When Disney announced plans to purchase Fox well over a year ago, the immediate reaction by film fans was shock (and a fair amount of horror). The biggest studio in the world merging with one of its biggest competitors, creating some sort of mega-studio that would dominate the box office even more impressively? It’s unprecedented and also further evidence that US currency would feature Mickey Mouse soon enough. That being said, there was a large contingent of superhero fans that saw the merger through rose-colored glasses, as it meant that Fox’s Marvel licenses would come back to Disney and Marvel Studios. But believe it or not, True Believer, Disney CEO Bob Iger says that the purchase of Fox had little to do with superheroes or box office futures.
In a new interview with CNBC, after the unveiling of Disney’s new streaming service, dubbed Disney+, Iger talked about the reason for pulling the trigger and spending tens of billions of dollars on 21st Century Fox – content. That’s right, it had nothing to do with licensing, box office, or global conquest. Instead, it was the simple answer to the question “What the hell would Disney populate it’s streaming service with?”
“We would not have done that transaction had we not decided to go in this [streaming] direction because — if we hadn’t, we would have been looking at that business and through a traditional lens: ‘Oh, we’re buying TV channels. We’re buying more movie-making capability, et cetera,’” said the Disney boss.
He continued, “But by the time the acquisition opportunity came up, and we knew we were going in this space, we evaluated what we were buying through this new lens of: ‘Wow, what could National Geographic mean to us?’”
Sorry superhero fans, Iger was not looking at the Fox acquisition as a way to bring together all the Marvel heroes under one roof (minus Spidey). No, he had more logistical, streaming considerations in mind.
“What could it mean having access to [Fox’s] library, not to monetize it through traditional means, but to do it through [streaming]?” Iger said. “Bam! I mean, the light bulb went off.”
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The Fox deal doesn’t just mean that the Mouse House gets all that lovely Fox content for Disney+ either, though that’s a big part of the consideration. It also means that Hulu, which was split equally among the major studios, now is under control of Disney, as the studio has a 60% share in the streaming service. That means the deal not only fleshed out the Disney+ streaming service, but also gave the studio another outlet, Hulu, to focus on as part of its initiative, as well.
Disney+, filled with Fox-related content, launches on November 12, for the low-low price of $6.99 per month.