In 2023, Sony’s PlayStation Productions released The Last of Us on HBO. It wasn’t just a good video game adaptation—it was the most-watched series on the network. Meanwhile, Nintendo quietly partnered with Illumination to make The Super Mario Bros. Movie , which grossed $1.36 billion, proving that a purple dinosaur (Yoshi) and a talking star are more bankable than most Marvel heroes.
“A24 proved that ‘popular’ doesn’t have to mean ‘four-quadrant spectacle,’” says film programmer David Chen. “Popular today means . It means a movie you put in your bio. That’s the new mainstream.” The Production Bubble & The Hangover Yet there is a shadow over this golden age. The streaming wars led to a peak-content bubble. In 2022 alone, 599 scripted TV series aired in the US—double the number from a decade ago. Studios ordered shows by the dozen, then canceled them after one season for tax write-offs (see: Warner Bros. shelving Batgirl and Coyote vs. Acme ). brazzers house 5
Netflix doesn’t make hits; it cultivates habits. Its productions—from Squid Game (South Korea) to Berlin (Spain) to The Crown (UK)—are designed for a global palate. The studio’s secret isn’t the $17 billion annual content budget; it’s the internal data dashboard that tells producers exactly when viewers pause, skip, or rewatch. In 2023, Sony’s PlayStation Productions released The Last
