(Welcome to my weekly streaming ratings report, the single best guide to what’s popular in streaming TV and what isn’t. I’m the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a former streaming executive who now analyzes business strategy in the entertainment industry. If you were forwarded this email, please subscribe to get these insights each week.)
Before we get going, I wanted to acknowledge that two of the most important figures in sports media (at least to me and my team) are stepping back from two of the best sports shows of all time.
First off, Ernie Johnson will no longer host possibly the greatest studio show in the history of all sports, Inside the NBA. (Charles Barkley has said in the past that he’s retiring when Ernie does, which would be even worse!) EJ is one of the greatest to ever do it, and the NBA won’t be the same without him.
Next, Michael Wilbon is taking a leave of absence from PTI, my favorite sports news show. I’ve been listening to the podcast for this show since the 2010s, if not earlier, treating it as my daily sports page. Wilbon, along with his co-host Tony Kornheiser, is also one of the greatest to ever do it.
The sports media landscape will be worse without these two in it! Wishing all the best to Wilbon and EJ.
Okay, on to this week’s issue. We’ve got two big shows—the second season of Prime Video’s The Terminal List and the third season of Netflix’s Nobody Wants This—but both were bested by an acquired title landing on Netflix. All that, plus an Original film from Mexico makes the charts but a formerly huge foreign TV show does not, a notable creator’s latest standup special flops, Ted Lasso finishes as a top season four series of all time, big numbers for the NBA’s new season (finally), the top animated shows on linear and streaming, movie budgets, and all the flops, bombs and misses, and a whole lot more.
But first, on the film side, I’m taking a look at Moana and A24’s buzzy film from last summer.
Let’s dive right in!
(Reminder: The streaming ratings report focuses on the U.S. market and compiles data from Nielsen’s weekly top ten viewership ranks, Luminate’s Top Ten Data, JustWatch and Reelgood interest data, Samba TV household viewership, company datecdotes, Netflix hours viewed data, Google Trends, and IMDb to determine the most popular content. While most data points are current, Nielsen’s data covers the weeks of October 19th to October 25th, 2026.
You can find a link to my terminology here.)
Film – What Do Customers Want?
If I could remove one phrase from entertainment journalism, it would be “what customers want”. It’s not that it’s not wrong per se, but I read a lot of articles that use that phrase, but then don’t provide evidence of what customers actually want.
For example, look at the bar chart below. It shows customer interest as measured by how much customers actually spent at the American box office, comparing four films to four others. Which films would you say represent “interest” the most?
The one on the left certainly seems bigger, right? So it seems like “customers” wanted to see those films more. So here’s that chart with names attached:
That’s right, four very buzzy films—The Invite, You Can See Everything, Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma and Primetime—went up against four notable “flops” or underperformers—Moana, Disclosure Day, Minions and Monsters, and Supergirl—and the latter clearly had more interest. That doesn’t mean they’re more profitable or well-liked by critics, but if you’re asking what customers want to spend their money on, it’s those movies.
I’d especially argue that You Can See Everything had about as much media coverage as a film can get—I saw/read about it constantly; whenever random NBA podcasts are talking about it, you know it’s everywhere—and yet Moana will likely best it.
I bring this up, because this week features a showdown between a notable box office flop, Moana on Disney+, and a buzzy dramedy, The Invite on HBO Max.
Moana was widely considered to be a flop, and it was a disappointment at the box office, only earning $126 million domestically (and $323 million globally). For the budget, that’s a big miss, down from Moana 2’s heights of $1 billion globally. But as I’ve written a few times this summer, we often confuse “this film is profitable” with “more customers want to watch this film”, which is not the same thing.
But that’s the box office. Let’s look at the streaming numbers, starting with the Moana live-action reboot. Where, yes, Moana (2026) also disappointed. It made Nielsen, but under 10 million hours, which is low for kid-skewing Disney+ films:
It did make Samba TV, but at tenth place for only one week:
Those numbers stand in stark contrast to some of Moana’s previous superlatives on streaming.
- Moana (the original animated film) has made the Nielsen charts 130 times since 2021.
- Moana 2 opened to 33.3 million hours on Nielsen.
