MGM Open To More Stargate Depending on Success of Stargate Origins and SGC

[Ascended Jonas]

A streaming company owning those rights will increase the likelihood of new Stargate content. It will be more cost effective to produce than it would to license the rights from MGM (as they would have to do now), and it's MGM's second highest earning property after Bond, so when deciding which properties to exploit after a buyout, Stargate would be high on the list. It also doesn't hurt that space based TV Sci Fi has had some winners lately with Star Trek on CBS and "Lost in Space" on Netflix.

I'd keep a particular eye on the Apple since they're hungry for content right now and will likely try to move quickly after a big purchase in a similar (albeit it less impressive) vein to Disney + with their deluge of upcoming Marvel, Star Wars, and Fox shows/movies.

Well I hope that Apple will buy MGM because if Netflix wins we will most likely only get two seasons of a Stargate series.

[Platschu]

Thanks for the link. I wish Amazon would join the Appe vs. Netflix battle. Personally I prefer Netflix as it can be reached in more households. They really try to please the Hungarian subscribers, so kore and more shows get subtitles or Hungarian synchron.

It is not written in stone that Netflix would cancel a new SG show. Currently I would more than happy to get 2 seasons than nothing. Actually I would be satisfied with a 90-100 minutes long tv movie at first to "test the waters". Then anything could happen : series of individual SG movies, mini-series, serialized seasons. Just we can't expect more than 10-15 episodes. But as I have said as long as we get something the larger, global audience can decide if they want more.

[Falcon Horus]

Well I hope that Apple will buy MGM because if Netflix wins we will most likely only get two seasons of a Stargate series.

If Apple doesn't get the subscribers, it won't last long with them either.

Streaming services need subscribers to survive. If series don't pull in the money, they are not worth continuing. That's the formula of any streaming service.

[ScifigirlSG]

Any updates? I haven't seen/read anything.

[Platschu]

I am guessing the virus outbreak has changed the plans. I hope Netlix still buys / rents MGM's movie and tv shows library.

[Falcon Horus]

All articles are from end of January or beginning of February.

i'm gonna concur with Platschu and say COVID19 has hit the pause button on this acquisition.

[Mnikolic]

Everything stopped everywhere due to virus outbreak. So the pause button really is the samrtest thing that could have happened. That won't hurt Stargate or any other franchise since right now, the most important thing is to preserve innocent lives.

[Platschu]

Well.. All tv productions will suffer as pilots, whole seasons must be skipped as shootings were stopped. But maybe something will happen in autumn, when all streaming company will restart their own well oil machines as viewers need new materials. And who knows? Maybe Stargate will be amongst them.

[Mnikolic]

I trully hope that will be the case. It's already been too long without anything new.

[Platschu]

It looks like nobody is talking anymore about Stargate. The Stargate part of the forum is so quiet.

[Mnikolic]

Well, considering the progress of the pandemic, everything kind of stopped. I am actually thinking of starting my own SG board later this year or early next year in order to give Stargate an interest boost.

[planet_tv]

It could also be that one ad, in the lower right corner, that appears just about everywhere too.

[Falcon Horus]

Well, considering the progress of the pandemic, everything kind of stopped. I am actually thinking of starting my own SG board later this year or early next year in order to give Stargate an interest boost.

I don't think the pandemic makes much difference to whatever is/was happening as far as Stargate is concerned, considering that was still nothing.

Of course, it might throw a wrench in Wyvern Gaming's plans.

[Xaeden]

If Apple doesn't get the subscribers, it won't last long with them either.

Streaming services need subscribers to survive. If series don't pull in the money, they are not worth continuing. That's the formula of any streaming service.

There are actually two major differences.

The first is the Apple TV+ is a division within a larger company, so they don't need to be as hyper focused on short term profits. Netflix's entire business model relies on subscriber revenue, while the majority of their business expenses go to licensing, production, and advertising costs. Showing strong quarterly earnings are important and to do that consistently, they have to carefully manage subscriber growth while strategically cutting spending. For Netflix there's no better way to do that than to cancel original programming that is getting more expensive to produce and replacing it with cheaper programmer. For Apple, their streaming service is a side project that they hope will lead to profits down the road, not just through subscribers but by making their hardware a more appealing buy. Hence they offer a whole year free if you buy an Apple device rather than just a month. They want people to pay for the service when their trial is over, but they also want to encourage people to buy into Apple as a brand.

The second is that Apple TV+ is in a growth stage. Right now they're willing to spend more on shows and keep them around longer than they would if they were in Netflix's position because they're not yet making money on the service. If they were independently profitable, they could be more surgical in their approach, but the bar is lower at the moment. If something does reasonably well, they're not going to ax it because they don't have a large body of original content to fall back on, which means it's harder for them to maintain and grow their subscriber base. It's also significantly more of a gamble to invest in a replacement when the number of shows you have is lower.

This translates to network TV as well. Top networks rarely give shows room to try to grow an audience beyond a season because they rather try to replace it with something new. They know many of the pilots they fund will never air and a good chunk of new shows won't make it beyond the first season and that's okay because they have dozens of successful programs on the air. For a smaller network with only a handful of shows, cutting 1 or 2 shows and trying to develop an unknown replacement is a much riskier proposition. Consequently, there are many classic shows that only found success because they originally aired on up and coming networks. Some of them had lackluster first and second seasons, but they were given an opportunity to rework things that they likely wouldn't have at a bigger outlet.

Simply, the bar is lower for Stargate on a steaming platform that is trying to achieve profitability than a well established one. Stargate has to be a huge hit for Netflix to keep around, but it only has to be a decent hit on a smaller service.

[Falcon Horus]

...but they also want to encourage people to buy into Apple as a brand.

Apple is for snobs...

With that said... Netflix is available everywhere (except for North-Korea).

There's no other streaming service that even remotely has that big of a reach, or bothers to have that reach.

Except for illegal streaming perhaps... they are everywhere.