Every major studio in Hollywood seems to have it’s origin story about how they came to conquer their chunk of the movie industry.  For Disney, it was all started by a mouse.  For Warner Brothers, they were a family business that knew what the audiences wanted.  And Paramount became it’s own icon when founder Adolf Zukor looked out his office window to see a mountain peak in the distance.  These are all the things that made these studios more than just a business, but also a brand; the thing that made their names known throughout the world.  Universal Pictures had a story just like the rest, but their origin story was a fairly different kind of one.  The oldest studio in Hollywood still running today, Universal Pictures is known for a lot of different kinds of movies, but only one genre can be credited for making them the powerhouse that they are today; horror movies.  Universal was the industry leader when it came to delivering chilling thrillers for audiences, and to this day they are still leading the way in delivering crowd-pleasing horror movies thanks to their long term partnership with the Blumhouse production company.  While Universal horror movies are noteworthy for their chilling atmosphere and iconic scares, more than anything else what has helped to make their movies iconic are the actual monsters themselves.  Universal Monsters have become a brand all on their own, becoming not just a staple in their cinematic output over the years, but also within their theme parks as well.  Some of these characters are sourced from literature, but a couple of others were invented by Universal themselves and have joined the pantheon of celebrated monsters within the whole of pop culture.  While we view these movie monsters through the prism of how Universal markets them as a brand today, it’s also worth noting that their presence in Universal Pictures history is foundational to the studio as a whole, and it could be said that Universal wouldn’t be what it is today had it not been for these Monsters.  It’s a tale that goes all the way back to Universal’s early years, and the fact that the Monsters continue to be a key presence in the studio’s identity today is a real testament to their legacy both on and off the screen.

Carl Laemmle founded Universal Studios in 1912, and in less than a year of starting their production company, Universal made their first ever monster movie.  It was a simple two reel adaptation of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1913), but this would be the beginning of something much bigger down the road.  In 1915, Laemmle’s company had done well enough for them to aggressively expand.  Universal moved out of New York City and came to Los Angeles, where Laemmle bought a large parcel of land just off of the Cahuenga Pass in the San Fernando Valley.  Over 100 years later, modern day Universal Studios Hollywood still occupies that same parcel of land, which is now called Universal City.  In the early days of the lot, Universal had built a large variety of outdoor sets, and even charged admission for guests to come and watch the movies getting made, since everything was still shot with no recorded sound.  In one corner of the studio you would have an old Western town set up and then on another corner there would be the walls of a medieval castle, all within a few feet of each other.  One particular space on the studio lot would prove to be very important to the development of the studio, and that space has since become known as “Little Europe.”  The Little Europe sets were made to look like a 19th century European village, with cobblestone streets and open public squares.  The construction of this set helped to open up Universal’s abilities to film movies with European settings in the glow of the California sun.  During this time, Universal had a movie star that was quickly rising in esteem as a man know for a thousand faces.  Lon Chaney’s greatest talent as a movie actor was his ability to completely disappear into a role.  He pioneered many techniques in make-up effects, transforming his face into many different kinds of characters, including monstrous ones.  When he came to Universal in 1917, he had a desire to play one of the most notable literary characters of the 19th century; Quasimodo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923).  Chaney’s performance as the Hunchback became such a hit with audiences that it prompted Universal to greenlight another ambitious adaptation of The Phantom of the Opera (1925), giving Chaney another chance to disappear into another screen monster.  With these two movies, Universal began to establish itself as the home of cinema’s most iconic monsters, and it was only just the beginning.

Sadly, Lon Chaney’s career did not last long after the roaring successes of his early horror movies.  He died suddenly in 1930 at the age of 47, leaving behind an amazing body of work of which he was also the driving creative force.  He only ever made a single sound film, The Unholy Three (1930), and one would imagine that he would’ve adapted well to the sound era if he had survived.  But, even though Universal lost a pioneer with Chaney, they had a few more daring filmmakers who were ready to pick up the mantle at the studio.  Two filmmakers in particular would become instrumental in creating more than just horror movies for Universal; they would be the ones who gave Universal it’s identity as the home of the monsters.  These filmmakers were Tod Browning and James Whale.  Whale was an English born artist who had come to Hollywood as a producer of stage play adaptations being made for the silver screen.  He came under contract with Universal with the adaptation of Waterloo Bridge (1931), a WWI set drama.  Universal granted him permission to create any movie he wanted afterwards, and Whale landed on making an adaptation of Mary Shelley’s gothic horror classic Frankenstein (1931).  At the same time Tod Browning, a one-time circus performer turned filmmaker, had been with Universal since 1919 and would go on to direct many films there, including several with Lon Chaney.  After Chaney’s death, Browning wanted to keep horror alive at the studio, so he pitched them the idea of adapting Bram Stoker’s horror novel Dracula (1931) to the big screen.  There was famously a failed attempt to secure the rights to the novel from Stoker’s stubbornly protective estate, which led to the legendary German filmmaker F. W. Murnau to create the legal distinct but still very similar Nosferatu in 1922.  For Universal, their plan was to base their adaptation on a stage adaptation rather than the book itself, which they could secure the rights to.  One other thing would also be noteworthy about Dracula at Universal, as it would be the first ever talkie horror film.  This would be a breakthrough for the genre, and as it was following in the pipeline right behind it, James Whale’s Frankenstein would also go into production with sound as well.  Together, these two productions would leave a lasting legacy on the studio that still can be felt nearly a century later.

What mattered more than anything else with these productions was who would be cast in these iconic roles of Count Dracula and Frankenstein’s monster.  Tod Browning initially wanted his longtime collaborator and friend Lon Chaney to play the part, but Chaney’s death unfortunately brought that plan to end.  After some time searching, Browning and his team came across a tall and imposing Hungarian actor named Bela Ferenc Deszo Blasco, who was going by the stage name Bela Lugosi.  Lugosi had been playing the role on stage for years in America, so he already had a good handle on the character already.  Today, it’s hard to imagine anyone else in the role.  Bela’s whole persona seems inexorably tied to the Transylvanian count, with every portrayal of the character thereafter taking some cue from Bela’s performance.  What is remarkable is just how much Bela was able to instill fear without doing much on screen.  There isn’t a lot of onscreen violence shown, just the suggestion of horror.  But Bela strikes just a hypnotic presence on screen that you can’t help but be chilled to the bone when he delivers his unnerving stare.  Not to be outdone, James Whale managed to find the right person to bring Frankenstein’s creature to life.  An English actor named William Henry Pratt tried to create a more exotic identity for himself, so he adopted the stage name of Boris Karloff.  He had been making the rounds of stage work in both Canada and America, before eventually coming to Hollywood in 1919. Karloff’s striking features helped him to land roles in many movies, notably playing villains for the most part.  He already had 81 screen credits by the time James Whale selected him to play the monster in Frankenstein.  The role would be physically demanding.  Karloff was an average 5’11” in height, but to play the gigantic monster he had to wear four inch platform boots as well as a bulky costume to give his skinny frame more mass.  And yet, it came together as Karloff’s creature was instantly iconic.  While some of the features of the character were taken from Shelley’s original descriptions in her novel, James Whale and Karloff added their own unique touches, like the flattop shape to the creature’s head, and the bolts sticking out of his neck.  Just like with Lugosi’s Dracula, Karloff’s portrayal of Frankenstein’s creature would have a lasting impact on all the versions of the character that followed thereafter.

