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Netflix found that instead of buying the rights from Marvel for a large price, it was better to buy a small "Marvel" to develop it itself.
Author: bb sauce
On August 7, Netflix announced the acquisition of comic book publisher Millarworld, which has created comics such as "Sea King" and "Ace Agent".
The Wall Street Journal reported that the transaction could be priced between $50 million and $100 million. With the completion of the acquisition, Netflix and Millarworld will collaborate on film and television episodes and character copyright licensing to bring more comic book characters to Netflix's content platform. It is reported that this is the first M&A transaction that Netflix has made since its inception.
Millarworld founder Miller said in a post on Millarworld that this was "the third acquisition of a comic book company in history." Prior to that, the two deals were the merger of DC Comics and Warner Bros. Pictures in the late 1960s, and Disney's multibillion-dollar acquisition of Marvel in 2009.
⏫ M&A case in the American comic industry
Is Mark Miller the next "Stan Lee"?
Millarworld was co-founded in 2004 by Scottish cartoonist Mark Millar and his wife. Mark Miller, who previously worked at Marvel and DC, was called "the modern version of Stan Lee" by Netflix's chief content officer Ted Sarandos.
It is worth mentioning that three licensed comics produced by Millarworld, "League of Assassins", "Sea King" and "Ace Agent" have been adapted into movies, with a total of nearly $913 million at the global box office. However, the deal did not involve Millarworld's most well-known comics, "Sea King" and "Ace Agent".
Millarworld is a film company focused on characters, especially suitable for film adaptations. Although "Sea King" and "Ace Agent" are not covered by this transaction, the transaction brings Netflix a series of other franchise comics spanning various genres, from science fiction to fantasy, in addition to superhero images and real-life characters.
Mark Miller previously spent eight years as a writer at Marvel, where he developed the storyline of comic books and was involved in the pre-production of Avengers 1, Captain America: Civil War, and Wolverine.
Tedsarandos, Netflix's chief content officer, seemed to have a very high opinion of the new partner, saying in a statement: "Mark has created a next-generation comic book world where these indelible characters can be easily identified by people living around the world. We look forward to creating new Netflix originals from the existing series, as well as new superhero, anti-hero, fantasy, sci-fi and horror stories that Mark and his team will continue to create and publish." ”
Foreign media believe that Netflix's acquisition of a mature comic book publishing company is to follow Walt Disney's acquisition of Marvel. On the last day of 2009, Disney bought Marvel, the giant of the comic book industry, for $4 billion (stock exchange and cash) to further develop the character resource of "Hero Anime". Since then, in addition to the successful launch of the superhero series of movies "Iron Man", "Spider-Man", "Captain America", "Thor", "X-Men", "Avengers" and other movies, the development layout of the industrial chain has been carried out in Disney theme parks, and Disney animated characters and animated film characters "Toy Story" and Marvel hero characters "Iron Man" have also entered Disney theme parks.
With the acquisition of millarworld, where does Netflix and Marvel work together?
Comic book adaptations of TV series are not new, and Warner's "Superman Prequel" and "Green Arrow" are examples of superheroes testing the waters on the small screen.
In 2014, after Marvel integrated the six major Hollywood heroes of Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Hulk, Hawkeye, and Black Widow and created "Avengers", it turned its attention from the big screen to the small screen, hoping to use this success recipe in the field of television to save the decline of Marvel production in the field of television. So we found a new partner, Netflix. At that time, the two sides agreed to cooperate in the launch of four comic book hero series plans. In the years since, the series "Daredevil", "Jessica Jones", "Iron Fist" and "Luke Cage" has been launched, and the four-protagonist mini-series "League of Defenders" has been launched.
From a fan's point of view, they want the TV series and the movie to have the same treatment - luxurious casts, sophisticated adaptations, but this is still a little too difficult for the producers, even if they get high ratings, they are far from strong enough to spend $100 million to build a TV series, with this money, at least half of the budget of a superhero movie has it.
Ted Sarandos admits that the situation is not optimistic, but hopes that Netflix's model is more suitable for the promotion of Marvel series and the implementation of TV strategy, at least more advantages than cable networks.
While Netflix didn't release its ratings, the acquisition of Millarworld seems to indicate that instead of buying the rights from Marvel, it's better to buy a comic book company directly from the source. But Netflix did not respond to whether the acquisition affected the cooperation with Marvel.
Quoted from Businessinsider, "Although Netflix did not announce the specific cost of acquiring millarworld, some in the industry estimate that its overall cost is much lower than the $300 million content solo fee paid to Disney last year." ”
Netflix's total debt now stands at $5 billion, and they'll burn $15.7 billion more on original content in the future. In the second quarter of this year, Netflix added 5.2 million subscribers, exceeding 100 million subscribers worldwide for the first time, the highest since the second quarter of 2011.
At the end of last month, Netflix released its second-quarter earnings report, and chief content officer Tedsarandos said that the company will continue to invest in high-quality homemade content. Netflix's users who continue to burn money are becoming more and more diverse in age, and they also need to be diversified in content themes. On Netflix's official homepage, it covers action and adventure animation, classic comedies for children and families, documentaries, music concerts, fantasy thrillers and more.
It is undeniable that the competition for original content of comics by streaming companies is very fierce. Over the past few years, Netflix has been aggressively expanding the development of original content to protect its vulnerable leading position in the market for shows based on subscriptions and internet distribution. Amazon and Hulu followed suit, also betting on comics. Back in 2014, Amazon acquired comixology, a digital comic book production platform. The expansion of the emerging landscape shows that streaming platforms are using exclusive content in an attempt to force consumers to choose a platform.
Twentieth Century Fox invested $25 million in boom! studios
As of now, the film and television entertainment giants have divided up the head comic company: Warner holds hands with DC, Disney has Marvel behind it, Sony has Spider-Man and Warrior Comics, and Universal Pictures has chosen to cooperate with Dark Horse Comics, and now Fox has ushered in a cooperation with Explosion Studios.
In June, the comic book company exploded studios (boom!). Studios) raised $25 million from Twentieth Century Fox, which has the sixth-highest number of comic sales in the United States, with the top five being Marvel, DC, Image, Dark Horse and IDW.
Currently boom! Studios owns comics such as Death Run, Police Combat Team, Enchanted, King's Landing, North Wind, Salvador, Second Wave and other classic comics. In addition, Explosion Studios also holds the rights to movies such as "Dinosaur Squad", "Planet of the Apes", "Kong Skull Island" and manga adaptations of Disney and Pixar animations.
In China, Chengxing International, which claims to build another Marvel in the Asian market, recently acquired pow under Stan Lee's name! entertainment, acquired for $11.5 million. According to reports, Chengxing International is a Hong Kong listed company, the main business includes IP introduction and business incubation, entertainment content production, channel distribution three major sections. It has operated brands such as Transformers, Tom and Jerry, Doraemon, Hello Kitty, and Spider-Man.
pow! Entertainment is a comic book production company co-founded by Stan Lee and his old friend Gillchampion in 2001, based on film and animation content production, having previously launched the superhero movie "Tiger Shadow Man" starring Li Bingbing, and joined hands with Hualian Media to launch a new superhero comic and movie series "Arch Alien".
After this acquisition, Stan Lee will still serve as chief creative officer, and Chengxing International will receive a large number of IPs for film, television, games, VR, animation, live events, and comics.
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