To no one’s surprise, 2020 was a bumper year for streaming. With people stuck at home last year, services saw millions of new subscribers — Netflix attracted 16 million customers in just three months, alone. The early part of 2021 continued that trend, but as the year draws to a close, it appears the growth is slowing down across the board. This suggests that as restrictions ease around the world, people might be returning to pre-pandemic norms.

But on the whole, 2021 was still a pretty big year for streaming. Netflix now has 214 million global subscribers, and services like Disney+ and HBO Max lured customers with exclusive TV shows and movies. US platforms, like Peacock, expanded internationally and online-only programming was well-represented at multiple award shows. Titles exclusive to streaming, such as Squid Game and WandaVision, became part of the cultural landscape. A slow year or not, it’s clear that this is how most of us watch our shows now. Here are some of the biggest stories in streaming this year.

Netflix

Netflix continues to dominate

As mentioned above, Netflix is the undisputed leader in streaming with over 214 million subscribers worldwide. Sure, it’s faced a few challenges from rivals like Disney+ and Amazon Prime, but Netflix is still holding strong. Part of that is due to the company’s strategy of investing in original content that you can’t get anywhere else, like Stranger Things and The Crown.

And of course, there’s Squid Game which is undoubtedly the number one TV show of the year. Netflix has said that around 142 million households watched the Korean-language show, making it the most-viewed new show in Netflix history. There’s also the recently released Red Notice, which became the service’s most-watched movie in its first 28 days of release, with around 328.8 million viewing hours in that time span. That tops the previous record held by Bird Box, which had 282 million viewing hours back in 2018.

Things don’t seem to be slowing down, either. Netflix has signed multi-year deals with big names like Kevin Hart and Steven Spielberg, it has exclusive rights for Universal animated films and it purchased the rights to Roald Dahl’s entire catalog. this phenomenon

Still, 2021 wasn’t without its hiccups. The largest one by far is when Netflix employees staged a protest over the CEO’s remarks defending Dave Chappelle’s standup special, which was heavily criticized for its transphobic content. CEO Ed Sarandos has since said he “screwed up” on the messaging, but has not rescinded his defense.

Disney

Disney+ proves it’s a serious contender

Disney+, on the other hand, currently has 118.1 million paid subscribers worldwide, which doesn’t quite compare to Netflix. But the service still gained ground in 2021, with around 43 million more subscribers compared to last year. A lot of that can be attributed to Disney’s powerhouse brands such as Pixar, Star Wars and, especially in 2021, Marvel.

2021 was when the Marvel Cinematic Universe released four different TV shows, all exclusively on Disney+: WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki and Hawkeye. This is a big deal, as Marvel has said that these TV series are key to the MCU’s “Phase Four” chapter, indicating that fans will likely want to watch them in order to understand the context behind upcoming movies set in the same universe.

But there was more to these shows that made them required viewing. As the first out the gate, WandaVision set the tone. The episodes were meant to be watched weekly, as each one spurred so-called “water cooler” discussions in-person and online. This felt a lot like “anti-binging” TV, as much of the appeal of these shows lay in the anticipation of what would happen next. At the very least, it showed that Disney+’s slate of original content — which also includes The Mandalorian and the upcoming The Book of Boba Fett — could hold its own against that of more established platforms.

Warner Bros.

The direct-to-streaming revolution that wasn’t

During the thick of the pandemic, many movies eschewed theatrical releases for direct-to-streaming debuts. Examples include The Lovebirds, Borat Subsequent Movie Film,Mulan (via paid Premier Access), Soul, and Wonder Woman 1984. That carried into this year as well, with Disney+ continuing its paid Premier Access model with Cruella, Black Widow and Jungle Cruise (Luca, however, did not have Premier Access release).

The biggest move, however, was when Warner Bros. announced that every single one of its movies in 2021 would have a one month exclusive access period on HBO Max concurrent with the film’s domestic release. This meant that big blockbuster movies like Suicide Squad, Dune and Matrix 4 would be available on HBO Max on the same day they debuted in theaters for an entire year.

While some may have heralded this phenomenon as the future of entertainment, it looks to be short-lived. Disney revealed a few months ago that all of its remaining 2021 movies will get a 45-day head start in theaters. This could be due to strong responses to titles like Free Guy and Shang-Chi, but Disney might also want to avoid lawsuits like the one Scarlett Johansson filed for breach of contract over shortened theatrical releases. Warner Bros. also said that it’s going back to theater-first releases in 2022. It looks like the direct-to-streaming revolution isn’t quite here just yet.

