Know What's Happening in Entertainment
Know What's Happening in Entertainment
Super Mario Galaxy film targets $200M+ opening weekend
Nintendo and Illumination are positioning the upcoming "Super Mario Galaxy" movie to open with more than $200 million domestically over the Easter holiday weekend. The strategy leans on the franchise’s multigenerational appeal and a family‑focused release window, with analysts citing the 2015 "Avengers: Age of Ultron" $191 million opening as a benchmark.
Also developing:
By the numbers: K-Love seeks FCC approval to acquire WFCC
The NBA is in advanced talks with YouTube TV, Amazon, ESPN and DAZN to launch a centralized streaming hub for local team broadcasts, potentially as early as the 2026‑27 season. The effort gained urgency after Main Street Sports Group collapsed, leaving 13 franchises without a regional partner. Early negotiations focus on aggregating in‑market streams for up to 22 teams, combining former Main Street affiliates with other markets. A successful deal could reshape NBA revenue streams and simplify fan access to live games.
Netflix announced the acquisition of InterPositive, Ben Affleck's AI‑focused filmmaking‑technology firm, to bolster its in‑house production capabilities. The deal underscores Netflix's commitment to integrating generative AI tools that enhance, rather than replace, creative talent. Meanwhile, German media conglomerate Axel Springer...
Blackpool Pleasure Beach Resort has completed the first controlled swing of its new £8.72 million pendulum attraction, Aviktas. The 138‑ft tall, 40‑seat gyro‑swing is currently undergoing testing and is slated for a spring 2026 debut, ahead of the resort’s March season...
Lee Choong Yan announced his resignation as President and Executive Director of Genting Malaysia, ending a tenure that oversaw the company's recent diversification and debt‑refinancing efforts. The board has not yet named a successor, prompting speculation about the strategic direction...
Disney announced that its long‑running Muppet*Vision 3D attraction, which closed at Hollywood Studios, will be revived as a virtual‑reality experience for Apple Vision Pro and other headsets. The company filmed the show ahead of the closure to create a digital...
CFRA Research upgraded Netflix to a Buy, raising its 12‑month target price to $115, implying about 16% upside. The firm highlighted the streaming giant’s expanding advertising business and demonstrated pricing power as key drivers of revenue growth through 2026. Analyst...
T‑Mobile has revived its partnership with Major League Baseball, offering eligible customers a free MLB.TV subscription for the 2026 season—a service normally priced at $149.99. The benefit applies to qualifying T‑Mobile and Metro by T‑Mobile voice and data plans, but...
TinyBuild’s "The King is Watching" reached over 500,000 copies after a strategic pivot to roguelite mechanics, improving replayability and player engagement. The shift aligned with Steam’s evolving tag‑based recommendation system, which helped the game find a niche audience without relying...
Ryan Murphy’s limited drama "Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette" has become FX’s most‑watched limited series on streaming, delivering over 25 million hours viewed across its first five episodes on Disney+ and Hulu. The fifth episode attracted 51 % more viewers...
A new Ipsos global survey shows public attitudes toward gender equality have plateaued, with little movement over recent years. The study reveals modest generational shifts, as younger respondents are marginally more supportive of progressive norms while older groups retain traditional...
Actors’ Equity Association has signed its first collective bargaining agreement with an escape‑room venue, The Basement in Sylmar, making it the nation’s first unionized escape room. The contract delivers higher wages, stronger safety rules, scheduling guarantees and media rights for...
A city‑owned golf course in Delray Beach, Florida, houses a Class B AM radio station that transmits at 5 kW during the day and 500 W after dark. The station currently airs a Spanish‑language Christian format. Ownership and programming leadership are shifting to...
Czech television viewing jumped sharply in February after Atmedia introduced a new audience metric that adds out‑of‑home consumption. Average daily viewing rose to 4 hours 11 minutes, a 10% year‑on‑year increase. Out‑of‑home viewing accounted for about 7% of total time but drove roughly...
Pitchify has introduced Pitch Direct, a new service that lets game developers browse detailed publisher requirements and submit pitches directly to suitable partners. The platform displays criteria such as budget, timeline, platform and genre, and includes built‑in CRM tools, search...
Aferian has suspended its AIM‑listed shares as it moves toward a pre‑pack administration and the sale of its operating subsidiaries, 24i and Amino, to a single buyer. The transaction, backed by senior lenders, is expected to close within days and...
