"It's Streaming Then" - Disney Plus Coming Out November 12.

[Guest]

Disney Plus: Release dates, prices, shows and movies to expect on the streaming service

Source: https://www.cnet.com/news/disney-plus-streaming-service-release-date-price-shows-and-movies-to-expect-d23-mandalorian/

 

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Disney is calling it the future of the company: Disney Plus. It's the entertainment giant's upcoming streaming service for almost everything it creates. It'll be the exclusive home for streaming the company's blockbuster Star Wars, Marvel and Pixar movies -- Avengers: Endgame, for example, will be available to stream on Dec. 11. But in addition, Disney is ramping up a slate of original shows and movies based on those brands and others.

Notably for me, a Kenobi series starring Ewan McGregor is confirmed. Very excited. 

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Friday was Disney's coming-out party for many of those originals. At its biennial fan convention, the D23 Expo, Disney put on a parade of trailers, talent and new announcements about Disney Plus. Disney revealed plans for six new original series for the streaming service: a Star Wars Obi-Wan Kenobi series with Ewan McGregor reprising his role; three new live-action Marvel shows based on the characters Ms. Marvel, Moon Knight and She-Hulk; an "unscripted" short-form series Muppets Now; and a Lizzie McGuire revival with Hilary Duff playing the role she originated as a teen. Trailers dropped for the live-action, big-budget Star Wars spinoff The Mandalorian and a slew of other shows and movies that'll be on the service when it launches. 

And the company started to talk about more features of the service itself. Disney Plus is going to eschew pricing tiers, giving all subscribers access to four simultaneous streams and 4K and HDR high-quality video. It'll also allow you to create seven profiles, so personalization can suit different members of the household. And even though Disney Plus is the company's answer to Netflix, it won't be releasing episodes of its original series all at once like its giant rival does -- new episodes will come out weekly.

So it may seem on the surface that it appears to be a straightforward Netflix competitor, however it may be more akin to Floatplane:

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Disney's other streaming services -- Hulu and sports-focused ESPN Plus -- will run on the same tech platform, so you can subscribe to them with the same password and credit card info. Disney plans for all three to be individual subscriptions, but when Disney Plus launches in the US, it'll offer a triple-service bundle for $13 a month. 

So much like the several channels floatplane has, available to purchase separately or as a bundle. Either way, its cheaper than Netflix, and with better shows it looks like. 

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Globally, Disney plans a progressive rollout worldwide over two years. The company provided a generalized timeline for when it'll expand the service to the world's major regions. 

Disney Plus is slated to roll out in:

• Western Europe over the course of six months between October this year and March of next year.
• Eastern Europe over the course of a year starting as early as October 2020.
• Latin America over the course of three months starting as early as October 2020.
• Asia Pacific over the course of two years starting as early as October this year.

US etc are expected to get it November 12th, while AUS/NZ get it November 19th. 

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In the US, Disney said the service will cost $7 a month, or $70 a year. Its price undercuts the $13 monthly fee for Netflix's most popular plan in the US, which lets you stream to two different devices simultaneously in high definition. But Disney Plus will allow all subscribers to stream to four devices and access 4K content at no extra cost -- features Netflix includes in its $16 premium tier. 

In Canada, Disney Plus will be priced at 9 Canadian dollars a month, or C$90 per year. In the Netherlands, it'll be 7 euros per month, or €70 per year. In Australia, it'll be priced at 9 Australian dollars a month, or AUS$90 per year.  And New Zealand subscribers will pay 10 New Zealand dollars per month, or NZ$100 per year.

Way back in 2017, Iger noted that the price would reflect the "fact that it will have substantially less volume" than prime competitor Netflix. As the months and years pass, Disney will accumulate a bigger catalog of exclusives and originals on Disney Plus. As that happens, it's a good bet the company will start pushing its price higher. 

I wouldn't mind paying more. Netflix has gotten rather mundane once you finish re-watching all the TV shows. I'm excited. 

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Disney promised wide device support, saying Disney Plus will support streaming to phones, tablets, computers, connected TVs and streaming media boxes. At its big unveiling in April, Disney specifically called out support for Roku TVs and the Playstation 4. In August, the company said it also had global distribution agreements in place with Apple, Google, Microsoft, Roku and Sony. That encompasses the makers of:

• Roku's boxes, sticks and TVs.
• Apple TV, iPhone and iPad.
• Phones and TVs running on Android operating systems, as well as Chromecast streamers.
• Xbox One.
• PlayStation 4.

Great news for almost everyone. (Sorry Linux, no entertainment for you!)

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Disney Plus will include content from the Disney brand itself, Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars and National Geographic. It'll also integrate programming from Fox -- all 30 seasons of The Simpsons will be on Disney Plus starting on day one, and more titles, like The Sound of Music, The Princess Bride and Malcolm in the Middle, will join it in the first year. In August, Disney said that it'll go further than that, "reimagining" past Fox franchises "for a new generation" -- Iger indicated a reboot of Home Alone is in the works, for one. 

 

Disney Plus will be the only place you can stream all of Disney's theatrically released movies, starting with Captain Marvel at launch and the rest of its 2019 slate later on. Frozen 2, for example, will be streamable on the service next summer after its theatrical release in November. Disney Plus will also house the entire film libraries of Pixar, Star Wars and its Signature Series and Disney Vault lines of classic hand-drawn animated movies. (Think Bambi, The Lion King, Snow White and so on.)

