Disney revealed its streaming ambitions just over a year ago by announcing two upcoming streaming services: one for its movies and TV shows and the other for content from just ESPN. While there hasn’t been much said about the latter, the former is, reportedly, the “biggest priority of the company” for 2019.
It appears to now have a name: per a report by Variety, Disney CEO Robert Iger refers to the service as Disney Play.
As it confirmed last year, Disney will also be withdrawing all its content from Netflix around the same time its own streaming service goes live; all Disney-distributed movies and TV shows – including ones by Lucasfilm, Marvel, and Pixar – are expected to be available on Disney Play. That will be at a cost though, as Variety notes, the company currently earns about $300 million of revenue annually from Netflix.
Netflix, meanwhile, is expected to continue producing its lineup of Marvel shows, such as Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Iron Fist, Luke Cage, The Punisher, and The Defenders.
Variety’s report also notes that Disney will rely heavily on its 2019 movie slate – including Captain Marvel, Dumbo, Toy Story 4, The Lion King, Frozen 2, and a new Star Wars movie – to be the key selling points for the service. In addition to that, Disney is also working on multiple Star Wars live-action series that will be exclusive to the service, as well as shows from its other franchises such as High School Musical, Monsters, Inc., and Marvel.
In its Q4 2017 earnings call last year, Iger told investors that it would be priced “substantially below where Netflix is,” because “of the fact that it will have substantially less volume,” and the “price will reflect that.”
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