Why Corporate Studios Aren't Making Anything Good Ever Again

A recurring complaint from fans reverberates across social media every time a beloved franchise receives another disastrous reboot. Viewers ask why studios keep spending millions on projects that anger the audience that made those brands valuable in the first place.

The ongoing backlash over Netflix’s Castlevania adaptations best illustrates the pattern. Fans watched a classic property get radically rewritten by showrunners more interested in personal ideology than in honoring the material that built the franchise.

The frustration is understandable. What confuses many observers is the assumption hidden inside the complaint: Fans still believe major studios need to please them.

But there is a name for the moment that assumption died: Cultural Ground Zero.

Entertainment companies once depended on audience approval to survive. A movie studio that repeatedly alienated ticket buyers collapsed. A record label that failed to deliver popular albums went bankrupt. A publisher that printed books nobody wanted to read quickly vanished from store shelves.

Corporate consolidation changed those incentives.

Read the full post on Substack!

Access it free for the first two weeks, then find it in the paid archive.