Other notable streaming news

• Paramount+ replaces CBS All Access, which essentially opens up the service to other ViacomCBS channels, such as Comedy Central and VH1, plus Paramount’s existing movie library.

• Discovery+ makes its debut. The service features content from HGTV, Food Network, Animal Planet, TLC, the Magnolia Network, and Discovery.

• AT&T spun off its WarnerMedia division and merged it with Discovery in a $43 billion deal. The new company will combine Warner’s film division, HBO Max and Discovery+.

• Roku purchased Quibi’s shows and released some of them as “Roku Originals.”

• Roku pulled YouTube TV from its channel store amid a contract dispute with Google. The latter apparently requested priority placement in search results and wanted to block results from other providers while the app was in use. As of December 8th, both parties have finally agreed to a multi-year extension.

• In other notable YouTube TV news, the service recently lost access to all of Disney's channels, which includes ESPN, ABC and FX, as Google and Disney had failed to strike a deal. After just a couple of days, however, the two companies reconciled and reached an agreement, thus restoring all of the aforementioned channels. When YouTube TV initially lost those channels, Google had dropped the price of the service by $15 (from $65 to $50 in the basic package). Now the price is back to normal. However, if users had already initiated the cancellation process, Google will still honor the one-time $15 credit if they resume their membership. 

• WWE Network ceased operations as most of its content moved to Peacock.

• Peacock aired multiple live Olympics sporting events as well as the opening and closing ceremonies.

• Universal made a deal where Peacock and Amazon Prime Video would have some streaming rights for its live-action movies after their theatrical run. They would air on Peacock for four months, then on Prime Video for 10 months, and then back to Peacock for at least another four months. This kicks into effect in 2022.

• Netflix gained exclusive streaming rights to all of Sony’s upcoming movies, including upcoming titles in the Spider-Man franchise.

• Peacock debuts in the UK and Ireland.

What to look forward to in 2022

While the growth in streaming might be slowing, there are still plenty of shows and movies to anticipate next year. Netflix has confirmed that the aforementioned Sandmanwill be released in 2022, as well as The Witcher: Blood Origin and new seasons of favorites like Stranger Things, The Crown and Ozark. Disney+ will continue its MCU run of TV shows with Ms. Marvel, and will introduce a couple of Star Wars series too: Obi-Wan Kenobi and Andor. Perhaps the two biggest TV series to get excited about, however, are HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel series, House of the Dragon, and Amazon’s epic Lord of the Rings series, which is set thousands of years prior to The Hobbit.

You won't have to wait too much longer to catch Marvel Studios' Eternals on Disney+. The movie will be available to stream on January 12th. That's just over two months after the most recent Marvel Cinematic Universe film, which received lukewarm reviews, arrived in theaters.

In September, Disney announced that its remaining slate of theatrical releases would get at least a 45-day run in theaters before they were available to stream — save for Encanto, which will hit Disney+ on December 24th, just 30 days after it landed in cinemas. Eternals was one of those movies, but Disney evidently decided to keep the movie exclusively in theaters beyond that minimum timeframe of 45 days.

Starting with Mulan last September, Disney experimented with allowing Disney+ subscribers to stream theatrical releases at home on the same day they debuted in cinemas for an extra fee. However, Scarlet Johansson sued the company, claiming that the streaming strategy cost her up to $50 million in lost earnings from Black Widow. Disney settled the suit.

Sonic the Hedgehog turned out to be one of the biggest movies of 2020, despite serious CG character issues that caused a three-month delay. Now, Paramount has dropped the first trailer for the sequel that gives us our first look at a new character, Knuckles, voiced by none other than Idris Elba.

The trailer shows Sonic (Ben Schwartz) and his new sidekick Tails (Colleen O'Shaughnessy). He's once again taking on Dr. Robotnik, aka, Eggman (Jim Carrey) who's seeking a classic Sonic McGuffin, the Chaos Emeralds. However, Robotnik has an Echidna up his sleeve in the form of Knuckles, who shows off his brute strength and weirdly elegant speaking voice. (Elba promised that his Knuckles wouldn't sound sexy, but he is more posh than ever.) 

The first Sonic film became one of the most successful video game adaptations ever, so there's a lot riding on the sequel. Luckily, the slick trailer indicates that we won't be seeing any of the CGI issues that plagued the first film. The sequel is set to be released on April 8, 2022. 

Netflix has opened up a fan-focused hub for updates and information about its shows and movies. The minisite is called Tudum, the same name as a three-hour fan event that took place in September. It's also the onomatopoeic name for the signature sound that plays when you fire up Netflix or start watching an Original.