Universal Monster movies as a brand really started due to the massive success of these two films, and thanks to the iconic portrayals from both Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff.  On the heels of the success of the Frankenstein, Universal wanted James Whale to create a follow-up sequel, and they granted him a massive amount of creative control.  From this, The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) was made.  Whale would expand on the story of the original novel, taking the concept of the creature coercing Dr. Frankenstein to make him a mate in his own likeness and expanded it into a feature length story.  In this film, the Bride herself would actually be brought to life, and she herself would join the ranks of the iconic Universal Monsters.  In the movie she would be played by English actress Elsa Lanchester, who did double duty by also playing Mary Shelley herself in an opening prologue.  Lanchester’s appearance as the Bride is brief, coming in right at the end of the movie, but she was instantly iconic with her white flowing robes and the lightning strike strips of white in her beehive hairdo.  Karloff also returned to reprise his role as the creature and even gave the character the power of speech in the film for the first time.  After playing Frankenstein’s creature the first time, Karloff also would led his star power to bringing to life another horror movie icon, The Mummy.  In The Mummy (1932), Karloff would portray Imhotep, the cursed Egyptian undead monster wrapped head to toe in his mummification wrappings.  The character was inspired by the fairly recent unearthing of the tomb of King Tutankhamun, and he would also be the first original monster developed for the silver screen, as opposed to the previous ones that were adapted from literary sources.  James Whale would also successfully bring another iconic literary monster to the big screen with 1933’s The Invisible Man, starring Claude Rains in his first major movie role.  Unfortunately, due to the Hays Code, there were fewer horror films made in the later half of the 1930’s.  James Whale chose not to work under the stricter code placed on Hollywood, and he faced higher social pressure due to his homosexuality being at odds with much of the rest of American society at the time, so he left Universal and Hollywood behind.  Tod Browning also saw his career decline, especially after his controversial film Freaks (1932) flopped at the box office.

But, even as horror went into decline, Universal still found success with their collection of Monsters.  In 1939, Boris Karloff would play the creature one more time in Son of Frankenstein.  And this time, hew would be sharing the screen with Bela Lugosi, not as Dracula mind you, but as another original character who would go on to appear in many other horror movies thereafter; Ygor.  Though Universal would go on to make more Frankenstein films thereafter, this one would mark the last time Karloff would play the role.  It also marked the end of Bela’s time at Universal as well.  But with the departure of these two icons, another actor with a legacy at Universal would step in and keep the monster movies coming.  Lon Chaney, Jr. picked up his father’s mantle and would also become an actor of a thousand faces.  Chaney did play Frankenstein’s monster in the movie The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), but Chaney left a bigger mark by bringing to life a whole other movie monster with his portrayal of The Wolf Man.  Using the same make-up techniques that his father pioneered, Chaney Jr. completely transformed and gave Hollywood it’s first truly iconic portrayal of a werewolf.  Lon Cheney Jr. would continue to make many more horror movies over the years until his death in 1973, but it’s his portrayal in The Wolf Man (1941) that has cemented him as an icon within the monster movie pantheon.  In the post-war years, the horror movie genre would go through many changes.  The major studios began to invest less in the horror genre, and smaller independent companies were filling that hole left behind, leading to the era of B-movie horror.  But even still, Universal would still invest a bit in the legacy of their monsters.  And with the invention of new gimmicks like 3D, they even managed to make another horror film that added even more to their roster of movie monsters.  In 1954, Univeral shot a small little horror thriller on a pond located in the middle of their lot.  This pond would serve as a setting for a place in the Amazon jungle called the Black Lagoon, and living inside it was a fish man creature that was preying on human beings.  The Creature From the Black Lagoon suddenly became another horror movie icon that Universal could proudly tout as one of their own.  With his movie shot in 3D, the film became a hit with younger audiences and he would be the last big addition to Universal’s movie monsters for a long while.

What is interesting is how Universal has managed to keep these characters in the public’s eyes for all these decades after.  Even long after Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff and Lon Chaney Sr. and Jr. have left these characters behind, their iconic status has endured.  Universal Studios still is very much aware of how much these horror icons matter to their identity.  That’s why their theme parks still carve out space for these monsters to be represented.  There are references to these characters in almost every Universal park, and in the freshly opened Epic Universe park in Orlando, Florida, the Universal Monsters have a land devoted just to them.  Traces of the history of these films can still be found at the original Universal Studios in Hollywood.  The sets for “Little Europe” that were used extensively for these early monster movies sadly burned down in a fire on the studio lot in 1967.  A replica of the original sets was constructed on the same spot, and that re-construction still survives to this day.  The Court of Miracles section in particular can still be recognizable when compared to scenes that were shot there for The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and Frankenstein (1931).  The pond that played the part of the Black Lagoon is also still present on the lot, though it’s been more recently crowded in by construction of new soundstages on the property.  And today, these iconic locations mingle with some of the more recent movie monsters that have come from Universal Pictures, like the Bates Motel from Psycho (1960), the shark from Jaws (1975), and an encounter with Peter Jackson’s version of King Kong (2005).  And the park’s yearly tradition of Halloween Horror Nights also heavily feauture appearances from all of the Universal Monsters.  The characters also have their own merchandise wing in the stores at Universal.  It’s a clear sign that Universal is still aware of the strong legacy these characters have, and they are determined to maintain ownership of that legacy.  While some of their characters belong to the public domain like Dracula and Frankenstein, others are wholly original to their movies, and they very much want to spotlight that.  While many other studios can try to make monster movies, Universal can firmly state that their foundation was built off of these characters.

It’s harder today to know exactly how to keep marketing oneself as the home of movie monsters.  Universal famously failed hard trying to make their movie monsters exist with a shared cinematic universe similar to what Marvel had done with their super heroes.  The ill-fated Dark Universe crashed and burned after just two movies; the box office bombs of Dracula Untold (2017) and The Mummy (2017).  But, out of the ashes of this Dark Universe experiment came a different way of bringing these characters up to the modern day, with a partnership that Universal has with independent production company Blumhouse.  Blumhouse managed to reinvent some of Universal’s iconic monsters with more modern takes.  Filmmaker Leigh Whanell got to do his fresh new takes on The Invisible Man (2020) and Wolf Man (2025).  There’s also visionary director Robert Eggers whose been working with Universal’s art house label Focus Features to create visually daring movies based on characters similar to the Universal movie monsters, such as Nosferatu (2024) and Werwulf (2026) coming out later this year.  But even as Universal makes several attempts to keep monster movies going at their studio, the original classics still hold a lot of power.  They undeniably wrote the rules of how to make horror work within the Hollywood machine.  And that has inspired generations of horror filmmakers over the years.  Oscar-winning filmmaker Guillermo Del Toro was particularly influenced by Universal horror, and his home almost acts like a museum devoted to the legacy of those movies, especially Frankenstein, which Del Toro finally got to make his own version of last year to great acclaim.  Hell, his Best Picture-winning The Shape of Water (2017) owes it’s very existence to the legacy of The Creature From the Black Lagoon.  The fact that most depictions of Count Dracula today still speak with a vaguely Hungarian accent (yes even the one on Sesame Street) and most depictions of Frankenstein’s monster still have those bolt in the neck are undeniable signs that Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff’s performances are still the gold standard for these characters.  That’s why Universal continues to value these characters; because they endure well beyond just their presence on the big screen.  They are icons that continue to be a presence in the culture at large, and Universal is largely responsible for getting them to that place.  Even with all of the great movies that Universal Pictures has released over the years outside of the horror genre, it’s these monster movies that clearly helped to give Universal it’s most important identity.  After nearly a century in the game, the Universal Monsters are no where near forgotten, and hopefully they allow Universal to keep scaring audiences again and again for another century.

