HBO launches True Detective, The Sopranos, The Wire and Game of Thrones
Sex and the City in this year marks 25 years. This is an anniversary that few people noticed. Even at the launch of the third season of the sequel And Just Like That… last month, there was no mention of the birth of the original show. Next year Soprano will reach the same age. And many people think that we will never see people like them again.
HBO, the network behind these shows, has long earned a reputation for edgy, genre-bending programming. Its slogan — “this is not TV, this is HBO” — deliberately distinguished it from other channels. There was a «creative first» policy that made The Sopranos and The Wire possible and allowed writers and directors to follow their hearts, which meant Martin Scorsese, Julia Roberts, Steven Soderbergh, Spike Lee, Nicole Kidman and Tom The Hanks were happy to work there. often make their debut on the small screen.
However, HBO will be in trouble in 2023. When he won 127 Emmy Awards this year, with four of the eight drama nominees coming from his stable (Succession, White Lotus, House of the Dragon and The Last of Us), one headline read: «HBO may be on top again.» for the last time.»
Branding changes, show cancellations and a flurry of events from CEO David Zaslav have put the brand in danger of losing its reputation at a time when it should have dominated because the streaming model is HBO's. In 2013, Ted Sarandos, then co-CEO of Netflix, said his goal was “to become HBO faster than HBO can become Netflix.” This year, Bela Bahariya, Netflix's head of global television, said the job was done and that the company now wanted to «replace all of television.»
HBO recently canceled its star-studded Los Angeles Lakers drama «Victory Time» after the controversial «Idol» was canceled after just one season. Also this year, HBO released Gossip Girl, the Batman spin-off Pennyworth, the legal reboot of Perry Mason, the Armando Iannucci comedy Avenue 5 and many others. High-profile dramas such as the Watergate thriller White House Plumbers, starring Woody Harrelson and Justin Theroux, and David E. Kelly's true crime drama Love and Death, starring Elizabeth Olson, have struggled to attract broad audiences . Upcoming series include Kate Winslet's political satire Regime and stylish spy drama The Sympathizer. Both look great, but don't scream «next Game of Thrones.»
In 2024, we have extra helpings of Game of Thrones sequel House of the Dragon, a zombie adaptation of the video game The Last of Us. and also True Detective, this time with Jodie Foster. But HBO may have a hard time recovering from the writers' strike thanks to one man: David Zaslav, CEO of HBO parent company Warner Bros. Discovery.
Zaslav had already outraged writers, commentators and Wall Street for going to an annual «billionaire summer camp» in Sun Valley, Idaho, the day before talks between studios and actors broke down. When the tycoon gave a speech at Boston University in May, he was interrupted by students chanting “pay your writers.” Add to that his support for the problematic flops of The Flash and Idol, and he single-handedly makes himself the most hated man on the picket.
«Zaslav has transformed HBO, the most valuable brand in television, into the 'brand center' of the revamped Max streaming service,» says journalist and writer Drew Magary. “He kept a lot of other movies and shows that were released, such as the HBO series Westworld, in his memory to avoid paying off the balances. That's why Zaslav was booed by Boston University students and why striking writers at the Writers Guild of America, including myself, made him the face of studio bosses who want to reduce television and film writing to gig work.»
Adrien Brody in the recently canceled HBO series «Victory Time» Photo: HBO
Zaslav, whose team reportedly pressured US GQ in July to remove a critical article from its website, is considered the architect of HBO's failure. When Warner Bros launched its streaming service in May 2023, it bundled movies and TV channels into one package under the HBO Max brand. After Warners and Discovery merged in a $43 billion deal last year, Zaslav decided to rename the service Max. HBO's programming now resides in a «hub» inside the Max, whose all-important home screen tends to push more niche productions to the bottom.
The move appears to have backfired: Max lost 1.8 million subscribers in three months, and John Oliver, host of the HBO satire Tonight with John Oliver, proposed a new corporate slogan: “Max! It's nice to watch a company die! To some observers, however, it makes sense.
House of the Dragon Photo: HBO
«HBO is a niche channel that has proven very successful as a premium add-on to basic cable packages,» says Tom Harrington of Enders Analysis. “It has a fairly small output volume and, with a couple of very obvious exceptions, views are generally low. That didn't make him the best candidate to support a mainstream streamer. Discovery's content expands Max's audience, but oddly reduces the amount they can charge. It also points to some weakening in the perceived value of HBO's content, which has been going on for some time. Previous and current owners continue to tell HBO that it needs to make more programs, which makes quality control difficult.»