The company notes that it's early days for Tudum, though the site will feature things like interviews, behind-the-scenes videos and bonus features. Right now, Tudum is showcasing a piece called "The Year in Pop Culture Obsessions" and an explainer that delves into how long witchers live, ahead of the second season of The Witcher arriving next week.

You'll also get to check out the latest Netflix news and trailers, and learn about upcoming releases. There's a section for trending content, as well as recommendations based on things you've watched. However, for me, that section is full of content about Lost in Space, a show I haven't watched in three years.

Tudum is obviously another way for Netflix to promote its shows and movies. Still, it could come in handy for fans looking for more details about the likes of Money Heist, Emily in Paris and the company's other hits.

Apple will fund and distribute a long-in-the-works movie about embattled Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes. Bad Blood will star Jennifer Lawrence as Holmes, while Adam McKay will write and direct. Both are producers on the project, which is a coproduction between Apple Studios and Legendary.

The movie, which is based on the book Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Start Up by former Wall Street Journal reporter John Carreyrou, has been in development since at least 2016, as Deadline notes. The film will depict the rise and fall of Holmes and her company.

Hype around the blood-testing startup led to Holmes becoming the youngest self-made billionaire. Accusations and charges of fraud led to her stepping down as CEO in 2018 and the company liquidating later that year. Holmes is currently on trial for fraud.

Bad Blood is far from the only film and TV project about Theranos and Holmes. Hulu greenlit a miniseries in 2019 with Saturday Night Live star Kate McKinnon pencilled in to play Holmes. She dropped out earlier this year, and was replaced by Amanda Seyfried. An HBO documentary about the Theranos saga premiered in 2019.

Meanwhile, Lawrence and McKay recently worked together on the Netflix film Don't Look Up, which hits theaters this weekend and will be available to stream on December 24th. It's a satire about two astronomers (played by Lawrence and Leonardo DiCaprio) who try to warn humanity about a catastrophic comet that's set to collide with Earth.

HBO Max has uploaded another alternative DC Comics movie cut, but it won't brag about this one. As CBR and The Verge note, WarnerMedia comms executive Johanna Fuentes has confirmed HBO Max accidentally uploaded the censored TV version of the 2020 movie Birds of Prey. While it's listed as the R-rated version from theaters, play it and you'll get the same 'family-friendly' edit you'd see on TNT.

Fuentes promised that HBO Max would upload the R-rated movie, although she didn't provide a timeline. That uncensored take will be the only version on the service, the exec added, and it has been available for about a year.

It's not clear how the slip-up occurred. We've asked WarnerMedia for comment. With that said, HBO Max certainly isn't averse to foul language or violence. This is an embarrassing moment for a streaming provider still in its early stages, but it doesn't represent a sudden change of heart.

Cowboy Bebop was like nothing else when it premiered twenty years ago. It was a neo-Western set in space; a noir thriller alongside the spectacle of martial arts action and John Woo-esque shootouts; an existential vision of a broken future where characters were forced to live with their shattered pasts. And on top of all of that, it was propelled by an iconic soundtrack that easily danced between genres. We didn't have much time in the Bebop-verse — just 26 episodes and a movie — so every second felt like a miracle. How could a live-action Netflix adaptation live up to that?

Simply put, it doesn't. While the original show was a love letter to cinema and pop culture, crafted by a creative dream team (director Shinichiro Watanabe, writer Keiko Nobumoto and composer Yoko Kanno), Netflix's remix is mainly in love with Cowboy Bebop. It wants to remind us of the anime, so much so that it replicates many iconic sequences shot-for-shot, but it doesn't latch onto what made it so special. It hums the melody, but has no soul. It's a hollow tune that's common to nostalgia-focused reboots, like Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Ghostbusters: Afterlife, and it almost always holds them back.

By almost every measure, I should hate Netflix's Cowboy Bebop with a passion. But, it's a testament to the talented actors involved that I don't. John Cho wouldn't be my first choice to play the impossibly cool Spike Spiegel (that would be Sung Kang, Fast and Furious's swagger king Han), but he makes a serious effort to replicate his charm. Mustafa Shakir easily carries Jet Black's irascible yet lovable nature. And Daniella Pineda's Faye Valentine is an absolute scene stealer.

But this talented group is failed by a confounding production, which often looks worse than a cheap Doctor Who episode. Some sets appear to be made out of cardboard and spray paint, nothing conveys the lived-in aesthetic the anime captured so well. There are flashes of visual brilliance, to be clear, but that mainly comes from digital effects that often replicate shots from the original series. At times, Bebop wants to replicate the live-action cartoon aesthetic from the Wachowski's under-rated Speed Racer. Then, at other times, it will just have a bright neon "PORN" sign in the background, as if that's enough to convey the seediness of a neighborhood.