Seems like lots of content, even initially, at a great price. Definitely undercutting Netflix and finally giving competition to the market (Sorry Floatplane, not yet)

 

 

Opinion:

Yes please. I'm watching re-runs of the Office waiting for new TV shows (Peaky Blinders coming out soon). Nothing good on Netflix now, all watched. Hopefully this platform doesn't get region-locked like Netflix, not that it won't matter with a VPN. 

[FezBoy]

EWAN SHOW!!!!!

[Trik'Stari]

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Tedny said:

US only? 

I'd expect ESPN and Hulu to be

[PlayStation 2]

I was gonna say “yawn” but for $13 a month for Disney Plus, ESPN+ and Hulu? That’s not bad, especially if ESPN+ streams at 60fps.

[MrTiC]

Hulu comes to wests europe oct 2019 en east europe oct 2020

Disney+ is 2020 for all of europe

[Fnige]

WOOOOO AUSTALAH FERST

[Andreas Lilja]

My disdain for super hero movies makes this not worth it. I'd rather watch rom coms.

[Zodiark1593]

Just now, Andreas Lilja said:

My disdain for super hero movies makes this not worth it. I'd rather watch rom coms. 

Not a big fan of hero movies either, though theres a good bit of Disney stuff I like, as well as many shows on Hulu. Though Netflix tends to co-operate a bit better with T-Mobile's Binge-On, as commercial tend to buffer, and the content seems to stream at a somewhat lower quality vs Netflix.

 

If Hulu is rolled into Disney Plus and omits the commercials, there may be a strong incentive to take that on.

[williamcll]

I wonder how the DRM works on this service.

[jagdtigger]

6 minutes ago, williamcll said:

I wonder how the DRM works on this service.

Ineffective and only harass the legal customers as usual.... 

Edited August 25, 2019 by jagdtigger

[dalekphalm]

I’ll almost certainly be getting this on launch day specifically for The Mandalorian - which just had a new trailer launch and holyyyyyyy shit it looks good!

 

Its available in canada on launch, surprisingly. 

[Unixsystem]

I'll never understand the massive delay between theatrical release and home/streaming for movies. I can understand the desire to not cannibalize your ticket sales (although as time goes on that starts to feel less and less like an excuse), but the fact that even on their own platform they are enforcing a 6+ month gap just feel so out of place when digital distributions entire point is to be instantaneous. 

 

Hell, give me the option to stream a new movie in HD day one of the theatrical release for $15, and I may actually consider paying for movies again. It's not like I can't find a camrip day one anyway, so instead of getting $0 or whatever fraction of ticket price that they get from theater chains, just let me pay you for your product directly. Why is this so difficult?

[Guest]

10 hours ago, Tedny said:

what ESPN? 

Its a sports TV Channel in USA. 

[Andreas Lilja]

10 hours ago, Tedny said:

what ESPN? 

American channel that considers the NBA the only sports league in North America.

[Commodus]

44 minutes ago, Waffles13 said:

I'll never understand the massive delay between theatrical release and home/streaming for movies. I can understand the desire to not cannibalize your ticket sales (although as time goes on that starts to feel less and less like an excuse), but the fact that even on their own platform they are enforcing a 6+ month gap just feel so out of place when digital distributions entire point is to be instantaneous. 

 

Hell, give me the option to stream a new movie in HD day one of the theatrical release for $15, and I may actually consider paying for movies again. It's not like I can't find a camrip day one anyway, so instead of getting $0 or whatever fraction of ticket price that they get from theater chains, just let me pay you for your product directly. Why is this so difficult?

The delays are actually shortening these days -- some of the delays in this case are simply because Disney wants them to be streaming on Disney+ the moment they're available.  As for why it's "so difficult," it's partly because there's a not-so-ideal symbiotic relationship between movie studios and theatres in the same way that GameStop used to hold game publishers hostage.  I'm sure Disney would love to stream movies from day one, but you know what happens if it does that now?  AMC and other theatre chains drop that title and it loses a ton of profit.

 

With that said, I don't really buy the "if I could stream it legally on day one I'd pay for movies again" argument.  You know you can pay a similar amount or less to go to an actual theater, right?  (Not including transportation.)  I don't think it's a terrible, terrible burden to venture into the outside world and see the movie on a big screen with other people.  I'd like studios to stream movies on day one, too, but I'm not going to use the absence of that option to rationalize piracy.

[Unixsystem]

57 minutes ago, Commodus said:

With that said, I don't really buy the "if I could stream it legally on day one I'd pay for movies again" argument.  You know you can pay a similar amount or less to go to an actual theater, right?  (Not including transportation.)  

I don't care much about the cost (although I do think movies cost too much for the amount of entertainment, but that's just subjective). The problem is that I wouldn't go to the theater if it was free. Watching movies at home is across the board a better experience, and there's no technical reason for it to not be feasible.

 

For a smaller studio I'd absolutely buy the argument of them having agreements with movie theaters to not step on their toes and keep ticket sales up, but this is Disney we're talking about. If AMC decided to stop showing Marvel, Star Wars and Pixar films, they would almost certainly be bankrupt within a few years. Smaller independent theaters would probably be fine, but those big chains have been struggling for years and are kept afloat by the big wide audience event movies, which Disney holds a near monopoly on (for better or worse).