In the last 10 years, we have seen a dramatic shift in the make-up of Hollywood, and not in a good way.  The streaming wars ignited by the rise of Netflix sparked a frenzy of business restructuring at all of the Hollywood studios.  To deal with this newly formed means of distribution, each studio poured billions of dollars into development of their own platforms as well as into producing exclusive content that would play on those platforms.  In all that rush, some of the power players in the industry weren’t able to keep up.  So, then came the era of mergers and acquisitions, where the mid-level majors began to be gobbled up by the bigger companies.  Not only that, but a giant shift towards tech companies being involved in the entertainment began to occur.  Amazon Studios, the production wing of the largest online retailer in the world, merged with the MGM/UA after Amazon bought the once mighty studio after they need to be financially bailed out.  Rupert Murdoch decided to put 20th Century Fox on the market after 30 years of ownership so that he could cash in and focus more on his new media empire in his twilight years.  After a fierce battle, Disney won out and acquired Fox for a then record $75 billion transaction, which put Disney into a staggering amount of debt that they are only now starting to manage after a couple turbulent years of budget cuts.  But now, that merger between Fox and Disney seems pretty small compared to the looming $111 billion deal struck to merge two of Hollywood’s most legendary studios into one: Paramount and Warner Brothers.  This deal has been controversial to say the least, and is causing a lot of justifiable worry across the industry as a whole.  There are a lot of concerns about what it’s going to mean for employment opportunities, for the independence of the media, for what kind of entertainment value we are going to get, and for the legacy of two of the studios that were instrumental for creating Hollywood into what it is.

This merger has happened on the heels of yet another mega-merger that led into this one.  Paramount, which had been under the steady ownership of Viacom for 30 years, was now looking for a buyer after the passing of the company’s longtime CEO Sumner Redstone in 2023.  Sumner’s daughter Shari needed to grapple with a significant amount of debt that was affecting the bottom line of Paramount Pictures after the limited success of the launch of their streaming platform Paramount+.  That relief came with an offer from Skydance Media’s CEO David Ellison, who were frequent production partners with Paramount on a variety of projects over the years; most notably the Mission: Impossible movies.  In a deal valued at $8 billion, the Skydance assets would be merged into Paramount Studios, and the new company would carry a value of $28 billion.  Shari would step aside from management of the studio side, with David Ellison taking over as the new CEO.  This now put David Ellison in the driver’s seat of one of the top “Big 5” studios in Hollywood.  But, his ambitions didn’t end there.  He had sights on gaining even more control of the industry.  In September 2025, Ellison proposed the idea of acquiring Warner Brothers Discovery, one of Paramount’s competitors in the film industry.  He then met with David Zaslev to propose a deal which would be a cash and stock bid for $19 a share.  Bound by legal obligations to his shareholders, Zaslev had to publicly announce that Warner Brothers was now officialy up for sale, and sought to see if anyone could beat Paramount’s price.  Indeed for a moment it did appear that there was.  Netflix put in an even stronger offer to buy the Warner Brothers studio for $82 billion.  This wasn’t even for all of the assests that Warners had; they just wanted their studio and the library, with linear television assets likely to be sold in a seperate deal.  But Ellison was not through yet.  Despite an agreement in principle already being reached between Netflix and Warner Brothers, Ellison put up yet another offer that blew away all that had been seen before in Hollywood; $111 billion for everything; all of Warner Brother’s assests including linear television, such as their cable networks HBO and CNN.  Netflix walked away and the deal seemed to have been reached.  Paramount and Warner Brothers were now going to be joined into one.

Of course, mergers of this size cannot go through so easily.  Anti-trust laws in this country require oversight of the impact that such a deal may have over the market as a whole.  Combining two of Hollywood’s major studios into just one entity would make it so that the majority of media in this country would now be in the control of just four mega-corporations: the new Paramount/WB studio, Disney, Comcast (the owners of NBC Universal) and Sony.  This would greatly limit competition in the marketplace when only four players are competing, and this can effect everything from job opportunities with the industry as well consumer pricing.  If anti-trust laws worked the way they are supposed to, a merger like this wouldn’t be allowed to move forward, and if it were, it would still take months to years of review to get the all clear.  But this is where the red flags become even more apparent, as David Ellison and his father Larry Ellison (the world’s second richest man) have a cozy relationship with the current Trump administration.  And sure enough, not only has Trump and his allies given the greenlight for this deal, but they have even speed run through it, giving the deal the minimalist of oversight.  A lot of that probably has to do with Warner Brothers being in possession of CNN, one of the most watched cable news networks in America.  With the Ellisons taking over the network and exerting editorial control over their news room, Trump can now force another news outlet into compliance with favorable coverage of his administration.  And this may have likely been the deal the Ellisons made with the President to speed up the approval process.  But, not all clearance was so easily made.  State governments wanted more assurance from Paramount that this wasn’t going to affect the job market of the already hurting and highly competitive film industry.  With California leading the way, 11 state attorney generals filed a legal hold on the merger, preventing it from closing until they could have a court hearing to plead a case that the deal was breaking crucial anti-trust laws.  Many legal experts believed that the state AGs had a strong case to make and could force many crucial concessions from Paramount to ensure that long term damage was not made to the industry.  Unfortunately, Paramount exerted enough political pressure that California’s attorney general Rob Bonta folded and the last ditch effort failed to stop this merger.

There are a lot of problems about this merger that range across a variety of issues.  One is the fact that we are going to lose yet another independent studio in Hollywood.  One doesn’t have to look very far to see how one of these mega-mergers has a ripple effect across the industry.  When Disney acquired Fox, there was some hope that the two studios would simply operate as two pillars under one roof.  But alas over time, we clearly saw who won out in that merger.  20th Century Fox quickly began to recede into the background at Disney.  For one thing, the Fox part of the name was completely jettisoned, with 20th Century Studios being the new rebrand.  The once mighty studio that dated back to the silent era of Hollywood was now just another brand under the Disney umbrella with no more importance to the company than what Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm already offered.  Disney did acquire the whole of Fox’s library, but thus far we have only seen the spotlight given to the studio’s most famous films such as The Sound of Music (1965), while most of the other titles are just taking up shelf space in Disney’s expanded library.  And this was just the cost to the legacy of the studio.  Because of the staggering amount of debt that Disney took on to close the deal, steep financial cuts were made across the company; especially with regards to labor.  Several thousands of well paying jobs were cut across both studio entities, and those who were let go had few options available to them in Hollywood, as there was less competition overall thanks to the merger that had also cost them their job.  And taking on ownership of Fox didn’t help with the quality of Disney’s productivity either.  It certainly didn’t help that Disney also faced the struggles of Covid as well as the mis-management of failed CEO Bob Chapek’s short run in that same amount of time, but when your company is spending so much of it’s time cutting spending that it desperately needs and putting money where it doesn’t need to be, it’s going to lead to some bad results.  Disney didn’t improve after acquiring Fox; it more than anything suffered a blow to it’s reputation as a creative friendly company.  That’s the worry that many are having about what may happen when Paramount and Warner Brothers are merged together.