Geoffrey Short/Netflix

So where did everything start going wrong? As with most nostalgia reboots, it usually comes down to the writing. Netflix's Cowboy Bebop was developed by Christopher Yost (Thor: Ragnarok, Star Wars Rebels) and includes genre talents like Javier Grillo-Marxuach (Lost, Charmed). Their combined credits gave me hope that the show would be something more than a copycat of the anime, but instead it's a confusing mishmash of nostalgia worship and superfluous story additions.

Instead of being a mysterious cutthroat assassin, the villain Vicious comes across as a dull Eurotrash gangster. Instead of a haunting past based on the consequences of being overbearingly protective, Jet gets an estranged daughter and a ticked-off ex-wife. And perhaps most damningly, Spike's love interest Julia loses her mystique, and instead becomes another pretty damsel in distress. We've seen all of these storylines before, so instead of feeling like "a new genre unto itself," the bold proclamation the anime made in the middle of every episode, it all just feels like "been there, done that."

That's the same vibe I got while watching Ghostbusters: Afterlife. It starts out as an intriguing portrait of a struggling family, but eventually becomes bogged down by replicating almost every plot beat from the first Ghostbusters. It's still a fun and enjoyable film, but it's reverence for the past clearly prevented it from doing anything truly new. Watching that movie and Cowboy Bebop over the weekend made me genuinely worried about the future of pop culture. Are we just doomed to repeat the past, over and over again, to appease the fans?

Now, here's the thing: Despite all of the ways Cowboy Bebop fundamentally misunderstands its source material, it still ends up being a decently enjoyable sci-fi romp. And if you don't know what you're missing, it's easy to overlook the flaws as you soak in the talent of the cast, the strange yet familiar future filled with terraformed moons and planets, and the catchy Yoko Kanno tunes.

My one faint hope is that viewers who enjoy the live-action series will also check out the anime, which is also available on Netflix. I'm all for new viewers finding ways into existing properties. I just wish that didn't involve watering down classics to make them more palatable.

After doing the same for Disney, Spotify has launched a Netflix hub bringing all of the streaming service's soundtracks, playlists and podcasts into one place. While many of Netflix's soundtracks were already on Spotify, the new feature puts all content related to the service in one place. 

That includes playlists and soundtracks from series and films like La Casa De Papel, Narcos: Mexico, Outer Banks, Squid Game, tick, tick... Boom! and Cowboy Bebop. It also features podcasts around Netflix content like Okay, Now Listen, Netflix Is A Daily Joke, 10/10 Would Recommend and The Crown: The Official Podcast. 

Spotify launched some special material for the hub as well, including an enhanced album for the western movie The Harder They Fall and a refreshed content destination for La Casa De Papel. The latter also features a mobile-only character matching experience putting together La Banda characters and soundtracks. 

Feature-wise, the Netflix hub goes beyond what Spotify offered for Disney, though the latter's content is more iconic thanks to soundtracks from properties like Star Wars and Toy Story 4. In a case of reverse synergy, Netflix will soon release a Spotify drama focusing on co-founders Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon, based on the non-fiction book Spotify Untold. 

"Why doesn't Kojima just make movies?" It's a rhetorical question fans of Hideo Kojima have asked after every game since Metal Gear Solid. For better or worse, no other creator in the gaming industry has pushed the medium closer to film than Kojima. And after hinting his studio could venture into filmmaking, it's doing precisely that. 

Per GamesIndustry.Biz, Kojima Productions has established a division dedicated to music, TV and film that will operate out of Los Angeles. Riley Russell, a former Sony Interactive executive, will lead the unit as it attempts to expand the cultural footprint of Kojima Productions.

"The new division will be tasked with working with creative and talented professionals in television, music and film, as well as the more familiar games industry," Russell told the outlet. "The team has as its charter, the goal of expanding the reach and awareness of the properties now under development at Kojima Productions, and to make them even more a part of our popular culture."

It's not surprising to see Kojima Productions expand beyond games. Kojima is known for his film-like approach to making games, and if you follow him on Twitter, you'll know he frequently tweets about his favorite albums and movies. The question now becomes how the studio plans to handle the expansion. Since reforming in 2015, Kojima Productions has released one game. You can push that number to two if you count the recent Director's Cut release of Death Stranding as a separate title. What would a film adaptation of Death Stranding look like? For that matter, what would an adaptation of any Kojima game look like? We may just find out soon enough.  

