Ahead of the merger with Showtime Paramount+ has cancelled more shows. The most surprising of which is Star Trek:Prodigy
The animated coproduction with Nickelodeon was very well received and had been renewed for a second season. The second season is in post production and will be sold to another streamer/broadcaster.
My view is that cancelling already renewed content is a sure fire way to lose subscribers.
A thing I also don’t understand is why they are scrubbing the service from some of the cancelled shows (you can’t view the previous seasons either). Why?
A show I was going to watch, but now can’t, was Queens of the Universe, a song/talent competition for/by queer people. We already don’t have that many queer shows, let me at least watch the first season of it.
It’s so they don’t have to pay residuals to all the folks that worked on the show. Otherwise every time you stream an episode, Paramount has to cut checks.
Ngl, I still feel like they’re shooting themselves in the foot with this in the long run. Sure, this saves them $$$$ on residuals, but it also reduces the variety of their library (an important part of attracting subscribers, it’s not all about the big headline titles) and makes people feel less secure that their favorite shows will be finished or remain available, so they might not even start watching until it’s finished, and that kills early viewership numbers.
I feel like more and more people will subscribe for a month, binge one or two shows, and unsubscribe until the next big thing they’re ibterested in comes out.
Very much agree, but Paramount+ has never been good at marketing outside of the US. It’s simple, if you make shows difficult to watch/find then people don’t watch and don’t subscribe.
It’s to do with licensing fees. Just hosting a show carries a cost for the streamer, and if it isn’t driving growth or retaining customers enough to justify that cost, it’s going to get cut. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/29/streaming-services-remove-movies-shows-heres-why.html
My friends used to ask me why I pirate shows that are on common streaming services and now I can point out some of the shows that are disappearing completely.