Can You Name Disney’s Top Streaming Program?
The entire entertainment industry has fundamentally changed this century.
Netflix ascended and promptly disrupted a century-old industry in a matter of years.
Photo: Netflix
Since then, Hollywood’s most iconic companies, including Disney, have adjusted to a shocking reversal of fortune.
Their formerly monolithic entertainment empires suddenly shook at their very foundation, leading to some shocking changes.
Image: The Wall Street Journal
Perhaps one of the most stunning revolutions has quietly occurred in plain sight on Disney+.
Can you name Disney’s top show? No, it’s not Bluey. Today, I’ll explain why.
Everything Old Is New Again
Photo: eBay
In a past life, I covered the last fundamental disruption in Hollywood, the rise of the DVD.
With the benefit of hindsight, everyone accepts this change as inevitable.
At the time, the media portrayed the matter much differently. Few understood the financial ramifications of the DVD.
Since the early 1980s, video stores had operated under the tenet that you must rent, not buy, your favorite films.
DVD
A-list titles would debut as price-prohibitive VHS options.
Consumers had the choice of buying them for $100 or renting three for $5. You can guess what most movie fans did.
Photo: Wikimedia
A year later, the same film would become available for sale at a more tolerable price of $10-$20. That’s when the real sales began.
DVD changed all that, as studios offered titles for $10-$20 right off the bat.
Walmart
The discount market became the Wal-Mart bargain bin, which may still exist in your area today.
You can snag your favorite films for as little as a dollar, and this was 25 years ago.
How revolutionary was the rise of DVD? Strong sales could save canceled programs. Like Family Guy.
You Can’t Kill Stewie Griffin
Family Guy
Family Guy debuted on September 23, 1999, roughly six months after Fox’s other new animated series, Futurama.
That’s oddly relevant today, but the story read differently at the time.
Photo: Disney
Critics dismissed both as the latest knockoffs of The Simpsons, which was ten years old by that point and at the height of its greatest run.
I have no idea how much people are aware of the references now, but Fox execs were notoriously twitchy with their trigger fingers at the time.
Credit: Freeform
Fox famously killed several exceptional shows like Firefly and John Doe before they had a chance to build an audience.
Two of the most notorious examples were Family Guy and Futurama, the latter of which Fox treated horribly.
Photo: Hulu
Futurama episodes aired at 7 PM EST on Sunday night…as long as NFL games didn’t run long.
If you know anything about the NFL, you know that there’s always a game still playing at 7 PM.
Photo: Hulu
So, Futurama episodes aired late and often not at all. Fox simply pushed them to later, undefined dates.
Seth MacFarlane’s Family Guy couldn’t even claim that. Fox canceled the show with little fanfare. Twice.
FOX
First, Fox canceled Family Guy after its first season in 2000 and then later in 2002, as its third season was winding down.
The reason you even remember Family Guy is because its DVD sales were nothing short of astounding.
Loyal fans flocked to their local Sam Goody’s (google it, kids) to buy the entire series run on DVD.
Once Fox execs saw those numbers, they restored Family Guy, airing new episodes in May 2005.
Fox
Fox never canceled the show again because Family Guy’s ratings stabilized, with the show developing a devoutly loyal audience.
Quahog Ascendant
Photo: Deadline
In 2019, Family Guy was one of the many franchises Disney acquired in the Fox deal.
Disney CEO Bob Iger had a plan, but he needed content to make it work.
NBC News
Also, some of this content needed to be non-Disney in nature and thereby appeal to those poor, unfortunate souls who aren’t true believers.
In the same deal, Disney acquired a controlling interest in Hulu. That’s where Family Guy has shown out.
Wall Street Journal
In fact, for the week of September 2nd through September 8th, 2024, Family Guy was Disney’s most popular streaming series.
According to Nielsen, fans watched 1.062 billion minutes of the show, which recently turned a quarter-century old.
Photo: Ludo Studios
Even Bluey couldn’t match that title. The beloved Australian pup has actually faded ever so slightly in the ratings recently.
For the week in question, Bluey earned 878 million viewer minutes…but here’s the thing.
Photo: Ludo Studios
Disney doesn’t own the Bluey brand. While I suspect that’s an eventual acquisition, it hasn’t happened yet.
So, Family Guy is easily Disney’s most successful and consistently reliable streaming brand. Who knew?!
Disney’s Other Streaming Hits
Photo: Roku
The charts this week were relatively humdrum, as we’re all awaiting Agatha All Along’s arrival.
Due to Nielsen’s head-scratching publication schedule, that won’t happen for two more weeks. But you can get a sneak preview here.
AGATHA ALL ALONG, exclusively on Disney+. © 2024 MARVEL.
We do know that Futurama remains on fire, as the other show Fox left for dead in the early 2000s garnered another 356 million minutes.
Remarkably, that was only Hulu’s third-most popular title on the Originals chart.
Photo: Hulu
Only Murders in the Building had another fantastic week with 544 million minutes, while The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives entered the charts with 409 million minutes.
I’ve studiously avoided learning anything of note about that one, but it apparently has…an Affleck in it? FWIW, Ben and Casey deny it.
On the Movies chart, Moana is the only Disney+ title on the chart in tenth place with 188 million…but that will change soon.
Finally, on Acquired, Hulu finished in first and second place with Family Guy and Prison Break, which gained 1.048 billion minutes.
Credit: ABC
Grey’s Anatomy is losing a bit of steam at 750 million minutes, but Bob’s Burgers remains strong at 689 million minutes.
Finally, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit managed 594 million minutes.
Photo: Getty
Oh, and while it has absolutely nothing to do with Disney, I’ll mention that Gilmore Girls is back on the charts, which just makes me happy.
I loved a lot of these shows that Fox and The WB kept canceling.
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Feature Photo: New York Post
