{"id":824426,"date":"2026-07-25T03:14:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-25T03:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/824426\/"},"modified":"2026-07-25T03:14:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-25T03:14:09","slug":"netflix-reportedly-almost-walked-away-from-michael-jackson-doc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/824426\/","title":{"rendered":"Netflix reportedly almost walked away from Michael Jackson doc"},"content":{"rendered":"

A week before the premiere of Michael Jackson: The Verdict, Netflix was getting cold feet. This is per Variety<\/a>, which reports Netflix feared reprisals for its three-part docuseries about Michael Jackson\u2019s 2005 criminal case that acquitted Jackson of all charges. According to Variety\u2018s sources, the streamer feared \u201ca lawsuit from the estate rather than the fans,\u201d with the world\u2019s biggest streamer worrying over the Jackson estate\u2019s \u201cfinancial muscle.\u201d That\u2019s probably for good reason. The Jackson estate has a history of being quite litigious regarding works criticizing the late King of Pop. In 2024, HBO pulled its lauded and nauseating examination of Jackson, Leaving Neverland<\/a>, a harrowing account of Jackson\u2019s alleged abuse from his now-grown accusers. The 2019 documentary was pulled from the service in 2024 due to a 30-year-old non-disparagement agreement between the Jackson estate and HBO. Before that, the estate sued ABC over its 2018 documentary The Last Days Of Michael Jackson. According to Variety\u2018s source, \u201canxiety\u201d over what the estate might do led to \u201cthe decision there\u2019d be no marketing and no publicity.\u201d The documentary wasn\u2019t announced until two weeks before its debut and wasn\u2019t screened for critics.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For its part, Netflix officially denies the account of events from Variety\u2018s source. \u201cCharacterizations that Netflix reconsidered the release or changed course because of outside pressure are inaccurate,\u201d a spokesperson told the trade. \u201cThe series launched as planned and reached the Netflix Top 10 for three weeks.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Verdict hit the algorithm about a month after Michael became one of the biggest hits of the year. HIStory continues with Michael: Part Two<\/a>, which is legally barred from discussing any of this<\/a>. \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A week before the premiere of Michael Jackson: The Verdict, Netflix was getting cold feet. This is per…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":824427,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[49,48,361,75],"class_list":["post-824426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=824426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/824426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/824427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=824426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=824426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=824426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}