Disney Buys 20th Century Fox for 52.6 Billion

It was announced on Thursday that The Walt Disney Company would be purchasing part of 21^st Century Fox for 52.4 billion dollars. Rumors of the acquisition have been floating around the internet for over a month. First reported on November 6^th, negotiations were said to have died down until the start of December. 21^st Century Fox is looking to sell their Fox Entertainment Group. Now that the deal has gone through, Disney has gained control of 20^th Century Fox, the FX Networks, another 30% stake in Hulu (Disney already owns 30%), a 39% stake of the European channel Sky, and Fox Regional Sports Channels. Disney will not however be buying Fox News, Fox Network, and Fox Sports, 21^st Century Fox will change most of their focus onto these subgroups and get out of the movie/television industry.

The acquisition of so many new assets is sure to change some of Disney’s plans they have for the future. Bob Iger, the Disney CEO, was going to step down from the position in 2019, with rumors of a presidential run; however, with the purchase of the Fox Entertainment Group, Bob Iger has stated he will stay on as CEO until 2021. While there is sure to be some internal mix-ups combining the two companies, the internet’s big question is what will happen with their respective movie universes?

 There are two big talking points about this deal from an entertainment standpoint, streaming and the MCU. Disney announced a few months ago they are planning to start their own streaming service for their shows and movies. Now that they have Fox’s properties, Disney can add quite the catalogue of shows and movies to their site. With the deal Disney now has the rights to The Simpsons, Futurama, Bob’s Burgers, The X-Files, Firefly, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, How I Met Your Mother, the Aliens film series, the rebooted Planet of the Apes trilogy, and the highest-grossing film of all time, Avatar. On top of those series, Disney finally gets back home distribution rights to some of their older Star Wars films. Combine this with Disney’s animated films, Pixar’s animated films, the Star Wars franchise, and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and you have the recipe for an amazing streaming service.

Perhaps the most exciting part of this deal for nerds all across the world is Marvel regaining full control of Fox’s super heroes. Between 1986 and 1996, Marvel Comics sold the film rights to some of their comics to different film studios to help Marvel from going into bankruptcy. Fast forward some 20 years later, and a takeover from Disney, and Marvel now has the highest-grossing film franchise of all time, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The MCU consists of 17 super films all based on different Marvel comics, but what separates this film franchise from those of the X-Men, and Dark Knight series, is that all of the films come together to tell a greater story. For years fans have wanted the X-Men, the fantastic Four, and their respective villains to join the fold, but because of lawsuits, they were never allowed to cross over. Now that Disney controls 20^th Century Fox, they have regained the rights to Fox’s super hero franchises. This means, Wolverine, Storm, Deadpool, The Thing, Mr. Fantastic, and the Silver Surfer will be coming into the MCU. Maybe more important than the heroes joining, the villains will also be coming into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Most of Marvel’s large scale villains were over at Fox. Fans were thinking when Marvel finishes Phase 3, what bad guy could top Thanos? Now, Disney/Marvel can choose from Galactus, Annihilus, Kang the Conqueror, and Dr. Doom. Clearly with all of these new characters to choose from Phase 4 will be fantastic.