The Media Grapples With the Reality of Skydance as Entertainment Megamerger Enters Day 2

Stephanie KaloiWed, October 7, 2026 at 6:06 PM UTC

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Guido Neira/APTOP STORYWHAT IS THE SKYDANCE ERA?

We’re now collectively in Day 2 of the Skydance era, and everyone is still trying to figure out what that means. From the sounds of what the stack’s writing today, “everyone” includes CEOs David Ellison and Ynon Kreiz, who were on hand at a media event Tuesday.

There was plenty to learn — and to report.

CNN’s Reliable Sources, Brian Stelter — Now that the merger is complete, Ellison is free to discuss any part of it he wants to, Stelter pointed out. And he began doing so on Day 1, when he told Skydance employees, “It was not easy to get here. At times, it was downright ugly.” But now, Ellison added, it’s time to “turn the page and make sure we are in the business of rebuilding trust.” In addition to affirming his stance that the work done by CNN and CBS News is “a vital part of our democracy,” Ellison also said the company “want[s] to actually help scale and transition the business digitally.” But how? It seems no one is really sure. As Jake Tapper told viewers Tuesday night, “We here at The Lead want you to know that we take Mr. Ellison at his word and we will hold him to it.”

Status, Oliver Darcy — Ellison offered “the assembled journalists” at yesterday’s Day 1 event “a hype reel showcasing the vast array of assets now under the Skydance umbrella” before he began answering questions, and they had plenty of questions for him. Ellison insisted in part that “we want to speak to the largest audiences humanly possible.” But he also “appeared to suggest that some of the company’s behavior over the last year aimed to curry favor with Donald Trump to secure his administration’s approval for the Warners deal,” something that “raised serious antitrust concerns” — as Darcy put it, Ellison seemed to “ask the public to wipe the slate clean and discard from the record the ways in which he, rather overtly, kowtowed to Trump.” The Skydance head also “portrayed Skydance as something of a savior for the news networks.”

The Poynter Report, Tom Jones — The “mega media deal” that made Skydance possible was a “laborious” one, Jones noted, and “there is plenty of work to be done.” Winning the “big prize” of the merger is “just the start” of Ellison’s work. While a lot of attention has been paid to what this means for CNN and CBS News, Ellison also has to keep the NFL happy. Per Jones, the football league was under contract with CBS through 2033, but the acquisition means they can begin new negotiations with Skydance until next August. “The N.F.L. could also opt out of their deal at the end of the 2029 season,” Jones wrote, adding that the league “has not exercised its change-of-control option. But some industry analysts say the league could seek $1 billion more per year from CBS Sports.”

Page Six Hollywood, Ian Mohr — Tuesday’s media event included “a lot of serious schmoozing,” Mohr observed. But the “mood inside was also one of weary relief,” Tim Baysinger and Peter Kiefer, who attended the event, reported. Ellison and Kreiz “were non-committal on which of the two lots would emerge as the primary headquarters for the company’s leadership team,” and offered “only that film will be centered on one lot, with TV and streaming on the other.” Ellison also took a big swing of his own when “he accused Hollywood of letting its guard down, which allowed Silicon Valley interlopers like Netflix and Amazon to come in and take over the town.”

The Ankler’s Reel AI, Erik Barmack — Ellison also has a plan to use AI to make movies, Barmack noted today. He previously “suggested that AI could allow Paramount to make multiple versions of a movie, test them with audiences and learn quickly what works.” But though he may be “an AI evangelist,” that may not mean everyone is on board. “So AI-as-tastemaker is the radical end state of a 21st century studio that every union and director will oppose,” Barmack wrote. “The transformation inside the company, though, likely starts somewhere far less cinematic — but with equal impact on its workers.”

TheWrap, Roger Cheng, Drew Taylor, Kayla Cobb, A.J. Katz, Jeremy Fuster, and Lucas Manfredi — The “new Hollywood giant” is “nothing like the giants of old,” the team at TheWrap wrote. Ellison and Kreiz “mostly said all the right things” while speaking to the media Tuesday about Skydance, but “questions remain about its ability to operate while burdened with the nearly $80 billion in debt it took on to complete the merger.” The pair didn’t speak about animation, despite “Skydance now being in command of three separate animation studios, each run by different creative executives.” TheWrap concluded, “It’ll be interesting to see if Skydance’s output is as robust and exciting as its executives are touting. Or, to borrow an expression, the slate will be all sizzle, no steak.”

