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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States, 1. Paramount, 0. The $111 billion Paramount–Warner Bros. Discovery merger has hit its first real wall after a coalition of 12 states won a temporary restraining order blocking the deal. And California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who is leading the charge, isn’t interested in helping Paramount find a way around it.

“We love the judge’s order,” Bonta tells Elaine Low in an exclusive interview recorded just hours after the ruling. The decision gives Paramount as many as 28 days to choose among three bad options — settle, fight or walk away — and Bonta argues it has already undercut one of the company’s central defenses: that the merger would help it compete with Netflix, Amazon and Apple, even if it reduces competition in theatrical film and cable. He explains why more states may now join the challenge, what happens at the pivotal preliminary-injunction hearing and whether any concession could persuade him to stand down. His answer, essentially: Don’t merge.

Plus, Sean McNulty and Richard Rushfield join Elaine to explain why the deal is no longer inevitable — and whether this is merely a two-week delay or the beginning of the end for Paramount-WBD.

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It’s a bad week for David Ellison, with Paramount Skydance facing two concurrent lawsuits seeking to block its $111 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery — plus a shareholder case accusing Ellison and his father, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, of corruption. On Monday, 12 state attorneys general — led by California AG Rob Bonta — filed their long-expected lawsuit, claiming the proposed merger was “unlawful.” On Tuesday, the Writers Guild of America stepped up, saying the combined company “threatens the economic and creative health of the American entertainment industry.” Former FTC commissioner Alvaro Bedoya and WGA West board member Adam Conover join Elaine Low to explain the states’ and WGA’s respective suits — and the harms they see the deal causing to an entertainment industry already under strain. Plus, all good things must come to an end: Sean McNulty and Natalie Jarvey break down the power of Love Island USA and the ratings bonanza that is the World Cup.

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Welcome to Netflix’s hard pivot.

Faced with lagging engagement from its users and signs of audience disinterest in some of its top shows between seasons, Netflix’s next big thing might be… cable television. Live channels, more talk shows (via video podcasts) and creator content and bundles with other streamers (including perhaps Peacock) to recreate the lean-back appeal of watching TV on the couch.

Certainly, it’s possible Netflix makes a play for another company — perhaps NBCU now that Comcast has split the film and television studio from its broadband company, or Starz. But Jessica suggests there’s an even better fit for M&A hiding in plain sight: Spotify.

Listen to today’s bonus episode for more from Sean and Jessica on Netflix and the next steps for Paramount, plus hear Sean’s conversation with Fandango’s Shawn Robbins about the weekend box office, where Disney’s live-action Moana added another flop to the summer tally.

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Monoculture may not be dead after all — it just needed Taylor Swift in a wedding dress and Christopher Nolan in IMAX. Elaine Low, Sean McNulty and Natalie Jarvey break down an old-fashioned July of cultural spectacle, from the Swift-Travis Kelce nuptials to Nolan’s star-studded Odyssey, which arrives with sold-out premium-format screenings and billion-dollar expectations. Is this the summer moviegoing comes back? And is Nolan the last director in Hollywood whose name alone can make audiences show up? Plus: hot takes on this week’s Emmy nominations — including big love for Widow’s Bay and another tough year for YouTube’s contenders as they inch into the race.

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Books run on word-of-mouth. So what are the people who shape what gets made, watched, read and bought reading? Elaine Low, Natalie Jarvey and Sean McNulty dig into The Ankler’s inaugural summer reading list, where 100 notables — including Sony Entertainment CEO Ravi Ahuja, Gov. Gavin Newsom, Sherry Lansing, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, YouTube CEO Neal Mohan, Netflix film chief Dan Lin, Gillian Anderson and Janelle James — shared the books they’re packing, recommending and obsessing over now. Plus, with every major buyer adapting a glut of novels for the screena — see Elaine’s Series Business sellers’ guide — the team unpacks why book-based IP is hotter than ever and which major titles are in development.

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Another Monday, another huge deal in Hollywood.

Two weeks ago, Fox Corp. announced its intentions to acquire Roku for $22 billion. Now, it’s Comcast’s turn — in reverse.

Today, the company revealed it will exit Hollywood completely, spinning off another division, consisting of NBCUniversal and Sky Media, as a publicly traded company, and joining Versant outside the Comcast gates.

Comcast hopes to have all this done by summer 2027 – just like Fox and Roku.

On Monday’s special extra-bonus edition of Ankler Agenda, Sean McNulty and Wall Street Journal reporter Ben Fritz dive into the strategy afoot here, how Wall Street is driving the split, and the challenges and opportunities for both companies going forward.

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Oprah flew in to close deals, FOX Entertainment CEO Rob Wade came to talk up his investment in creator-led programming and even the Teletubbies arrived, ready to party. Last week, a cross-section of dealmakers, executives and stars flooded the Croisette for the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, where the battle between YouTube and Netflix was hotter than France’s record-setting heatwave — and “creator” was the buzzword for the second year in a row. Ankler Media CEO Janice Min and Like & Subscribe’s Natalie Jarvey break down who broke through in a week where, as Janice noted, subtlety was not the name of the game. Then, listen to Janice’s full conversation with YouTube chief business officer Mary Ellen Coe and Royal Court host Brittany Broski, where Coe came to the Croisette ready to hit back at Netflix’s podcast poaching with a few choice words, including “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” It’s on!

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Leave it to the U.S. sports-TV machine to turn three-minute hydration breaks at the FIFA World Cup — a new feature to prevent players from collapsing in the heat — into a multimillion-dollar ad opportunity for Fox. With 48 nations competing for global football domination on U.S. soil, the World Cup is a cultural and ratings bonanza, delivering NFL-sized audiences for marquee U.S. matches and proving once again why global soccer is the one sports property that can make even the Super Bowl look local. Elaine Low, Sean McNulty and Reel AI columnist Erik Barmack break down Fox’s incredible broadcast bargain, Telemundo’s crossover to English-language viewers and whether Netflix could get the rights to the 2030 World Cup. Plus, Natalie Jarvey pops by from the South of France to talk Cannes Lions — the canapés, conversations and the buzz on the ground about the Fox-Roku deal and how fandoms are driving entertainment’s future.

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