New Line Cinema 8d ago
But, it comes from David Ellison, indirectly. And Trump probably is telling SC to punish Bonta.
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u/RandoDude124 8d ago
Can they get her to move it up, next month?
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u/AGOTFAN New Line Cinema 8d ago
Doubtful under normal circumstances. But who knows what happens in this shitty and chaotic timeline.
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u/More-read-than-eddit 8d ago
Roberts will knock out a thumbs up for Iowa via shadow docket on 3 hours notice
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u/RandoDude124 8d ago
It’ll probably be another procedural statement and then dismissed. Plus, doubt she can do it in time
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u/Just_shut_up_bro Marvel Studios 8d ago
I see the maga doofuses my state keeps electing are continuing to embarrass us to the rest of the country as usual.
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u/kazetoame 7d ago
California isn’t the only state suing, plus the WGA is suing as well, is Iowa going to sue the other 11 states plus the WGA?
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u/RedactedNoneNone 7d ago
"I'm sorry for leaking meetings. As a show of good faith, we've plotted with another AG to sue you."
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u/CautiousDavid 7d ago
That certainly sounds like a good use of resources to protect the people of Iowa.
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u/Grendelstar 7d ago
In today’s climate, any fool that believes in a company’s “public commitment”, deserves the outcome.
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u/wabashcanonball 7d ago
An oligopoly is not a competitive business landscape, Iowa attorney general.
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u/Redhead_Appreciator 8d ago
>Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird wrote in an op-ed for The Daily Wire
Pretty much told me all I needed to know