Another big worry is the intention behind acquiring Warner Brothers for the Ellison family.  It’s been observed that David Ellison has been pushing an agenda within Paramount since acquiring the studio.  This is apparent with what is going on at CBS, the network that was already under the Paramount umbrella from it’s Viacom days.  CBS’s programing has been tampered with very much by the Ellisons, most clearly in the news room side of things.  David Ellison appointed Bari Weiss as the head of CBS News, a former New York Times columnist and blogger with no prior experience in running a broadcast newsroom.  Weiss managed to convince David’s father Larry to buy her blog, the ironically called “Free Press,” for a baffling $250 million price tag, and in exchange she now has full editorial control over the news output of CBS and it’s subsidiaries.  In exchange, she must now devote CBS News’ coverage to the pet causes of the Ellison family, which includes favorable treatment of the Ellisons’ ally Donald Trump, as well as promoting the industries that the Ellisons are involved in, namely data centers and AI.  Proof of Weiss doing the bidding of her media overlords is the decision she made to kill a story on the program 60 Minutes that was exposing the brutal conditions of the illegal immigrant detention centers that the Trump administration was running.  This was a clear example of her silencing anything that may appear critical of the current administration in a deliberate act of censorship, which she had hypocritically had championed herself as a fighter against.  Another sign of the Ellison’s pushing their agendas across their companies was the decision they made to cancel the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, despite it being a ratings leader in it’s time slot.  Colbert’s show was not losing audience interest, and had been retaining it’s viewership better than some of the other late night talk shows that had long been seeing a downturn in the last decade.  No good excuse was ever given as to why they canceled the show.  The only excuse that we have to go with is the speculation that Colbert was cancelled because he’s been an unapologetic critic of the President and his administration, and that this cancellation was retaliatory.  If the Ellison’s are able to exert this much control over the editorial and creative chocies of their company, it’s safe to say that there are a lot of worries about what they’ll do to the parts that belong to Warner Brothers.

There’s also the question about what kind of debt the company is putting itself under.  Disney financially suffered after they merged with Fox, but that was for an amount that was $40 billion  less than what Paramount is acquiring Warner Brothers for.  You have to ask, where is the money coming from.  A significant portion of that is being funneled by David Ellison’s father Larry, whose tapping into his own vast fortune that’s been built up from ownerships of data centers and investments in AI.  But it’s not the only source of money put into the deal.  The Ellisons are also getting financial backing from foreign entities as well, including wealth funds from the governments of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE.  So, one of Hollywood’s most important media empires that about to acquire another major media empire, will be under the influence of petrol states with some dubious human rights records.  That’s going to make a lot of people in Hollywood anxious, given that these studios have always operated as American institutions.  Sure, it’s not the first time that Paramount fell under the ownership of oil barons, as they were a subsidiary of Gulf+Western before Viacom took over.  Apart from the dubious alliances of who is investing in this deal, the staggering amount is going to overwhelm the newly formed company for a while as they have to deal with a mountain of debt.  This puts a lot of pressure on the company that already has been promising too much upfront.  David Ellison, in order to convince investors that this is the best possible deal (especially for wary movie theater owners) he has promised an ambitious 30 movie a year slate of films making their way to the big screen.  How they are going to pay for that amidst the debt obligations that they’ll also have to cover every year is beyond anyone’s guess.  There’s no way that they’ll be able to do this without making steep cuts to labor and significantly restructuring the company.  And even that probably won’t even cover the many expenses that David Ellison has been promising shareholders.  And what then happens if it all collapses.  What happens if the AI bubble bursts, and the Ellisons lose a significant part of their fortune meant to invest in their new studio?  What if they are forced to sell, and what do they sell?  Who ends up buying the remains of what the Ellisons turned Paramount and Warner Brothers into?  The reality is that the Ellisons may end up leading to the ruin of not one but two of Hollywood’s most legendary studio brands.

And this leads to an examination of one of the biggest red flags of them all; David Ellison himself.  Ellison fancies himself as one of the biggest power brokers in Hollywood, but it’s largely been a dream financed largely by his family name.  Larry Ellison gave David the financial backing to form Skydance Media 20 years ago, which he also did for David’s sister Megan Ellison, who founded the indie film production company Annapurna Pictures.  Credit where credit is due, Ellison did oversee Skydance become a success over the years, particularly as a producer of successful action movies.  When Paramount was looking for his new leadership, he made his play and got the merger between Skydance and Paramount done, putting him in the position of CEO at a major studio, which probably was a dream come true.  It’s easy to believe him when he says that he does what he does out of love for movies that he’s telling the truth.  But, saying one thing and doing another is different.  The problem with Ellison is that he’s been in the job of CEO now for 2 years at Paramount, and he has yet to actually demonstrate anything close to a creative vision for the studio.  Instead, he has spent the majority of his tenure focused entirely on this deal to acquire Warner Brothers.  His laser like focus on that has left a creative hole at Paramount.  The studio has been a non-entity at the box office this summer, with it’s highest grossing movie of the year embarrassingly being the Scary Movie reboot, which grossed little over $100 million domestic.  If David wanted to make a power play for Warner Brothers, he should have demonstrated he could lead Paramount to box office glory first.  There’s no visionary direction going on right now at Paramount, and that lack of vision could sadly also extend to Warner Brothers once the deal closes.  And Ellison’s approach to getting the deal done has been rather unsavory as well.  He has been really callously brushing aside real concerns from industry professionals, trying to gaslight everyone into thinking this is essential for Hollywood to survive.  He’s also acted like a bully, threatening anyone who has resisted the merger.  His most recent threat was that he was going to move Paramount out of California and take it to a more politically “friendly” state like Texas or Tennesse.  Sadly, no one called his bluff, because that threat would never have been practical.  Paramount has deep roots in California which it has built up over 100 years, and moving a whole studio away from that and starting new in a whole different state would have been extremely cost prohibitive.  Plus you would also be leaving the biggest talent pool in the nation behind; not just with celebrities, but also with below the line workers as well.  Tom Cruise is not going all the way to Nashville to take a meeting with David Ellison.  He’d rather do a meeting close to home, like most other people in Hollywood would.

As of right now, the deal seems to be moving forward.  As of this writing, only one last legal roadblock remains, and all it’s going to do is delay the inevitable by a couple weeks at most.  It’s unfortunate that so many caved to the pressure put on them by the Ellisons who have in many ways bullied their way into the halls of power in Hollywood.  If this all goes through as it seems it will, it’s going to be dire for the industry as a whole.  The job market will shrink even more as it has in the film industry over the last couple years.  Another legendary studio will be consumed by another, ending it’s legacy as an independent player.  The big worry is that the Ellisons may have gotten in way over their heads trying to take over so much of the media landscape in such a short amount of time.  Sure, they have the support of the White House for now, but nothing lasts forever, and future administrations will be more diligent when it comes to enforcing anti-trust laws.  In the case of this merger, if David Ellison doesn’t fulfill every obligation he promised the state governments, the investors, the movie theater chains, and just the audience in general, it will lead to the implosion of the new studio he created out of the assets of Paramount and Warner Brothers.  If a sale in the future happens, the two studios won’t be split up into what they once were like nothing ever happened.  Both the remains of Paramount and Warner Brothers would be sold off as scraps one piece at a time, and that would be the end of two legendary studios that were instrumental in the building of Hollywood as a whole.  This is the great danger of these big media acquisitions; the loss of cultural institutions.  Warner Brothers and Paramount had identities that were all their own, and they functioned much better as competitors rather than as part of the same company.  That’s what Hollywood needs more than anything else; more competition.  David Ellison says that his plan to merge the two studios is so that they together can be competitive in a market that includes the likes of Disney, Netflix, Amazon and Apple.  But he would have better made his case for more competition by using the time and money his studio had not in trying to acquire another studio, but to improve what he already had, and sell that as competition to the rest of them.  Sadly, Hollywood is not investing the money where it should go in general, which is back into the industry itself and investing in better talent and product.  The Paramount/Warner Brothers deal is sadly just showing us how little the actual art of filmmaking is being valued by the people in charge, and instead it’s all about making power plays and exerting more control over the media we consume.  In essence, it’s making the magic of Hollywood feel more and more like a faded memory, found now only on celluloid treasures of the past.

