HBO Max rescinds season 2 renewal for Minx, will remove season 1 as well
HBO Max pulls an HBO Max, this time with the unreleased new season of Minx
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It’s getting to the point where someone could make a reasonably well-stocked streaming service just by looting the dumpster that Warner Bros. Discovery boss David Zaslav has been tossing his tax write-offs into, with the Ophelia Lovibond and Jake Johnson-starring HBO Max comedy series Minx getting a double-dose of bad news today: Not only has its second season been canceled, despite having already wrapped production after being ordered in May, but the first season is set to be removed from HBO Max as well. This comes from Deadline, which notes that, “The timing of the latest move is likely tied to the end of 2022 calendar year for financial reasons.”
Minx starred Lovibond as a woman in the ‘70s who teams up with Johnson’s character to create the first erotic magazine targeted toward women. Elizabeth Perkins apparently had a recurring role in season two. Deadline says that Lionsgate TV, which produced the show, is going to shop around both seasons in hopes of getting them onto some other platform, with the company saying in a statement that it is “working closely to find a new opportunity for Minx, so current, and new viewers, can continue this journey with us.”
This is the latest in a long line of HBO and HBO Max projects that have been unceremoniously canceled (or renewed and then canceled anyway) over the last few years, and it’s also the latest in a long line of HBO and HBO Max projects that have been completely erased from the streaming service in some confusing attempt to make money.
And for those keeping score at home, this is also the second time in two years that a show starring Jake Johnson has been canceled after a new season was ordered—it previously happened with Stumptown in 2020. That was an ABC show and its second season was canceled because of COVID, but we wouldn’t be surprised if David Zaslav saw that and thought it was pretty cool. Very few people love to not make TV shows and movies as much as he seems to.
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The only thing surprising about this is that they didn’t wait till the day it was set to premiere it’s second season to cancel it.
Yeah, did Chad ever find a new home?
It did! Roku picked it up for season 2, but no air date has been announced yet.
Someday very soon the only thing the entire Warner/Discovery family of platforms and stations will have to offer is this:
Well, that and more home improvement shows.
Uueegghh?
This is it, Zaslav is going to do to HBO what he did to Discovery, turn it into cheap, unscripted reality shows. It still makes money, we’re just all worse off for it.
I really think that the Warner Discovery merger has been the worst thing to happen to either company. I also think that the FCC and FTC majorly dropped the ball by allowing the merger. Of course I think all of the mega entertainment and News companies need to get broken up sooner rather than later.
Looking at that will cost you $12 a month.
Auto-renewing to $15 after three months.
Plus they’re going to take some heat over that Indian head. Can’t win for losing.
Fuckin’…Fuck all of this.
Serious question for anyone in the industry. How does this make financial sense for HBO?If they’ve already footed the bill to produce a second season, why wouldn’t they just air it?
They can write the costs off as a loss, since it never aired. Then, give Zaslav a huge bonus.
Thanks.
Standard-issue new CEO bullshit. Clear the decks of the predecessor’s imprint, take a one-time loss that won’t really affect your share price (since the market will consider it non-recurring), bank a bunch of losses that do create cash by reducing income tax liabilities, and move on to new guy’s vision of the glorious future.
Couple of different things:1. If a project was started before a company was acquired, the acquiring company can cancel it and write off (for tax purposes) the entire cost immediately, rather than having to recognize the expense (and tax writeoff) over time. This is what happened to the Batgirl movie: the new owners believed that the money already spent was badly spent, and that the tax shield was worth more than the benefit having Batgirl on HBO Max would generate in terms of subscribers.2. In the case of the second season of Minx, production contracts often have out clauses that would let the show buyer (HBO Max) decline to run the show (and pay a penalty), freeing the producer to shop it elsewhere. Discovery likely looked at it and said “we don’t think this is going to bring/keep enough subs for HBO Max to justify the difference between the full cost of the show and the penalty we’d have to pay to back out.”3. One thing to note, a number of sources indicate that some of the content being pulled off HBO Max (like Westworld) is going to pop up again on an ad-supported platform.
This is a bumer, I really liked that show. It was a really fun low-stakes summer sex comedy with some very charming performances. I like 70s aesthetics so I really dug the wardrobe and soundtrack as well! I didn’t think it stood much of a chance but I thought it would at least get season 2. Maybe another streamer will pick it up?
The show was/is too entertaining to simply disappear like this. Very disrespectful to all involved. I am excited that the producers won’t go down without a fight and will fight to get it shown elsewhere. I will follow!
The first season being removed from HBO Max seems like a positive move for them landing on another streamer, unless it’s another of those weird tax loophole deals like the Batgirl thing, where they have destroy the negatives and pinky promise never to allow the project see the light of day.
“with the company saying in a statement that it is “working closely to find a new opportunity for Minx, so current, and new viewers, can continue this journey with us.””
I know it was a really, REALLY long article, but the information is in there.
I think it looks something like this…
I read in another article that the series is one week from wrapping production, and will complete shooting, and then be shopped to another distributor, so the chances are good it will find a home somewhere.
That’s good news as it is an entertaining show.
I hope you’re right. Season 1 was good-looking, well-written, and fun and these folks deserve not to just have their work thrown into an abyss.
Now where am I supposed ot get my Ophelia Lovibond fix?
Apple TV+? Looks like Trying is coming back for a fourth season… unless they pull a David Zaslav on it.
At this point Zaslaving needs to be a verb.
Fuck!
