\n\tBut Ellison\u2019s Skydance Media has been active since 2006, and has a track record of producing primarily franchise titles, action films and streaming fare, though its television slate is somewhat more diverse.<\/p>\n
\n\tOf course franchises like \u201cG.I. Joe\u201d and \u201cStar Trek\u201d will remain a priority for the new studio, but does Skydance\u2019s track record indicate anything about where the new combined studio\u2019s priority will lie? <\/p>\n
\n\tIt seems unlikely that the Warner Bros. label will give up making awards contenders, or that Paramount will abandon rom-coms. But one thing seems to be a given: Ellison is big on crowd-pleasers, action films and familiar franchises, some that are decades-old.<\/p>\n
\n\tSkydance have earned more than $8.7 billion at the global box office, a healthy haul for a relatively small player. But how will the name translate from a production shingle making a handful of films and shows a year to a massive combined operation that Ellison promises will release at least 30 movies per year? If nothing else, Mark Wahlberg probably doesn\u2019t need to worry about his career prospects for a while.<\/p>\n
\n\tHere are five takeaways from Skydance Media\u2019s earlier films and TV series:<\/p>\n
\tSkydance Plays Favorites<\/p>\n
\t\t\t![\"Tom](\"https:\/\/variety.com\/wp-content\/themes\/pmc-variety-2020\/assets\/public\/lazyload-fallback.gif\")
\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Getty\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tSkydance plays favorites, and its favorite favorite is unquestionably Tom Cruise. Expect more collaborations between the action icon and Ellison, even if \u201cMission: Impossible\u201d was put to bed (for now). They already have a \u201cDays of Thunder\u201d sequel<\/a> on the docket. Also, important to note, thousands of Hollywood stars<\/a> have formally expressed disdain for a combined Paramount-Warner Bros., but Cruise told \u201cThe Pat McAfee Show\u201d that he\u2019s confident Skydance is \u201cgoing to deliver\u201d<\/a> on its promises of revitalizing the movie business. Another Skydance favorite is Mark Wahlberg, who led the two \u201cFamily Plan\u201d films for the studio. Ryan Reynolds is a frequent collaborator as well, starring in \u201cMayday,\u201d \u201cThe Adam Project\u201d and \u201c6 Underground.\u201d John Krasinski is a Skydance regular. He played the titular superspy across four seasons of \u201cJack Ryan,\u201d and co-starred with Natalie Portman in \u201cThe Fountain of Youth.\u201d The last name to look out for is Arnold Schwarzenegger. He did two \u201cTerminator\u201d sequels and starred in two seasons of \u201cFubar\u201d for Skydance.<\/p>\n \tSkydance Is Now an IP Machine<\/p>\n \t\t\t \n\tOne of the most valuable assets Ellison acquired in the merger was the Warner Bros. library and their toy box of IP. DC Studios, \u201cHarry Potter,\u201d \u201cLord of the Rings,\u201d \u201cGame of Thrones,\u201d Looney Tunes and \u201cScooby-Doo\u201d are now all property of Skydance. Iconic films like \u201cBlade Runner,\u201d \u201cGoodfellas,\u201d \u201cThe Goonies,\u201d \u201cThe Matrix,\u201d \u201cA Nightmare on Elm Street,\u201d \u201cOcean\u2019s 11,\u201d \u201cVacation\u201d and \u201cGremlins\u201d are also now in Skydance\u2019s hands, all ripe for exploitation. It\u2019s not hard to imagine any of these properties getting rebooted or retooled into TV series to help kick-start the slate. <\/p>\n \n\tSkydance Media was already producing films for franchises like \u201cMission: Impossible,\u201d \u201cTop Gun,\u201d \u201cStar Trek\u201d and \u201cTransformers,\u201d which will certainly play a role in filling out Ellison\u2019s promise of 30 films a year.<\/p>\n \tBig and Small Screens<\/p>\n \t\t\t \n\tSkydance Media certainly produced some of the biggest hits at the box office in recent years, from \u201cTop Gun: Maverick\u201d to \u201cMission: Impossible \u2014 Fallout\u201d and \u201cTransformers: Rise of the Beasts.\u201d <\/p>\n \n\tBut Skydance has also focused extensively on made-for-streaming films and their sequels. \u201cThe Family Plan\u201d brought favorite son Wahlberg into a more comedic action role, and was a hit on Apple TV+, spurring the upcoming \u201cThe Family Plan 2.