Disney Might Sacrifice Streaming Platform For Insane MCU Deal, Report Says

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Mark Ruffalo as Hulk with Chris Evans as Captain America in Avengers: Endgame

Credit: Marvel Studios

Disney might be investing millions of dollars just to acquire the rights for some iconic Marvel characters in a new MCU deal.

Mark Ruffalo as Hulk in Avengers: Endgame
Credit: Marvel Studios

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has a lot of great super heroes and villains, but Marvel Studios didn’t have all of the character rights to start the cinematic universe right away. At one point, Marvel was going bankrupt, and to avoid losing everything, movie rights for some of the Marvel super heroes were sold.

That’s why Spider-Man is under the Sony umbrella, the Fantastic Four and X-Men are with 20th Century Studios, and Hulk and Namor are with Universal. These deals kept Marvel alive, and now the studios want those rights back. Why? Because it’s one hell of a nightmare to include the character without the rights. For instance, Tenoch Huerta’s Namor can appear in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022) because the villain isn’t getting his own standalone film.

Tenoch Huerta's Namor stares down Angela Bassett's Queen Ramonda in 'Black Panther: Wakanda Forever'. Credit; Marvel Studios
Credit: Marvel Studios

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If Marvel creates a movie with Namor, Universal has the right to distribute the movie how they see fit and profit from what Disney creates. The same can be said for Hulk, which is one of the many reasons why the big green guy didn’t get a sequel after Incredible Hulk (2008) with Edward Norton.

Now, TheWrap claims that Citi analyst Jason Bazinet’s new finding might prove that Disney has one easy solution to get back some of these character rights. Due to their financial numbers from last quarter, Bazinet suggests Disney could easily sell their shares in Hulu in exchange for the distribution rights to Namor and Hulk.

Hulk talking to his cousin, Jennifer Walters
Credit: Marvel Studios

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Bazinet writes in his report that the benefit of acquiring the rights would be huge for Marvel. Reports of Mark Ruffalo getting a Hulk movie did surge after She-Hulk: Attorney At Law, and if Marvel wants both characters to have a large role in the MCU going forward, Bazinet makes it clear that it’s the right move:

“While Disney owns all Marvel IP, Universal has distribution rights to Hulk and Namor. As such, if Disney makes a Hulk or Namor film, Comcast can distribute the film on Peacock. If Hulu is sold, Disney may use this as an opportunity to secure these distribution rights.”

Namor about to write something down.
Credit: Marvel Studios

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Disney does own around 66% of the shares in Hulu, and Comcast could force the company to buy out the rest of the shares by 2024. If Walt Disney Company doesn’t want to deal with another streaming service and the costs required to run the platform, it would be wise to sell Hulu.

Bazinet does estimate that the deal could be worth around $27 billion, meaning that Disney would be forking a lot of money for those two super heroes. The reason why this deal would be insane is that Namor and Hulk might be big Marvel super heroes, but their time in the spotlight won’t earn them billions. Doing this deal could really hurt the company because there’s no guarantee that future projects could win back the amount of money for the MCU deal.

Do you think Dinsey should follow through with this deal and sell Hulu? Let Inside The Magic know what you think!

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