Bluey reclaimed the No. 1 spot on Nielsen’s Acquired Shows chart for the week of Feb 2‑8, 2025‑2026, logging 871 K minutes and breaking into the overall top‑10. Disney’s family‑friendly slate continues to dominate the acquired‑show rankings, while Netflix’s original hits The Lincoln...
Game Republic New Horizons has created an international advisory board of more than 20 industry veterans to shape its 2026 conference. The board includes leaders from Kickstarter, Revolution Software, Double Eleven and other key players. The three‑day event will run...
The Atlantic has entered a profitable “virtue cycle,” reinvesting subscription revenue to expand its newsroom and content offerings. Subscriber numbers jumped to 1.5 million in 2025, with half of those digital‑only, after a 14.7% year‑on‑year increase in 2024. The magazine capitalized...
Movistar Plus has expanded its mandatory pre‑roll advertising to several Atresmedia linear channels, adding a 30‑second non‑skippable ad before viewers can watch live broadcasts. The system, first rolled out on RTVE channels, limits exposure to one ad per 30 minutes...
Scottish artist Fern "4nt1r34l" Hook discovered Bungie used her artwork in the Marathon alpha without permission, prompting an investigation that confirmed the claim. Bungie identified a former staff member as the source of the breach and subsequently removed the infringing...
Aspire has unveiled a redesigned Creator Portal that adds a structured profile system, multi‑profile management, and agency‑friendly controls. The update surfaces creators' rate expectations, preferred campaign formats, and collaboration history, letting brands assess fit earlier. New authentication options such as...
The ABC police drama "The Rookie" has avoided cancellation after a dramatic surge in streaming viewership, with its same‑day 18‑49 audience now far exceeding the modest 350‑375k numbers that would have doomed it a decade ago. The bump, driven by...
At Streaming Media Connect 2026, Fuse Media’s CRO Karl Meyer and Spaceback co‑founder Joe Hall discussed how shoppable content is converging with cloud gaming on connected‑TV platforms. Samsung’s early integration of on‑demand gaming into its smart TVs set the stage,...
Organisers of Tomorrowland Thailand opened ticket sales on February 28, 2026 for a three‑day festival in Pattaya. The event is projected to generate about 5.5 billion baht ($177 million) in its first year and 30 billion baht through 2030. Authorities expect 50,000 daily...
Odencat announced that its retro‑styled turn‑based RPG Meg’s Monster will launch on iOS and Android on May 7. The mobile version will be free‑to‑play, supported by ads, with optional in‑app purchases to remove ads and unlock exclusive perks. It includes the...
Most Valuable Promotions (MVP) unveiled MVPW, a dedicated global platform for women’s boxing, and secured a multi‑year broadcast agreement with ESPN through 2028. The inaugural MVPW‑01 event launches in London on April 5, streamed on the ESPN App and aired on...
After nearly a week of being mum about it, David Ellison *finally* commented on CNN's future under Paramount—but he offered little more than empty platitudes and dodged the larger questions that loom over the network. More in @get_status: https://www.status.news/p/david-ellison-cnn-cbs-news-future
The transition from broadcast to IP delivery has sharpened the focus on live‑stream latency, exposing a 30‑60 second gap that threatens viewer engagement. Unlike Video on Demand, live events cannot rely on pre‑encoding buffers, forcing engineers to balance immediacy against stability....
The NFL is accelerating its media‑rights negotiations, aiming to lock in new agreements before the 2026 season starts in September, earlier than the previously expected fall window. Talks will begin with Paramount and then Fox, with contracts likely extending through...
Eurovision Sport, the EBU’s free‑to‑air streaming service, has teamed with AI specialist CAMB.AI to deliver live and on‑demand subtitling for the Milano Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games. The partnership will provide real‑time, contextual speech‑to‑text transcription across all six Paralympic sports, preserving editorial...
Estrella TV’s latest Nielsen report marks its strongest performance in half a decade, with a 51 percent lift in prime‑time audience among adults 18‑49 and a 65 percent year‑over‑year gain for February. The surge pushes the network’s average to 40,900 viewers in...
Here's our exclusive interview with Tim Sweeney (and a bit of Steve Allison) on Epic Games' settlement with Google and the return of Fortnite worldwide on Android. We got Tim's response to reactions about the benefits for game developers and...