We know from much of cinematic history that movies can sometimes be lost to the world.  For the most part, these are movies that were made long ago that were forgotten by time and were too far gone to be salvaged by film preservation.  Then there are the movies that disappear out of neglect because their distributors have gone out of business and the movies stop being circulated in the marketplace.  Thanks to the creation of home entertainment it’s much harder now for a movie to disappear, though it can still happen.  But what is even worse than losing a movie through the passage of time is seeing a movie be destroyed even before it has had a chance to even live.  In the wake of the massive shift in Hollywood that has occurred due to the advancement of streaming as well as the disruptions of Covid and the strikes in the last decade, a different kind of way to destroy a film has occurred which is erasing it from the library altogether to collect a tax break.  After the major studios spent a ton of money building out their streaming catalogs in the early years of the boom and realizing very quickly that it all lead to slower than expected revenue growth, many of them decided to capitalize on a short window where they could collect tax breaks on write offs if they were to demonstrate that they would never profit off of these same films and shows again,  This meant that these movies and shows that the studios literally spent billions of dollars on would have to be permanently shelved, or otherwise they lose that tax break.  So, hundreds of hours worth of programming across all the streaming platforms were suddenly wiped out in a flash, so the studios could make a quick profit to satisfy weary shareholders.  But while executives and shareholders were happy, many people who were fans of these shows and films, or were interested in seeing them for the first time, were suddenly denied the choice.  At least for some time these programs had been seen by audiences, but in some cases the axing of projects went even further, where completely finished films were not even allowed to be seen at all.

Enter the main character of this story; a little film called Coyote vs. Acme.  The movie was first pitched to Warner Brothers executives by none other than future DCU creative director James Gunn.  He presented the team at Warner Brothers, which at the time was still under the ownership of Time Warner Inc., a satirical article from The New Yorker which speculated on an imagined scenario where the fictional Acme Corporation of the Looney Tunes cartoons was faced with a lawsuit from the character of Wile E. Coyote.  Gunn saw the potential in this being fleshed out into feature length story, and the executives agreed.  Unfortunately, the project languished in development hell for a number of years while Warner Brothers changed ownership not once but twice.  First AT&T came in, and pushed the project to the back of the line in favor of a Space Jam sequel starring LeBron James.  Then when AT&T was looking to sell their stake in the company, Discovery Networks swooped in and merged with the studio.  Under the leadership of new CEO David Zaslev, there seemed to finally be some momentum for the Coyote vs. Acme project, and cameras started to roll with the movie now being set up as a streaming exclusive for the struggling HBO Max platform.  But then came the day when things were completely halted.  The streaming boom seemed to be falling apart as subscribers were being torn between multiple different channels, all of which cannibalized off of each other and couldn’t continue to grow in the same way Netflix had done in the decade prior.  So, in order to justify the massive costs of operating and expanding these streaming platforms, the studios that launched them now had to begin consolidating and downsizing.  With Warner Brothers now joined with Discovery, this created a massive mound of debt that David Zaslev now had to find ways of paying off, and that meant cutting costs anywhere he could.  A lot of movies and shows were suddenly without warning completely wiped off of HBO Max, never to be seen again, including multi-season shows like Westworld.  But that wasn’t all, movies that were either finished but unreleased were also subject to cancellation, and unfortunately Coyote vs. Acme fell into this camp.

This boggled the minds of so many people in the industry, that a studio that spent tens of millions of dollars on these films could just so casually decide to not release them.  Those millions of dollars went into the hard work of hundreds of craftspeople who devoted several weeks of their time towards making a movie they hoped would be enjoyed by audiences anywhere.  And here it was, the head of the studio deciding that none of that mattered and it was better in the financial interest of the studio to collect a tax write off instead.  Sure, this made a lot of shareholders happy that they were getting paid instead of seeing the studio further lose money on the waning streaming market, but for the creatives that worked hard on the film, there was a sense of betrayal.  Coyote vs. Acme was complete at the time Zaslev decided it would never see the light of the day.  Not only that, but it had already screened for test audiences and performed very well.  But when a studio pulls the plug on a movie in the middle of production, it gives that movie the stigma of being a bad film.  All indications were saying that Coyote vs. Acme was not bad at all, and even great in some test reviews.  But according to Zaslev, the movie was in his words, “unreleasable.”  It was the same assertion that he gave to another movie that got the can that unfortunately suffered a worse fate than Coyote faced.  One of the last projects under the old DCEU franchise was a movie adaptation of Batgirl.  The movie had a nearly $100 million budget and was going to star Leslie Grace as the titular hero, as well as Michael Keaton returning as Batman and Oscar-winner Brendan Fraser playing the villainous Firefly.  The movie was said to be nearly complete, with principle photography already done and only the visual effects left to complete.  But not only did Zaslev and the other execs at Warners decide to cancel the completion of the film; they also ordered the destruction of the material they had already shot so that there was no chance at all of Warner Brothers ever resurrecting the movie again to make money off it, otherwise they lose the tax write off.  This was the sad fate of the film, as cast and crew attended one final screening on the lot to see the movie they worked on for the last time right before it was wiped away forever.

The same fate was likely in store for Coyote vs. Acme as well, but some clever individuals who worked on the movie managed to go behind Warner Brothers backs.  Not long after word got out that the movie was going to be shelved permanently and possibly lined up for destruction by Warners, behind the scenes footage from the set started to leak onto social media, showing people what the movie could have looked like.  Pretty soon, the mainstream press took notice of the leaked footage and were stating to share it on their platforms as well.  Audiences started to become interested in this film, wondering what exactly made it so expendable to the executives at Warner Brothers.  One of the things that really sparked interest in peoples minds was the heavy use of practical effects that were employed in the making of the movie.  It recalled the extensive visual effects work that  went into a classic film like Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988), which also magically and convincingly mixed animated characters into a real world setting.  While this renewed interest didn’t seem to avert Zaslev’s intentions of shelving the movie, it did stay the film’s execution for a little while longer.  It of course wouldn’t be a good look for the company if they were to destroy yet another completed film.  What filmmaker or actor would want to come work at Warner Brothers if the CEO in charge was so cavalier about their hard work that he would destroy it just for a tax credit?  In many ways, Coyote vs. Acme became the rallying point for all the complaints that creatives have had with the industry in this era of media consolidation.  More and more studio executives are not in the business of creating art but creating product, and they are giving audiences less of a say in what they are allowed to see.  By leaking the footage of Coyote vs. Acme to the public, those brave crew members managed to shine a spotlight on it, and it helped prevent the movie from being forgotten, which is the thing that Zaslev and the other Warner Brothers execs were hoping would happen.