New streaming services are a dime a dozen. By now, their debuts are met with an eye roll. Viewers might wonder what beloved shows or movies are now leaving Netflix to be siloed off in some walled garden of a service. But the hype around Disney+ was a bit different when it launched two years ago today, mostly because it started off with a sizable library of well-loved content, much of which had never been available on streaming before. Add in some buzzworthy new shows from big-name franchises and 116 million subscribers, and it’s safe to say that Disney+ has become a must-have channel for your streaming lineup.

Disney has always been ahead of the curve when it comes to finding new ways to distribute its content. In 1983 it launched The Disney Channel, a premium network that showcased Disney-owned and other family-friendly content. (The channel would later make the shift to basic cable starting in 1990.) Other corporate-content-specific cable networks like Turner Classic Movies and Cartoon Network wouldn’t debut until a decade later. Disney was also well-known for how it would re-release classic animated films in theaters every seven years or so and, once home video was a thing, would consign those same movies to the “Disney Vault” until that period of time had passed. With the advent of DVD and later Blu-ray, Disney would loosen its grip on content, making movies available through subscription services like the Disney Movie Club, and adding free digital copies with every physical media purchase.

The launch of Disney+ promised an end to the Disney Vault, with every Disney animated film available to stream. Well, almost — Song of the South is still not available on Disney+ due to its racist content, and other shows and films have been held due to licensing restrictions. But it’s still an impressive lineup. If you wanted to give yourself a crash course in animation history Disney+ is a good service to have, home to some of the earliest Walt Disney Animation Studio films like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio and Fantasia, all the way to recent releases like Ralph Breaks the Internet and Frozen II. Plenty of shorts are available on the service, too, allowing kids and adults to check out all-time classics like Steamboat Willie and The Brave Little Tailor.

But while parents were happy to have a streaming service they didn’t need to put on parental lock with their kids, Disney was making a play for older folks with two franchises it had acquired over the previous decade: Marvel and Star Wars. Right out of the gate the company promised fresh content from both, with The Mandalorian debuting only weeks after the service’s launch. Alongside later Marvel Cinematic Universe shows like WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Loki, Disney could lay claim to having “water cooler” shows, ones that would light up social media and hopefully win a few awards in the process. Though the company hasn’t been entirely successful in the latter category and subscriber numbers have stalled, it at least has programs that generate as much excitement as Netflix’s Stranger Things or Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale.

So what’s next for Disney+? The service continues to add more programming from its big franchises, with shows like The Book of Boba Fett and Hawkeye not far over the horizon. I’ve talked before about how Disney+ can facilitate franchise world-building thanks to the ability to have all its content in one place, though both Star Wars and Marvel risk growing to the point where audiences may not be able to keep up with it all. The new shows and service definitely benefited from people having a lot of free time in 2020 and 2021 — it’ll be interesting to see if Disney+ can maintain its cachet as more businesses open back up. After gettingmixed results with offering new movies on “Premier Access” streaming for $30 a pop, Disney has switched to offering films “only in theaters” again, with even a divisive film like Eternals pulling in over $70 million on its opening weekend.

Disney+’s biggest strength today is its back catalog of content, namely the shows and movies that are still missing from the service. Some programs were held back to promote future releases. One easy example I can think of is how the Marvel One-Shot All Hail the King showed up a week or two shy of the release of Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. The short film was the last appearance of the character Trevor Slattery, who would go on to play a part in Shang-Chi. One can hope this means the other One-Shots will make their way to Disney+ as their characters reappear in the Marvel films.

The same, however, cannot be said for the Hulk, whose film rights are still tangled up with Universal, making 2008’s The Incredible Hulk the only MCU movie still missing from Disney+ — even with a She-Hulk series on deck for 2022. But if Marvel could patch things up with Sony over the rights to Spider-Man to the point where the new film seems to be bringing back previous actors and introducing the older films as part of a multiverse, there’s certainly room to be surprised over on Planet Hulk.

Other odd omissions: Disney+ has the original animated Aladdin film and its two direct-to-VHS sequels, but not the TV show that the two latter films bookended. At this point we don’t know if it’s a rights issue, an indication of future plans or someone just forgot the show existed. And you can only watch five episodes of the Mickey Mouse Club right now, from its classic black-and-white ‘50s period and nothing from the ‘90s reboot that launched the careers of Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Justin Timberlake. The service may just be holding those in reserve for a potential relaunch, or just something to promote if and when the content dries up.

But right now, things are strong for Disney+. It’s got five new MCU shows on the horizon, while also planning a second season for Loki. Star Wars has a whopping seven live-action shows on deck, along with more of the animated The Bad Batch for the kids. It’s plenty to keep subscribers on the hook week after week and, alongside its massive back catalog, those things have catapulted Disney+ into the top tier of streaming services only two years after launch.