Intro for March 21, 2025

Dear Gossips,  

Today in Do They Even Notice, Though news, it has been reported that Apple TV+ loses more than $1 billion a year. Simultaneously, Apple’s last fiscal year ended with a $93.7 billion profit. Do they even notice the money the streaming platform is losing? They must a little bit, because the same report states they’ve cut their annual content spend by half a billion dollars, but still. This is pocket change to Apple.

It has long been believed that Apple TV+ is a loss leader for Apple, not unlike Prime Video for Amazon. Apple isn’t really in the movie/TV business, it’s in the gadget business, and the movies and TV shows they can exclusively offer on their proprietary streaming service is just gravy for Apple customers who are buying phones, tablets, and other devices. It is estimated that Apple TV+ has 45 million subscribers, I wonder how many are automatically enrolled after buying an iPad? And to my point about Apple not really caring about their streaming platform, they don’t bother self-reporting their subscriber numbers like Netflix, Disney, etc do. 

Pound for pound, though, Apple TV+ is one of the better deals in streaming ($9.99/month or $99/year). They have a handful of good movies (Killers of the Flower Moon, Wolfwalkers, Fancy Dance, Causeway, The Velveteen Rabbit), and a bunch of good TV shows (Ted Lasso, Slow Horses, Severance, Shrinking, Blackbird, Loot, Bad Monkey, among others too numerous to name). And they have one thing Netflix doesn’t: a Best Picture Oscar, courtesy CODA. 

On the TV side, at least, Apple TV+ has been pursuing the kind of “quality over quantity” programming we see from the leader in the industry, HBO. Or, what HBO used to be when it practically invented “prestige drama” in the 1990s and 2000s. It’s a lot of character-driven dramas, a handful of comedies, and a few high concept series, like Sugar, here and there. It’s a nice mix of stuff, and if they keep going this way, they’ll end up with a roster of varied programming all united by one thing—quality. Apple TV+ does not skimp on production values.

On the movie side, though, I don’t think they have an identity yet. They don’t develop or produce much in-house, mostly they buy stuff at festivals, and they can’t decide if they want to commit to theatrical distribution or not. Remember the Wolfs fiasco? I don’t think that will get better any time soon, because the movie business is still recovering, and streamers are still figuring out how to play nice in the cinema landscape. 

Although it should be pointed out that Kraven the Hunter is currently the #3 movie on Netflix, once again demonstrating that even films that bomb in theaters go on to do well on streaming. People have come to associate “direct to streaming” with “garbage”, not unlike direct-to-video movies back in the old days. It would behoove streamers to commit to theatrical releases of their films, if only to bolster their eventual second life on streaming. And I don’t mean Netflix’s half-assed “600 screens for two weeks” thing, I mean actually put movies in theaters like that is the primary objective. Because audiences can tell when it’s not, and then they label your movie “garbage” and move on. 

Anyway, I don’t think Apple is too worried about losing a billion dollars a year on something that’s considered a treat for their customers. And even with that loss-leader attitude, they’re still putting together an enviable slate of series, especially. If they ever get it together on the film side, they could become one of the best streaming services out there. They just need an identity as a film distributor, the way the TV side has adopted the identity of “stuff you would have seen on HBO twenty years ago”.

Live long and gossip,

Sarah