Ethan Wood
Features Assistant
Ever since Netflix graduated from mailing DVDs to full on streaming, companies have been keeping an eye on how successful this new medium would be.
Then came the rise of Hulu and Amazon Prime, both of which have found great success.
Cut to today and now even more competitors are getting into the streaming market.
Nov. 1, we got Apple TV+ at just $5 a month. HBO has plans to release HBO Max in Spring 2020 at a whop- ping $15 a month.
Most recently though, the company whose cloud hangs over all of our heads released their big competitor.
That’s right, Disney+ released Nov. 12.
Disney’s new subscription service is at set at $7 a month, and, of course, they do not want this service to fail, which seems unlikely due to there already being more than a million preorders.
So, is this new service worth the extra seven dollars?
One student has already made the commitment.
“Growing up, I didn’t get to watch almost any Disney animated films, so I’m getting Disney+ and sharing it with some other friends,” sophomore music education major Cale Sugg said.”
What exactly are Sugg and his friends going to be getting content-wise in Disney+’s first month of existence?
Almost all of Disney’s animated classics were included, dating all the way back to 1937’s “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,” along with a good chunk of Pixar movies – including the film “Up.”
There is also a plethora of con- tent from Disney channel, both tv shows (“The Suite Life of Zack and Cody”) and original movies (“The High School Musical”).
At launch, Disney also premiered its live-action remake of “Lady and the Tramp.”
Looking at the Star Wars content, fans can watch almost every movie with the exception of “The Last Jedi,” “Rogue One” and “Solo.”
Those three movies will make their way to the service in 2020.
Fans can also delight in the fact that the new, original Star Wars series “The Mandalorian” will be waiting for them if they register for the service.
Coming at an unannounced time, is also a series following the Star Wars character Obi-Wan Kenobi.
However, fans of Marvel’s MCU don’t have too much content to delight in during Disney+’s first year.
Only 16 of the 23 films in the cinematic universe will be on the service for this first month (yes, one of them is “Avengers: Endgame”), and they’ll have to wait until Fall of 2020 to get the first of Marvel’s new MCU shows, that being “The Falcon and The Winter Soldier.”
The other MCU shows won’t premier until 2021, which begs the question of if it’s even worth it to get Disney+, until this time next year for Marvel fans.
Disney+’s launch line up is, naturally, very limited when compared to services such as Netflix and Hulu, as it doesn’t even come close to match- ing the hours of content the others provide.
At the same time, however, Netflix and Hulu also support a higher monthly rate for a subscription. Sugg had some insight to share about Disney+’s currently limited line-up.
“By having a lower price point, even with a smaller launch selection, [Disney] can get a lot of signups and hopefully convince investors that it’s worth it to have more of their catalogue available,” Sugg said.
In its current state, Disney+ is a great option for people who are feel- ing particularly nostalgic, parents who don’t want to worry about what their little kids are watching, and people who maybe never got to indulge in the classics so many have.
However, with Disney owning as much as they do, their streaming service might seem quite bare for Marvel fans or others looking for more original content.
With new streaming services pop- ping up, it’s going to be interesting to see how Disney+ can hold its own and appeal to the mass market.
If all else fails, they can just buy all their competition.
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