‘South Park’ lawsuit: Warner Bros. Discovery sues Paramount for $500 million | News Small business
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Warner Bros. Discovery submitted a lawsuit towards Paramount Friday, declaring the rival media company breached its 50 percent-billion-dollar exclusivity contract with HBO Max by airing “South Park” on its own streaming platform, Paramount+.
HBO Max is a unit of Warner Bros. Discovery, which also owns News.
Practically all “South Park” episodes air initially on Paramount-owned Comedy Central. In 2019, Paramount and “South Park’s” creators alongside one another auctioned off streaming rights to the show’s initial 23 seasons moreover 3 new 10-episode seasons to HBO Max.
Prior to Discovery’s 2022 merger with Warner Bros., WarnerMedia, then owned by AT&T, agreed to pay back almost $1.7 million for special streaming rights for each “South Park” episode, the fit alleges. The 1st episodes of “South Park” year 24 have been to be sent in March 2020. Then came the pandemic, and WarnerMedia was informed that the new output of “South Park” would be halted, in accordance to the complaint.
In March 2021, Paramount launched Paramount+, and Warner Bros. Discovery promises Paramount, MTV and South Park Digital Studios together “planned to divert as a lot of the new “South Park” information as probable to Paramount+ in order to strengthen that nascent streaming platform.”
The company also explained it was promised 30 new episodes more than a few seasons, but has only received 14 episodes to date.
“We consider that Paramount and South Park Digital Studios embarked on a multi-yr plan of unfair trade tactics and deception, flagrantly and frequently breaching our agreement, which evidently gave HBO Max unique streaming rights to the current library and new content from the common animated comedy South Park,” HBO Max said in a assertion.
Paramount claims these claims are “without benefit.”
Paramount “continues to adhere to the parties’ contract by providing new South Park episodes to HBO Max, even with the simple fact that Warner Bros. Discovery has unsuccessful and refused to fork out license costs that it owes to Paramount for episodes that have now been shipped, and which HBO Max proceeds to stream,” a Paramount Worldwide spokesperson explained.
The lawsuit, filed in the New York State Supreme Court docket, also promises a separate $900 million deal among MTV, a subsidiary of Paramount, and South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, broke the terms of the deal in August 2021. This deal included 14 “made-for-streaming” “South Park” movies that would premiere on Paramount+.
Warner Bros. Discovery statements the defendants employed language like “movies,” “films,” and “events” to sidestep their contractual obligations.
“As Stone publicly explained it, “we have f—k you income now,” the suit promises he said, about the deal with MTV.