But, at the same time, Warner Brothers had already collected their tax write-off, so having it be released under the Warner Brothers label was out of the question.  While the movie was temporarily saved from destruction, it was still in a permanent state of limbo, likely to never leave the Warner Brothers archives for eternity.  But, the outcry among fans began to grow.  Looney Tunes fans in particular, who had long been starved of new material starring their beloved characters, really wanted this movie to see the light of day.  But thankfully Warner Brothers, seeing the interest in this film grow over time, couldn’t ignore the fans’ outcry much longer.  So, they decided to put the movie up for sale.  They themselves were not able to  release the film themselves, but tax write off laws still allowed them to put the film out into the market, and have it be sold for either at the cost of production, or for a loss in value to them.  Unfortunately with a production budget at an estimated $70 million, the movie would have a steep price tag on it, even amongst deep pocketed rival studios.  Warner Brothers sought out interested parties like Netflix and Amazon, seeing if they would bite.  But alas, few studios were willing to take on the risk of spending nearly $70 million just to buy the film, and then pay the extra money to promote and distribute it afterwards.  So, the movie languished in this state of limbo for a few more years, with no one taking up the challenge of giving the movie a home.  But then there finally came the heroes of this story.  Independent distributor Ketchup Entertainment finally put in a bid to buy the rights to the movie.  Warner Brothers ended up selling the movie at a loss, letting Ketchup have it for $50 million.  But for Warner Brothers, $50 million was the best they could get out of it, and was a small loss for them in the grand scheme of things.  Meanwhile, Ketchup Entertainment was taking on a heavy risk accepting this price tag.  Their catalog of films are made up of very small, micro budget movies.  More recently they have been partnering up with other production companies on bigger films like Michael Mann’s Ferrari (2023) and Robert Rodriguez’s Hypnotic (2023).  But, they also seem to have had an interest in salvaging movies from Warner Brothers’ scrap heap, particularly when it came to the Looney Tunes.  Just a year before acquiring the rights to Coyote vs. Acme, Ketchup also saved another film that Warners had developed for HBO Max before shelving it, which was the animated comedy The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie (2024).  They were even able to put the movie out in a limited theatrical run, and while the movie didn’t light up the box office, it still got a strong critical reception and has even developed a small cult following since it’s release.  This is one of the reasons why they seemed like the ideal new home for Coyote.

But it would only matter if audiences were still able to show up.  Because of Ketchup’s huge financial risk in taking this movie on, they needed to be careful how they marketed the movie.  Their marketing budget would be a small $10 million, which pales compared to what is spent on most other movies.  But, Ketchup carefully targeted their marketing, appealing to those who were most adamant about seeing the movie.  They knew that longtime fans of the Looney Tunes would support the movie, but who they were also hoping would show up for the film were people who were upset about what Warner Brothers had done in their short term quest for quick financial gain.  A lot of the marketing for the movie was very subtly aimed at conflating the film’s fictional Acme Corporation with Warner Brothers themselves.  The tag line for the movie in most of the marketing called it “The Movie Acme doesn’t want you to see.”  They smartly connected the film’s long and complicated road to getting released with the tale of fighting back against corporate greed that is actually at the heart of the film’s story; blurring the lines between fiction and reality.  The marketing team even pulled off some hilarious stunts, including having a performer dress in a Wile E. Coyote costume and having him protest outside the Warner Brothers lot in Burbank, complete with a picket sign saying “Acme Sucks.”  It may have come across as petty, but it was tapping into something that was really connecting with people.  Watching this movie would be making a statement, showing Warner Brothers that they were very much in the wrong for wanting to erase this movie from existence.  Ketchup continued to play up this David vs. Goliath aspect of the film, and it was indeed working.  They also got a major assist from people involved in the making of the movie, including it’s stars.  In particular, actor Will Forte who plays the lawyer representing Wile. E Coyote in court devoted much of his social media towards getting the word out about this movie, encouraging people to make their voices heard in demanding this movie get released.  Voice actor Eric Bauza, who is the current voice for almost all of the Looney Tunes characters these days, and who also led the voice cast in this movie, likewise spread the word about this movie, appearing on multiple podcasts over the last couple years pleading with fans to raise the heat on Warner Brothers to make them release the film.  And all that finally culminated in a big theatrical release at the tail end of this summer.  But did it all work?

The greatest outcome of all this is that the movie was more than just alright;  it actually turned out to be great.  The movie currently sits at a very impressive 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, which is even higher than Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey (2026) by the way.  The film even outperformed expectations on its opening weekend, grossing a respectable $15 million.  Sure it’s got a long way to go before Ketchup Entertainment can make a profit on its investment, but it’s far from a flop either.  The conversation is now no longer if the movie can live up to the hype, but rather it has turned towards wondering what David Zaslev was thinking when he called the movie “unwatchable.”  It very clearly is not anything like he described, and in fact it’s one of the best crowd pleasers of the summer.  What has become clear is that Coyote vs. Acme was never cancelled on the basis of its quality.  It was shelved because the big wigs at Warner Brothers clearly have the wrong idea about what audiences actually want.  David Zaslev is not a creative person.  He is there to take Warner Brothers and turn it into a commodity that can be bought and sold to other investors at a profit to both him and the shareholders.  Sure enough, that’s what is currently happening with Warner Brothers as we speak with it’s planned merger with Paramount.  The only ones who are going to benefit from that merger are the executives and shareholders, while thousands of creatives at both studios are likely to lose their jobs through the process of consolidation.  Zaslev is going to come away from that merger nearly $100 million dollars richer, and in his wake, two legendary studios may end up being destroyed in the process, consumed into a single giant media conglomerate with a frighteningly agenda driven management team that’ll favor their own interests over the desires of the audiences they are supposed to cater to.  That’s what’s been appealing about Coyote vs. Acme to audiences; the fact that it’s a movie that actually speaks about these concerns about greedy corporations that are never held accountable, and end up cheapening the things that we love after they have taken control of them.  In every way shape and form, Coyote vs. Acme is a survivor and a movie that we need more than ever to remind us of what’s at stake when it comes to our collective culture.

One of the metaphors used in the movie is the Ancient Greek mythological story of Sisyphus; the man doomed forever to roll a bolder uphill, only to have all his progress undone each day.  It’s a struggle that mirrors that of Wile E. Coyote, which is something that his co-creator Chuck Jones very much emphasized in his discussion about how he defined the character.  The point of Wile E. Coyote is that he will never catch the Roadrunner, but it’s that struggle that gives him purpose to live.  The movie draws that distinction, and shows us why it’s important to take on seemingly impossible tasks, because it’s the only way that changes can happen.  Yes, we will all fail at something, but if we give up the fight, we ultimately lose everything that is important.  That is ultimately what evil corporations like Acme count on, that we give up after we fail and just settle for less.  That’s what makes the movie so poignant; it shows that failure is nothing to be afraid of, and that it’s better to keep pushing that boulder uphill than just letting it sit motionless where it is.  In a strange twist of fate, the movie Coyote vs. Acme became it’s own Sisyphisian struggle, with Warner Brothers coming across as the cruel Gods trying to wear us down to accept the inevitable.  But unlike the myth,  Coyote vs. Acme managed to crest that hill and come out on top.  Despite us having to wait nearly four years to see the actual film, it’s release actually marks something that we rarely see anymore in Hollywood, which is an actual underdog triumph story.  For one thing, it still shows that audiences still love the Looney Tunes characters, and that they are very much an under-appreciated and underutilized part of the Warner Brothers portfolio right now.  It’s also a movie that manages to give voice to a concern of many in the industry right now, which is the value of profits over people.  In the movie, the story actually involves showing how cartoons are treated as expendable pawns in Acme’s product testing phase, due to them being more durable to injury than humans.  Like most dubious corporations, they are valuing one set of customers over another.  You could point to the same thing happening in Hollywood, with shareholders needed being valued over those of the employees of the company or the long term fans who themselves feel ignored more and more.  Coyote vs. Acme gives voice to that, but even manages to be more.  It’s a movie with a lot of heart as well, turning Wile E. Coyote into something of an Everyman hero, and they even managed to give his contentious relationship with the Road Runner some surprising depth and heart too.  Hopefully this movie makes Ketchup Entertainment a lot of money in the long run and helps to convince them and many others that it’s worthwhile to save these movies that are being tossed aside by the major studios.  In the case of Coyote vs. Acme, we may have almost lost what could be a new classic of the genre, and the fact that it has survived is a story worth celebrating for many years to come.

