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Netflix boss recounts "fistfight" with Marvel over budgets for Daredevil, Luke Cage, and The Punisher
"Our incentives weren't aligned" the CEO of Netflix explained over the budget battles with Marvel Television.
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One of the biggest names in Hollywood you might never have heard of is Ted Sarandos. The co-CEO of Netflix has been with the company for 25 years and has seen it shift from DVD-by-mail to the biggest name in streaming, so he knows all the stories worth telling. He’s recently shared some tidbits about Netflix’s early deal with Marvel that gave us Daredevil, The Punisher, and Luke Cage – and he describes their working relationship in very combative terms.
During the height of the MCU, Netflix signed a monster deal with Marvel. “By far, our Marvel deal [in 2013] was the biggest deal in the history of television. No one will ever touch it,” Sarandos explained during a recent interview. “We committed to five original seasons of TV with no pilots, 13 expensive episodes for each show… and then a crossover season.”
However, despite the size of the deal, Sarandos feels that it was very much a learning experience for him and Netflix – and not necessarily in a good way. “We were dealing with the old Marvel television regime, which operated independently at Disney. And they were thrifty. And every time we wanted to make our shows bigger or better, we had to bang on them.” Sarandos describes the back and forth with Marvel producers as “a fistfight.”
“Our incentives were not well aligned. We wanted to make great television; they wanted to make money. I thought we could make money with great television.” Ted Sarandos says that the partnership between Netflix and Marvel on those shows taught him a valuable lesson. “You want to work with people whose incentives are aligned with yours…. That’s a lesson that I take forever.”
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