And our GB Max story with the full transcript of our exclusive interview with Tim Sweeney. https://t.co/AhPRDXRoQU
David Ellison, backed by Skydance and RedBird Capital, has embarked on a $125 billion media buying spree, acquiring Paramount for $8 billion, securing a $7.7 billion UFC broadcast deal on CBS, and moving to purchase Warner Bros. Discovery for roughly $110 billion. These transactions dramatically expand...
Bandcamp Fridays, launched in March 2020 during the pandemic, waive the platform’s revenue share so every purchase goes directly to artists and labels. The program has generated over $120 million for independent musicians and has become a vehicle for charitable fundraising....
NCTC’s AI Center for Excellence is wrapping up four pilot projects with three member companies, with results expected by May. The pilots aim to prove ROI for use cases such as network‑outage prediction and churn reduction. Successful outcomes could move...
CFX Download hosted CableLabs EVP/CTO Mark Bridges to discuss the company’s new Quality‑by‑Design (QbD) partnership with Zoom, upcoming Tech Summit highlights, and future broadband innovation initiatives. The QbD collaboration aims to accelerate service design and deployment across cable networks using...
YouTube now accounts for over 12% of all TV viewing time in January, outpacing Netflix by roughly four percentage points, according to Nielsen’s latest "The Gauge" report. The platform’s VP for the Americas, Tara Walpert Levy, framed YouTube as a...
Mediacom, representing ACA Connects members, petitioned the FCC to revise legacy rules that obligate cable operators to keep detailed signal‑leakage logs and make subscriber records available for inspection. The company argues that in today’s all‑digital networks, signal leakage incidents have...
OpenAI’s ChatGPT has entered its fourth week of serving contextual ads, with Sensor Tower reporting that retail and grocery promotions dominate the ad inventory. Over a two‑week sample, more than 100 distinct brand ads appeared, outpacing other categories such as...
TikTok released data, in partnership with measurement firm Samba, linking ad exposure to real‑world movie ticket purchases across 38 U.S. campaigns from early 2023 to mid‑2025. The analysis shows a median 172% lift in purchase rates for exposed audiences, with...
Don't look at sync licensing as a way to make a quick buck with all of your old music. If you're walking in with multiple albums and you've never done this before, you'll be doing lots of edits.
The MusicWatch Annual Music Study estimates that U.S. on‑demand and non‑interactive music subscribers reached a record 130 million in 2025, up from roughly 29 million in 2016. The figure is derived from a comprehensive consumer survey and aligns closely with hard‑data sources...
Rockstar Games announced that NBA 2K26 will join the GTA+ library from March 10 to April 20, offering subscribers a 5,000‑VC content pack and a 20% discount if they keep the game after removal. GTA+ originally launched in 2022 as a GTA Online perk...
New rule: if you use the word “efficiency” to try and sound better/smarter/more caring than saying “layoffs” or “jobs lost,” immediate big kick in the butt. Immediate. And repeated.
ESPN is launching an unprecedented 650+ hours of live coverage across 20 NCAA winter championships this March and April, streaming everything from women’s basketball and wrestling to gymnastics and ice hockey. The programming will be distributed across ABC, ESPN, ESPN2,...
Australian streaming service Stan Sport has secured a sub‑licensing agreement with beIN Sports to broadcast the entire WTA Tour, covering every 250, 500 and 1000‑level tournament as well as the season‑ending WTA Finals. The rights add a year‑round women’s tennis pillar to...
Walmart Canada announced a multi‑year sponsorship with Canada Soccer and the Canadian Premier League, aiming to make the sport more accessible nationwide. The partnership features forward Jonathan David as Walmart’s official ambassador and includes grassroots initiatives, match‑day activations, and fan‑engagement offers....
Music Box Television has signed a distribution deal with AzamTV, bringing its Music Box Hits and Music Box Dance channels to nine East and Southern African countries. The channels launch in Full HD across AzamTV’s IPTV, OTT and DTH satellite...
Audiochuck, the true‑crime podcast network behind hits like “Crime Junkie,” has appointed Matt Shanfield as Head of Television and Film to spearhead a new division. The unit will adapt the company’s podcast catalog for global streaming platforms while also developing...