Martin Scorsese’s status as one of the greatest filmmakers of all time is undeniable.  From his humble post-film school beginnings working with the likes of Roger Corman to becoming one of Hollywood’s most revered elder statesmen, Scorsese’s career in the business has been an undeniable success.  But for a long time, many people felt that he was still undervalued as a filmmaker, mainly for one major reason; because he hadn’t won an Oscar.  After you’ve made movies as iconic as Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980) and Goodfellas (1990), you would think that the Academy would’ve shown their love to Marty for all that he had done over his career.  But, Scorsese continued to remain a consummate bridesmaid on Oscar night.  This especially began to become an issue for many fans of the director during the 2000’s.  Scorsese was reaching his 60’s and many worried that he would be overlooked while still in his prime, believing that as he reached his senior years that he would become as less productive and likely never get the chance to make that movie that would finally win him Oscar glory.  But it wasn’t for lack of trying though.  Martin Scorsese did manage to get a project he had long had in development finally across the finish line with his historical epic Gangs of New York (2002), starring heavy hitters like Daniel Day-Lewis and also marked his first collaboration with Leonardo DiCaprio.  This would surely be the movie that would finally win him an Oscar, because it had all the ingredients that Oscar voters valued.  But, despite quite a few nominations, Gangs of New York came up empty on Oscar night, with the Academy instead going for the musical Chicago (2002) that year, and Scorsese losing out Best Director to Roman “Statutory” Polanski for The Pianist (2002).  For a lot of people this started to make them worry that Scorsese may never get his due honors, because if he couldn’t win it with a passion project he had been working on for decades then it may never happen.  This only seemed to be reinforced when two years later he also struck out with the epic biopic The Aviator (2004).  What would it take for Martin Scorsese to finally win the gold in the end.  The answer would indeed be a bit surprising, and yet at the same time the most logical conclusion as well.

In the early 2000’s, Warner Brothers secured the rights to remake a Hong Kong action crime thriller called Infernal Affairs (2002).  The original film, starring Andy Lau and Tony Leung, was about two men who become moles on opposite sides of the law.  One is a police officer who has infiltrated a dangerous gang while the other is working within the police force to protect members of the Triad.  Both have to maintain their cover and more importantly make sure that neither is aware of the other’s existence.  Hollywood saw a lot of potential in this story, and were eager to bring it stateside as a action movie vehicle for some A-List stars.  The decision was to bring the story to Boston, given it’s culture of the Irish American community falling into both sides of the law; often sometimes within the same families.  One other reason for picking Boston as the setting was that the crime boss at the center would be largely based on real life Bostonian mafia leader James “Whitey” Bulger.  To work on the adaptation of Infernal Affairs into this Boston set crime story, Warner Brothers tapped journalist turned novelist William Monahan to write the screenplay.  Though Monahan was at the time a prolific writer, he was still fairly new to the art of screenwriting.  He first got the attention of Hollywood with his original script Tripoli, a historical epic that got optioned in a six figure deal with Scott Free Productions, with the potential of being directed by Ridley Scott himself.  Alas, Tripoli died quietly in development, but Ridley Scott wanted to keep Monahan around so the two of them worked together to create another epic movie set during the Crusades in the Holy Land.  This became the film Kingdom of Heaven (2005), which was unfortunately heavily cut down by the studio and released in theaters to disappointing box office.  Only in the years since has Kingdom of Heaven been reassessed by audiences thanks to a vastly superior 3 hour director’s cut released years later.  But, even despite the disappointment in Kingdom of Heaven’s box office, people saw a lot of potential in Monahan’s work, and that’s why he seemed like an ideal choice for this project.  For one thing, it would allow him to write closer to his own home given that he was a Boston boy himself.  But what was especially important about Monahan’s writing is that it caught the interest of Scorsese, who decided on this new movie, now called The Departed, as his next project.

A crime thriller set in the mafia world is nothing new to someone like Scorsese.  If anything, it’s a homecoming for him.  With movies like Goodfellas and Casino (1995), Martin cemented himself as the quintessential mafia movie king; even eclipsing Francis Ford Coppola in this category.  But a lot of those movies also tapped into his roots as an Italian American and as a New Yorker.  Boston was an entirely different kind of city with an entirely different kind of mafia.  The question would be whether or not Scorsese’s style would translate over into this new setting.  Marty certainly seemed to think so, and him being attached to this project suddenly gave it a lot more prestige than it otherwise would’ve likely had before.  With Scorsese now on board, the project was suddenly now glimpsed as an A-list production.  But who would bring their star power to the roles in the movie.  In particular, they needed to find the right actors to play the roles of the two moles, who in this film would be named William Costigan and Colin Sullivan.  For the longest time, Brad Pitt had eyed the role of Sullivan, the mole on the inside of the Boston PD, and at one time he was hoping to rope in his friend and fellow A-lister Tom Cruise to play the role of Costigan in the movie.  But, Cruise was less interested and passed on the part, and eventually Brad Pitt began to drift away from the project as well.  Pitt did stay involved as a producer however under his Plan B production company, though most of the producing credit would go to Graham King, whom Martin Scorsese brought over with him from The Aviator.  This producing credit would later lead to a bit of controversy later on.  The casting of Frank Costello, the Whitey Bulger stand-in, would also be an important choice as well.  Initially, Martin wanted to give the role to his long time collaborator Robert DeNiro, but DeNiro was too busy at the time working on his own directorial debut The Good Shepard (2006).  Scorsese also offered the role to Al Pacino, who he had yet to work with at the time, but unfortunately the two would wait another 13 years before finally making a movie together with The Irishman (2019).  While many of these actors would’ve certainly been interesting choices for this film, the movie would eventually benefit from the right actors getting the roles.

For one thing, Scorsese benefitted from there being Boston raised actors that were just right for the roles.  One, of course, was Matt Damon, who was cast as Colin Sullivan.  Damon of course made his mark alongside his longtime friend and fellow Bostonian Ben Affleck with their Oscar-winning Good Will Hunting (1997), which was a film steeped in the local flavor of the city.  He also perfectly played into the good old boy facade that was needed for the role, given that he had to play a cop who was secretly helping the mafia from within.  But, his role also had to have the perfect counterbalance on the opposite end.  With the casting of William Costigan, Scorsese once again went with the leading man of his last two films, Leonardo DiCaprio, to play the part.  DiCaprio of course neither has Irish ancestry nor is from anywhere close to Boston.  And yet the chameleon like actor managed to find his way into the role and perfectly channel a Bostonian identity into the character.  But, who would fill out the role of Frank Costello, the crime boss who looms large over everyone in the movie.  Turns out there was another legendary actor that had never worked with Scorsese before who would be absolutely perfect for the part.  Jack Nicholson had wanted to work with Marty for a long time, but things hadn’t aligned for both of them until now.  At this point, Jack was eager to sink his teeth into a juicy villainous role, and the part of Frank Costello, with all of his menacing swagger and twisted sense of humor seemed to be tailor made for the actor.  While DeNiro and Pacino would’ve certainly been solid choices too, it’s fortuitous that Nicholson ended up playing the part instead, because it allowed to Scorsese to differentiate this mafia movie from the ones he had made in the past.  Nicholson’s Frank Costello was very much a product of the city of Boston and defined it’s very brash and very Irish identity.  In addition to these actors, Scorsese round out his cast with some pretty heavy hitters, such as Alec Baldwin, Martin Sheen, Vera Farmiga, Ray Winstone, and Mark Wahlberg, who really tapped into his Bostonian roots with his scene stealing performance as Sergeant Dignam.