Quality control is a big problem for HBO. Jesse Armstrong created The Succession for HBO thanks to the company's extensive talent support. Ten years ago, Frank Rich, a journalist and freelance producer for HBO, read the script for Armstrong's failed film, inspired by the Murdoch family. He shadowed Armstrong and was an executive producer of Armando Iannucci's political satire «Veep» for HBO.
Brian Cox in continuity Photo: HBO
Rich and Armstrong worked together on a show called The Imperialists for HBO that died in development, so when Armstrong finished his pilot for Legacy, his agent called Rich first to let him know him that HBO has one last chance based on the trust between them. Rich called then-HBO chief Richard Plepler, who acted quickly enough to get filming underway.
That kind of slow build flexibility doesn't seem to be in HBO's future, explains Ed Waller, managing editor of industry bible C21 Media. “Zaslav wants to focus on franchises like DC Comics, Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings,” he says. “He's already backed HBO with a TV retelling of the era of the original book. It won't mesh with HBO's edgy drama—niche, short-lived, the opposite of the spandex franchises that drive Hollywood. But these shows reach a different audience that superheroes cannot. That's why Disney is so keen to protect the edgy dramas on its FX channel. It's hard to imagine Jesse Armstrong choosing to take his next continuity to a channel filled with Harry Potter and The Flash.»
Jodie Foster and Cali Reyes in True Detective: Nightland, which will be released in 2024. Photo: HBO
Waller says writers and directors are pinning their hopes on HBO chief Casey Bloys, who has been given more breathing room than most of Zaslav's subordinates. «The success of 'Bloys' gave Zaslav bragging rights in the Hamptons,» he says wryly, although he notes that the fastest-growing source of quality 'Max' drama comes from AMC, a Warner Bros. rival that shares shows like Fear the Walking. Dead and Killing Eve, aiming to expand its own subscriber base.
In the UK, much of this is academic. HBO's programming has been tied to a number of broadcasters for several years now, meaning «Max» won't be airing here anytime soon. This makes it difficult for fans to follow the clicks, hisses and rising chords that open each HBO show: Love and Death on ITVX, How to Deal with John Wilson on iPlayer, and Succession on Sky. Eventually, when the deals expire, Warner Bros Discovery will call them all home and launch Max here. But if Zaslav continues his policy of scrapping old shows to save on paying off balances, and future Jesse Armstrongs look elsewhere, is it worth watching?
HBO1's Greatest Hits. The Sopranos (1999–2007)
Accents. Music. Damn baked ziti. The show that ushered in the «golden age of television»—and HBO's position as a channel with a Midas touch—followed James Gandolfini's New Jersey mob boss for six seasons as he dealt with his crumbling marriage, an overbearing mother and the need to occasionally impose sanctions. place of ultraviolence. Structured as a series of confessions to his therapist, it is complex, moving and profound.
2. The Wire (2002–2008)
Set in Baltimore, this crime procedural was convoluted, morally murky and often incomprehensible to British viewers. (Of course, everyone pretended to understand the dense, dialect-laced conversations while quietly watching with subtitles.) This cemented the star status of Dominic West, Idris Elba and Wendell Pierce.
3. Game of Thrones (2011-2019)
SPIRIT, SPIRIT, SPIRIT, YES, YES, DAD, DAAR… Anthropologists claim that there are Amazonian tribes who do not think that everything went downhill after the seventh season. But for the rest of us, this world-conquering adaptation of George R.R. Martin's sprawling fantasy novels is as much a part of the cultural wallpaper as Harry Potter. Despite its ubiquity, it still carries an undeniable charge: a combination of high fantasy tropes and Machiavellian realpolitik. Irresistible.
Paul Ritter in Chernobyl Photo: Sky UK Ltd/HBO 4. Chernobyl (2019)
This five-part mini-series, Proving it doesn't take multiple seasons to catch lightning in a bottle, it tells the story of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and its aftermath. Based on Svetlana Alexievich's landmark non-fiction work The Chernobyl Prayer, it soberly dramatizes a nuclear disaster that is not expected to be completed until 2065. about Soviet gray suits and the outlandish horror of radiation poisoning with chilling accuracy.
5. Inheritance (2018–2023)
Created by Peep Show co-creator Jesse Armstrong, this comedy-drama follows siblings' rivalry to inherit a vast media empire over four seasons. its characters are just a spark of humanity's redemption. The profanity in the rococo dialogue would put Malcolm Tucker to shame.
Alex Diggins
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