\u201d Gina Prince-Bythewood\u2019s \u201cThe Old Guard\u201d proved popular on Netflix, and also begot a sequel. <\/p>\n \n\tBut that doesn\u2019t necessarily mean the new Skydance will lean more heavily into streaming than before. The terms of the merger state that Skydance\u2019s wide release films must have a 45-day theatrical distribution period, and the company can\u2019t release those movies on any subscription streaming platform \u2014 including Paramount+ \u2014 sooner than 90 days after they premiere in theaters.<\/p>\n \tAction, Action and More Action<\/p>\n \t\t\t \n\tPick a Skydance movie poster at random, and chances are it features a bloodied movie star holding a gun. Aside from a few early outliers (2010\u2019s \u201cTrue Grit\u201d and 2012\u2019s \u201cGuilt Trip\u201d), it\u2019s been all action all the time from the Ellison camp. It seems Skydance fell in love with the genre, and its eventual favorite star, Tom Cruise, after the release of 2011\u2019s \u201cMission: Impossible \u2013 Ghost Protocol.\u201d Just a year later, Skydance and Paramount teamed again to attach Cruise to \u201cJack Reacher.\u201d In the years following, Skydance produced films like \u201cWorld War Z,\u201d \u201cG.I. Joe: Retaliation,\u201d \u201cStar Trek Beyond,\u201d \u201cBaywatch,\u201d \u201cAnnihilation\u201d and \u201cGemini Man.\u201d Recent Skydance titles include \u201cMayday,\u201d \u201cThe Family Plan 2,\u201d \u201cFountain of Youth,\u201d \u201cMission: Impossible \u2013 The Final Reckoning,\u201d \u201cThe Gorge\u201d and \u201cHeart of Stone.\u201d <\/p>\n \n\tEllison has repeatedly deemed himself a movie fan first and an executive second. He\u2019s also made it no secret that Skydance\u2019s creative direction is largely aligned with his own tastes. In the settlement with the state AG\u2019s, Ellison promised to maintain both the Warner Bros. and Paramount lots as separate entities. But as we learned on Friday, Paramount film heads Dana Goldberg and Josh Greenstein will oversee both movie studios. <\/a>Greenstein came from Sony, but Goldberg has been with Skydance for decades. The question now is: How will they balance the prestigious history of Warner Bros., the studio behind \u201c2001: A Space Odyssey,\u201d \u201cThe Shining,\u201d \u201cGoodfellas,\u201d and the most recent best picture winner, \u201cOne Battle After Another,\u201d with Ellison\u2019s crowd-pleaser approach?<\/p>\n \tSkydance Television: Diverse Selection<\/p>\n \t\t\t \n\tSkydance series like the massively popular \u201cReacher\u201d and its spinoff \u201cNeagley\u201d are extensions of the company\u2019s core Jack Reacher universe. But other series have gone in different directions: \u201cGrace and Frankie,\u201d which streamed for seven seasons on Netflix, garnered numerous Emmy nominations for the Jane Fonda-Lily Tomlin comedy. Apple TV+ series \u201cFoundation\u201d totaled three seasons of ambitious sci-fi, and action comedy \u201cFUBAR\u201d on Netflix starred Arnold Schwarzenegger in his first TV series leading role.<\/p>\n \n\tHowever, Skydance Television never quite broke through with the kind of Emmy-sweeping fare produced by Skydance\u2019s new subsidiary HBO, so it\u2019s probably a hopeful sign that the premium cabler will continue to operate independently. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Next week, Paramount and Warner Bros. will officially combine into one mega-studio with a familiar name: Skydance. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":790251,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[96,2839,16155,17293,74486,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-790250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-movies","tag-skydance","tag-tom-cruise","tag-top-gun-maverick","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=790250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/790251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=790250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=790250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=790250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Skydance\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Aimee Spinks\/Netflix\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Courtesy of Paramount Pictures\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Sophie Giraud\/Prime\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n