I continue to be flabbergasted that the new overlords have decided that the best thing to do with an incredible network is absolutely ruin it for tax write-offs.
“the best thing to do with an incredible network”
Sorry, are we pretending that HBO Max is “an incredible network”?
“Ophelia Lovibond” is the worst famous person name I’ve heard in my life
Sounds like a goth 007 heroine.
What a f’kin bummer. Such a stacked, great cast! Hope they can find another partner.
Someday, someone’s going to need to explain to me how it makes any financial sense to cancel a show or film after you’ve wrapped production on it.
“Someday, someone’s going to need to explain to me how it makes any financial sense to cancel a show or film after you’ve wrapped production on it.”
Well, it’s not a WB show, so they only pay the license fee to air it on HBO Max, therefore it makes complete sense since they spent no money on it.
The more you’ve spent, the more you can write off. Unless they think keeping Minx is going to attract more incremental subscriber dollars than it cost to produce (unlikely), the math works. Problem is, they’ve been doing this over and over, and are almost certainly going to lose subscribers over the drumbeat of disappearing content. One or two shows? Fine. Most of them? Bold strategy Cotton, etc.
“You didn’t watch Season 1!? Well, now you never will!!!”:-|
When does it get to the point where creators don’t want to work with platforms like this, where the content is immediately lost and removed? There’s a lot of people’s hard work and time invested into these shows. I’m just wondering when it’s going to become a breaking point for those in creative ventures.
Eh, that’ll be a problem for Zaslav’s successor.
Yeah, it’s akin to non-guaranteed money in a pro sports contract, except you also can’t play for anyone else if you’re cut. This feels like the old Hollywood studio system.
“Yeah, it’s akin to non-guaranteed money in a pro sports contract, except you also can’t play for anyone else if you’re cut.”
Sorry, in what world are people working for WB not allowed to work for someone else???
Depends on what you mean by “platforms like this”. There’s only a few platforms.
This is so fucking gross.Enjoy your shitty holidays, Zaslav. You increased your company’s bottom line by 0.00000000000000001% and all it took was erasing multiple years’ worth of work from hundreds of people off the face of the earth.I hope each one of them gets to kick you in the dick some day.
I have no words, I hate this merger and I have that quality scripted shows are dumped while Discovery will surely make cheap blah reality programs, “fix my bathroom/my basement needs help”Bah to it all!
What?! Why?! I liked this series!!!
So not only are they intentionally turning season 1 into lost media, but they spent all the money to produce season 2 and simply refuse to show it to anyone.I don’t think Zaslav has any strategy whatsoever other than “destroy stuff.”
It’s cost cutting. They won’t have to pay streaming residuals if the show can’t be streamed, and they can take a tax write off on the costs of the unaired season.
Feels more and more like we’re going to end up nostalgic for the era when shows at least got DVD releases. A few years ago I never would have imagined that. Wild! And not in a good way.
Go woke go broke
I am extremely worried about The Venture Bros. movie. Animated movie finale for a series that never had a huge following. Urbaniak said he wrapped his voice recordings this past summer which seemed to indicate production was moving along and it may come out next year. But with Zaslav killing completed and near-completed work, just feels like it’s inevitable that it gets axed.
Same thing I’ve been worrying about! And Metalocalypse too! I will quite literally shed tears if these finale masterpieces get Zaslaved.And also, maybe, start researching where the Zaslav palatial estates are located……
I like the way you think. Not even just Zaslav, but all rich people. Just let’s start with him so maybe we can save some not-yet-cancelled shows and movies.
I feel like the only hope both movies have is that they’re so beneath the radar that they can sneak out before Zaslav gets that far down in the cuts.
Be like me, and just give up on that now. It hurts less. And if somehow the movie escapes tax-writeoff Hell, then bonus.I would expect Zaslav and Discovery to destroy anything I like or will like from WB and HBO. They killed Cartoon Network. They killed a $90M Batman-adjacent movie, forever. The tender fragile beauty of Venture Bros won’t escape Zaslav’s vulgarian clutches.
Not a huge following except for every dude on the internet in a certain demographic? I’ve never had a show so relentlessly pushed on me. I view VB proselytizers with the same suspicion as anime enthusiasts.
It has a fervont fanbase, myself included, for sure but I never got the sense it had a wide audience. I mean the show’s airing schedule was 8-10 episodes airing at midnight every 2.5-3 years before it got cancelled (I first started watching it when I started college and I am no spring chicken now). Hard to capture and keep a huge audience that way.Not going to push it hard but I do think it is good and a better show than Rick & Morty, which seems like the more popular show. Just my opinion though.
Hope he’s killed in an accident, happy holidays everyone else
Ah yes, “an accident”
Why not shoot all their shows on flammable nitrate while they’re at it.
Minx is such a fun show. I very much enjoyed the 1st season. It’s in the top 5 of my best of 2022 list. I hope another streamer picks it up and the show continues for more seasons.
In other words: Please unsubscribe from our service and app. We clearly don’t want to retain current subscribers, and we may expand to alienating future subscribers. Somehow reducing revenue and permanently alienating customers reduces costs…somehow.Look, Zaslav isn’t just some incompetent goon who barely had anything to do with past successes credited to him. Well, ok, he clearly is, but he probably knows what he’s doing. If that means tanking WB and HBO for the tax credit.
I don’t have anything new to say, just that I loved the first season, was looking forward to the second, and hope that the show finds a new home. Such a great cast and solid writing.