Paramount Makes A Bold Promise About HBO's Future After Warner Bros. Deal - Will The Studio Keep It?

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With Paramount looking set to acquire Warner Bros., the future of the latter company's properties is up in the air. That said, fans of HBO's best shows can potentially breathe a sigh of relief, as Paramount head honcho David Ellison is promising not to make any significant changes to the network and its programming.

As documented by Deadline, Ellison — a self-proclaimed fan of "Game of Thrones" — praised HBO executive Casey Bloys and the work he's done in a call. Due to the network's success, the Paramount boss is happy for the folks over at HBO to continue doing their thing without any interference. As he put it:

"Our viewpoint is HBO should stay HBO. They are a leader in the space, and we just want them to continue doing more of it, but by bringing the platforms together, all of our content will be able to reach even a broader audience."

Of course, it remains to be seen if Ellison will keep his promise. History has shown that mergers lead to big changes, but HBO seems relatively safe for the time being. Indeed, as James Andrew Miller's 2021 book "Tinderbox: HBO's Ruthless Pursuit of New Frontiers" covers in extensive detail, HBO has a long and time-tested track record of operating in almost open defiance of its assorted parent companies' preferences. What's more, the fact that Paramount has remained essentially hands-off with the likes of "The Daily Show" and "South Park" since the Ellisons took over suggests it may take a similar approach to HBO. (... But maybe don't get too comfortable just yet, John Oliver and the "Last Week Tonight" production team.)

Beyond that? Ellison has also proclaimed that the acquisition will benefit all of Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery's biggest properties in the grand scheme of things.

When Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery eventually merge like Voltron, the company will have ownership of some of the biggest franchises around. David Ellison believes this will give them an advantage in the entertainment space, with plans to consolidate Paramount and WBD's streaming service into one profitable entity. So, fans can probably expect the big-hitters to stick around. As he noted in the call:

"We basically have 15,000 films and thousands of television episodes — iconic portfolio franchises from 'Harry Potter,' 'Lord of the Rings,' the DC Universe, 'Game of Thrones,' 'Mission: Impossible,' 'Top Gun,' 'Transformers,' 'SpongeBob,' and 'Star Trek.' [This] is incredibly powerful — the combined D2C platforms is basically 200 million subscribers at close. To contextualize, that's roughly the size of Disney."

To summarize, Ellison has promised that HBO will remain intact, as will Paramount and WBD's biggest franchises. Still, this is all dependent on the acquisition making it to the finish line. After all, Netflix looked certain to acquire Warner Bros. until recently, only for those plans to fall by the wayside.