It’s undeniable that the city of Boston is a character in of itself within the movie.  New York may run through Scorsese’s blood, but he did justice to the identity of Boston; capturing the swagger of the community beautifully in all of it’s hard edges.  But even despite the change in scenery, the movie does feel in line with Scorsese’s Italian mafia epics of the past.  This is thanks to him working with some of his trusted longtime collaborators.  The Departed would sadly be the last time that Marty worked with his longtime cinematographer Michael Ballhaus, who had been working with Marty since 1985’s After Hours.  Ballhaus only shot one more movie after The Departed and passed away in 2017 at the age of 80, capping off a storied career of shooting some truly beautiful films such as The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), Goodfella, and Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992).  Scorsese’s longtime friend and collaborator Thelma Schoonmaker also returned to edit this movie, fresh off an Oscar win for The Aviator.  While their work on the film is not the flashiest they had ever done working with Scorsese, given the other movies listed, they nevertheless delivered a solid, well crafted movie that serviced the story well.  There are some hauntingly beautiful moments that do bring out the best of their talents.  One is the breathtaking opening montage that serves as the prologue of the movie, set to the Rolling Stones’ “Gimmie Shelter.”  It’s an outstanding tone setter that primes you perfectly for the movie you are about to see, with Ballhaus’ striking camera work and Schoonmaker’s lyrical editing doing a great job setting up the city of Boston and the characters within in an almost mythical way.  And like many of Martin Scorsese’s movies, the needle drops in the movie are especially poignant.  Apart from “Gimmie Shelter,” there is also a haunting cover of Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb,” sung by Irish R&B signer Van Morrison used halfway through the movie during a romantic moment.  But no song got more of a boost from appearing in this film more than Celtic punk band Dropkick Murphy’s “I’m Shipping Up to Boston” which has almost become an unofficial anthem for the city, played at sporting events for the Patriots and the Celtics to this day.

But, how was the world going to receive this new Scorsese film.  Despite the shift from New York to Boston, many thought this was just Scorsese falling back on old tricks by making yet another mafia movie.  But, audiences responded quite well to the film.  To this day, it is still Martin Scorsese’s highest grossing film at the box office, making $292 million worldwide, which is pretty good for an R-rated mafia movie.  But, the question remained, would the Academy finally take notice.  The film did receive nominations for Best Picture and Director, but it’s victory was not a guarantee as it only had 5 nominations total in a very competitive year.  Not only that, but it would be a rematch of 2004, where Scorsese’s The Aviator lost out to Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby (2004).  Eastwood, who’s clout with the Academy was undeniably strong, was nominated again for his WWII epic Letters from Iwo Jima (2006), and it was going to be a difficult choice between these two titans of the industry.  But, it became clear through the night that this may have finally been the movie to get Marty up to the podium.  Both William Monahan and Thelma Schoonmaker walked away with Oscar wins for their work on the film, giving the movie momentum.  And then came the award for Best Director.  Though the Academy didn’t know for certain given the secrecy of Pricewaterhouse Cooper’s ballot counting, they seemed to have a pretty good inkling about who was going to win given who they chose to present the Award.  Walking onstage to present Best Picture were directing legends Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas.  These weren’t just some of the biggest names in Hollywood, they were also longtime friends of Marty’s going all the way back to their early days in the 1970’s when they were just starting out in the business.  It was an indicator that the Academy knew the time had come and they wanted to make the moment special.  And sure enough, a great sigh of relief could be felt as Steven Spielberg read out the name of Martin Scorsese.  He was a bridesmaid no more, and would now forever have the title of Oscar winner on his resume.  And though deeply grateful, Scorsese also tried to keep it humble as well, joking to his friends, “can you check the envelope again, please?”  But it was undeniable to everyone; this was a long time coming and very well deserved.

But, despite the fears that this would be Scorsese’s last chance to win the coveted Award, finally winning it didn’t cause Scorsese to slow down either.  If anything, it rejuvenated his career.  Scorsese has honestly put out some of his best work since The Departed, with movies like Hugo (2011), The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), The Irishman (2019), and Killers of the Flower Moon (2023), all of which he has received more Oscar nominations for.  And this year, at the age of 83, he still has more movies in development with no indication yet that he’s ready to retire.  Given his whole body of work, it’s actually quite unusual to think that The Departed was the one that got him on the Oscar stage.  It’s not a particularly showy movie, with the movie most grounded in realism throughout.  It’s also a movie that despite being a mafia film also feels the least like any of the other characteristically Scorsese crime epics.  You would think that for Scorsese to get the attention of the Academy, he would’ve had to have made a film that showcased a lot more of his unique style, rather than just do a better than average competent action flick.  But, that’s underselling what Marty achieved with The Departed.  It is a brilliantly crafted character study about these two individuals who have to carefully maintain these facades within places they do not belong or else their lives will literally be destroyed.  It’s ultimately a parable about paranoia and mistrust, and thinking that there is a rat in every corner of society.  It’s no surprise that this movie existed in a post-9/11 world, where paranoia and distrust was rampant in American society.  With the Scorsese touch, he made this cops and robbers thriller feel more reflexive and introspective of where America was standing at the time.  In his hands, this story takes on a far greater mythical sense, showing how we as a society was starting to evolve, with the lines between good and bad, lawful and unlawful being increasingly blurred.  A lot of people have critiqued the film over the years with regards to the final shot.  In the closing moments, Scorsese holds on a window shot overlooking the Massachusetts State House, and in the foreground appears a literal rat.  People thought this was too much of a heavy handed metaphor, but honestly after the chaos of what preceded it in the shocking third act of the movie, heavy handed symbolism does seem right in the parting shot of the movie.

20 years later and The Departed still holds up as one of the best mafia movies ever made.  It may not be up to the epic level of The Godfather (1971), but it’s undoubtedly one of the best executed ones in the last quarter century and that’s thanks to the talents of Martin Scorsese.  He took what could have been just another standard action thriller which are a dime a dozen in Hollywood, and created an Oscar winning movie out of it.  Certainly a lot of that has to do with it’s absolutely perfect cast, with DiCaprio, Damon and Nicholson all delivering some of the best performances of their careers.  It may be a subdued, by the numbers film for Martin Scorsese, but even with those limitations he still managed to deliver an all time classic under his direction.  And as we’ve seen, he still is not done yet.  William Monahan, who also came away an Oscar winner, has continued to work as a screenwriter on several more movies, and has even directed a couple as well.  Leonardo DiCaprio has also continued to remain a favorite of Marty’s, and they have worked on many more films together since, including The Wolf of Wall Street and Killers of the Flower Moon.  Matt Damon has also continued to remain an A-lister in Hollywood, and though he has not worked with Scorsese again since The Departed, he still considers his work in the movie to be some of the best he’s ever done.  This also has marked one of the last great roles for Jack Nicholson.  Though as of this writing Jack Nicholson is still alive and well at the age of 89, but he has not made a new film in 16 years, retiring after a small part in James L. Brooks’ How Do You Know (2010). The Departed is looked at as the last true Nicholson star role, and it’s great that he and Marty’s paths managed to cross and result in this film before he called it quits.  One of the benefits of making The Departed the way he did is that it gives Scorsese a film with a bit of universal and timeless appeal.  You don’t have to be familiar with what Scorsese has done prior to enjoy the movie.  It stands apart from his other work in a good way.  That’s why it’s Oscar win for Best Picture hasn’t aged one bit since it happened, because the movie still works just as well today as it did 20 years ago.  Sure, Scorsese deserved the Oscar much more for many other movies prior, but I don’t hear too many complaints about this being the one that got him there.  Often a filmmaker will end up winning the top award for a movie that wasn’t quite representative of the filmmaker they really are.  Here, I think it works better for Scorsese that he won for this movie rather than a traditional Oscar bait flick like Gangs of New York or The Aviator.  The movie may have been outside of his comfort zone of the streets of New York, but it’s fitting that by going to Boston that Scorsese still won the award for a mafia movie; the kind of film that he did better than anyone else.