- Moana was the biggest film on streaming in 2023 and 2024, second in 2020 and 2021, and top six in 2022 and 2025. Moana 2 was second overall in 2025.
To be clear, the Moana live-action reboot didn’t work, given how much it cost to make. It’s absolutely a disappointment. But more families paid to see it than people paid to see most of A24’s buzzy films this year, with one notable (horror film) exception.
Okay, on to The Invite, A24’s buzzy summer release, which just came to HBO Max. Mainly, I’m curious:
- Who made money from this film?
- Or who lost money: the stars of The Invite or A24?
No, seriously, read this Deadline article for the details. The Invite’s budget was allegedly “under $15 million” (so…$14 million?) then A24 bought it for “a sum north of $10 million”, which I saw elsewhere as over $12 million (so…$13 million?), but then it just made $26 million in the US. So basically, The Invite’s investors only made money after they sold foreign territories—it made $33 million overseas—but A24 might just make its money back in the US in the theatrical window, assuming it had $0 in marketing. I read one article analyzing this film’s marketing campaign which assumed no marketing spend, even though that article went on to detail how much marketing and PR and ads this film had. For what it’s worth, I saw a lot of marketing for it.
A24 will likely just break even after factoring in other windows, but no matter what, this isn’t a hugely profitable juggernaut from Hollywood’s most-heralded film studio. (And, I’d note, most coverage of IP or superhero failures doesn’t account for profitability in future windows.)
Really, I’m guessing that the stars—Olivia Wilde, Seth Rogen, Ed Norton and Penelope Cruz—had or kept their backend, hence why they did so much press for this film, which brings me to my actual takeaway, which I just mentioned two weeks ago about Backrooms:
I don’t trust A24’s reported film budgets anymore.
Either A24 is strategically releasing low numbers to get good press or they’ve really cracked the code on how to make movies at prices no one else can approach.
But I’m skeptical about that last point. You don’t keep elite talent happy by keeping budgets in check—see: Dan Lin getting fired—and by all accounts, A24 keeps talent very happy. There’s another option: not paying big name actors their actual quotes upfront by giving away back end/profit participation. Offering backend is one great way to keep the reported budget lower than it actually is, but it makes the film less profitable for A24.
(By the way, I’m still running down the numbers on Backrooms’ budget. If you know its actual budget—not the reported $10 million number—reach out to me on my contact page. I’ve heard rumblings I’m on to something, but would love something more concrete.)
Okay, enough asking questions about A24’s business model. To the streaming ratings! The Invite came to HBO Max on 23-Oct, so we could look at the streaming numbers now…
…and I don’t have any for you since it didn’t make any of the charts I track.
And that’s pretty much the moral of the streaming story. Even though it disappointed on streaming, Moana wins this round, too.
Quick Notes on Film
- The only other notable new straight-to-streaming film was Surviving Hurricane Otis, a Mexican Original on Netflix. It made Nielsen with 3.4 million hours and Luminate with 4.8 million hours. Overall, I’d call that very solid for a foreign language title, but still far from a hit. Overall, the Luminate and Nielsen charts felt very light this week.
- Gladiator II also came to Netflix non-exclusively (it’s still streaming on Paramount+) and had 5.0 million hours according to Nielsen. That’s up from the 3.7 million hours it had when it premiered on Paramount+ a year and a half ago.
- Netflix’s Animals fell to 4.9 million hours according to Nielsen and fell off the Samba TV charts. Peacock/Universal’s Disclosure Day actually made it for a third week, but only at 2.8 million hours. Apple TV’s Sacrifice was down to 2.7 million from 3.2 million. Still, for an Apple TV film to make two weeks is solid (for them). Toy Story 5 made a fifth week on the charts.
We’re just getting started with this issue, but the rest is for paid subscribers of the Entertainment Strategy Guy, so if you’d like to find out…
- …how The Terminal List did after a four-year break…
- …what acquired title surprisingly topped the charts…
- …where Ted Lasso finished in the all-time charts…
- …big NBA opening week ratings…
- …a controversial new reality show that missed the charts…
- …what very notable foreign TV show flopped…
- …all the flops, bombs and misses…
- …and a whole lot more…
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If you want an idea of just how much content you’d get in a full issue, check out this older issue.
