Hollywood is cooked

So, Netflix is buying Warner Bros. Discovery’s studio and streaming business. Yes, that Warner. Harry Potter, Friends, DC, HBO, the whole cultural hard drive.

Is this the end of traditional movies as we know it? Not overnight. But it is absolutely the end of pretending the old model is still the main character.

Am I surprised? No. Not even a little.

Back in August, I finished my master’s in Brand Design and Strategy, and my capstone was me reimagining and rebranding Amblin Entertainment while staring straight into the abyss of modern media behavior. And the abyss blinked back in 9:16.

So, yea. You can say I saw this coming.

When entertainment stops entertaining

Somewhere between your third streaming subscription and your eighth “Recommended for You” show about a dystopian bakery, entertainment lost the plot.

People are tired and emotionally jet lagged. And lately I keep hearing:

“Streaming feels like fast fashion.”
“I miss when shows had soul.”
“I just want something that doesn’t feel like it was made by a robot with trust issues.”

Same. Because streaming now feels less like cinema and more like speed dating with content. Everyone is “kind of cute.” Nobody is unforgettable.

Act I: the attention economy ate the movie industry

Studios still act like discovery happens in a theater lobby. It does not. Discovery happens in the feed. And the data is painfully clear.

From my capstone research on Gen Z media behavior:
• 76% find films via social
• 82% watch short form weekly
• 80% cancel subscriptions over cost
• 56% prefer social over traditional content
• 41% say SVOD is not worth the price
• and they spend 4X more time on socials vs TV  

Translation: your trailer is competing with a GRWM, a meme edit and a man reviewing popcorn like it is a religious experience.

Act II: Gen Z did not kill storytelling. They killed filler.

Gen Z does not “subscribe,” they sample. They watch a scene, steal it, remix it, send it to three friends and if it hits? You get a fan. If it does not? You get scrolled.

In my research I framed a design target as “scene stealers,” internet native people who remix, meme and emotionally express through film. Their entire worldview can be summarized by this line:

“If it moves me, I’m taking it with me. If it doesn’t, it’s gone.”  

And what do they actually want? Emotional and visual richness, moments for self expression, respect for remix culture and authenticity they can spot instantly.  

So no, attention spans are not “ruined.”

Your content is just not earning attention.

Act III: the beige era of entertainment

Here is the problem with designing everything around retention metrics and “proof of concept.”

Everything starts to sound the same. Same positioning. Same promise. Same safe, glossy, focus grouped nothingness.

We are in the beige era: lots of content, zero character. And when everything is interchangeable, loyalty dies. The algorithm becomes the brand.

Act IV: why Netflix buying Warner makes brutal sense

This move is not about Netflix “loving cinema.” It is Netflix buying leverage. Because the platforms that win are the ones that understand one simple thing:

Gen Z is building relationships with stories through the content they share. If your story cannot travel in the formats where culture is formed, it does not matter how good it is.

You become invisible.
And invisible does not get box office.
Invisible gets parked in Continue Watching until it evaporates.

The uncomfortable truth: Netflix buying Warner is a signal flare. The future belongs to whoever understands that distribution is not theaters vs streaming.

Distribution is the feed.  

Studios can either design for real behavior or keep yelling “back to cinemas!” into the void while everyone scrolls past.

Fade out: adapt to behavior or get left behind

If studios want to survive the platform era, they need to stop asking “How do we get people back to theaters?” And start asking “How do we earn a place in their daily media rituals?”

Feed first discovery. Shareable moments. Real emotional truth. Worlds that can survive the scroll.

Because nobody misses a platform. They miss a story.

If you want to see my full capstone rabbit hole, here it is. 

Disclaimer: All images featured in this article are used for visual reference only. I do not claim ownership of any image rights.