Ankler Agenda

It’s been a while since Hollywood has seen a power couple quite like Zendaya and Tom Holland. With Spider-Man: Brand New Day and The Odyssey, the newlyweds helped drive more than $2 billion (and counting) at the box office this year. What makes them so bankable to Gen Z in a volatile theatrical landscape? And how much does the audience’s parasocial investment in them help sell tickets? Elaine Low, Sean McNulty and Natalie Jarvey break down what each star gets right in an era of fractured attention. Meanwhile: David Ellison breaks his silence! Paramount’s chief took to the New York Times to defend his planned acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. The crew parses what he really means (“Unfortunately, I can’t give anyone a view into my heart and mind”) — and what he’s trying to signal to Hollywood as his company heads to trial in 2027 amid increasingly long odds and states unwilling to show mercy to “kings and oligarchs.”
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What a difference a month makes. With Paramount’s bid to buy Warner Bros. Discovery now in limbo, 35,000 Warners staffers have plenty of time to reconsider their options. Could HBO chief Casey Bloys or WBTV head Channing Dungey be tempted by more stable pastures? Is Warners still a haven for top showrunners? As confidence in the deal crumbles, Hollywood is taking sides. (Case in point: Ari Emanuel‘s WSJ op-ed dismissing the state AGs’ lawsuit as “trash.”) The Ankler’s Lesley Goldberg joins Elaine Low and Sean McNulty to break down the quiet panic inside WBD, and why anyone senior at the company who hasn’t spoken with David Ellison yet might want to be looking for a new job. Then, Degen Pener pops by to talk about the 4,000 newly minted SpaceX millionaires in L.A. and the luxury real estate they are about to snap up.
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What could Paramount Skydance do to make a dozen attorneys general drop their lawsuit against the Warner Bros. Discovery merger? Sell off CNN? Paramount Pictures? According to California Attorney General Rob Bonta: not much. “We’re not talking about settlement. We’re going to be telling the judge when we want a trial date,” he tells Elaine Low on Friday, shortly after Paramount announced it would delay the merger until June 2027 or until a pair of antitrust lawsuits against it work their way through the courts — whichever comes first. “We’re not going to have oligarchs or kings in the economy,” says Bonta.
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David Ellison may be calling Paramount’s agreement to delay its $111 billion Warner Bros. Discovery acquisition a “significant win.” Wall Street appears less convinced.

Paramount Skydance shares sank to a new low after the company agreed Friday not to close the deal until the antitrust lawsuits brought by 12 state attorneys general and the Writers Guild of America are resolved — or until next June, whichever comes first.

The delay starts an expensive clock. Beginning in October, Paramount must pay WBD shareholders roughly $7 million a day, or about $650 million per quarter, while the acquisition remains unfinished. Even a resolution early next year could cost close to $1 billion. A fight stretching to June would push the bill toward $2 billion — on top of the nearly $80 billion in debt the combined company is already expected to carry.

“The state AGs are clearly making a lot more noise than they probably were expecting,” MoffettNathanson senior analyst Robert Fishman tells Sean McNulty on a special bonus episode of Ankler Agenda.
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Who’s buying Letterboxd? The social media platform, prized for its Gen Z audience and movie fan bona fides, is on the market for a rumored $250 million — with multiple studios circling. Dealmakers columnist Ashley Cullins, who broke the big news of A24 pursuing the platform, joins Elaine Low to reveal the other potential buyers and why the price tag is raising eyebrows, and what other M&A moves could come next — including likely outcomes for Lionsgate and whether Disney might split up a la Comcast-NBCU. Plus: Elaine, Sean McNulty and Natalie Jarvey dissect IMAX’s sudden resurgence as Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey keeps the box office in a chokehold – and turns access to premium screens into the summer’s biggest FOMO.
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