TAKEAWAY: The merger may be complete, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that there won’t be any real answers about what comes next until it starts happening. The media may not love having to keep guessing, but oftentimes, the process of chasing the story is just as rewarding as the end result. Our stack authors are making their individual and collective concerns apparent.

We all have a few options: fret and fawn over Ellison and Kreiz’s next moves, keep one eye on the past and one on the future, or… maybe just take a look at this Instagram reel that showcases Ellison’s past acting days, which is currently making the rounds on the internet.

TOP SCOOPS & ANALYSIS

SCOOPThe Washington Sun, Evan McMorris-Santoro, Jasmine Wright, and Manuela Silva — Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) and her Democratic challenger Troy Jackson held their first debate Tuesday night. Jackson “held his own” against an opponent the party has long believed “they should be able to beat.” But he hasn’t taken off in the way that the state’s party hoped he might. “It’s weird, for sure. And it doesn’t entirely make sense,” a Dem operative told The Washington Sun. “Troy Jackson is not a blank canvas, like early-days Platner was. He has a long governing record in the state, for better and worse, and he just seems to have not hit his stride as a statewide candidate.”

SCOOPCJR’s The Media Today, Amos Barshad —Ruth Margalit writes “profiles of prominent Israelis” for The New York Times magazine. She’s also the author of In the Belly of the Whale: Portraits from a Fractured Israel, and lives in Tel Aviv. While speaking to Barshad, she said “it’s true” that “Israeli society has become more racist, more afraid about its own security” since Oct. 7, 2023. She also said that news in Israel is limited and there “was just a real vacuum with regard to everything coming out of Gaza.” Margalit added, “The footage wasn’t watched inside Israel. All we got was footage seen through the lens of IDF soldiers. The actual footage we got was either from reporters embedded with the IDF or directly from the military spokesperson unit.” As she put it, “People were not willing to accept a different story. Whatever camp you were in, you viewed stories coming from the other side as either propaganda or doctored somehow.”

ANALYSIS TheWrap, A.J. Katz — “Three years after the Oct. 7 attacks in southern Israel, one of the clearest shifts in the way news organizations cover Gaza has happened largely behind the scenes,” Katz wrote. “Reporters and editors have had to become increasingly explicit about not only what they know, but how they know it.” The ongoing war in the country has fostered “a striking contradiction for newsrooms” and “has made verification, attribution and open-source reporting more central to daily newsgathering.” In addition to changing how journalists get details, sources, and stories, the resulting pressure has also “changed how stories are written and presented, with news organizations putting more emphasis on what they can independently confirm, where information came from, and what remains uncertain.”

ANALYSIS Barrett Media’s Morning Edition, John Mamola — Braiden Bell was hired and quickly fired as the Portland Trail Blazer’s play-by-play announcer this month, and Mamola thinks he should be rehired. The firing came after “a local news station uncovered racist and sexist tweets he posted when he was 15 years old.” As Mamola put it, “Yes, an aspiring broadcaster was fired for something he did 14 years ago as a minor.” The resulting conversation “has mainly focused on whether the punishment fits the crime, which, by the way, isn’t a crime at all.” He also wrote, “Anyone can tweet whatever they wish. It’s a free country, and there’s free speech, but people have come to understand the consequences that can come with what they post.” But that focus should shift, he said. “The focus should be more on the Portland Trail Blazers and the double standard in their hiring process. If tracing social media isn’t a priority when you make a hire, why does social media from before you hire become an issue that warrants firing someone afterwards?”

ANALYSIS The Federalist, Christopher Jacobs — The Trump administration began rolling out $90 Medicare rebates to seniors this week, a decision that “undermines the program they claim to protect.” When thinking about it “on many different levels,” Jacobs continued, sending the payments “doesn’t make much policy or political sense.” Also, there’s the reality that seniors who are enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans, which is most of them, “can’t qualify for the rebates.” So, “the payments represent yet another wealth transfer from younger generations to seniors” — and “contrary to popular opinion, no, this isn’t a case where seniors had ‘earned’ this payment.”

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ANALYSIS Status, Oliver Darcy — Disney and the FCC went to federal court on Tuesday. Disney’s legal team argued “that the agency’s unusual early review of eight ABC station licenses amounts to political retaliation and a broader threat to press freedom—and urging a federal judge to block it.” Disney also “contended that FCC chairman Brendan Carr has used regulatory power to punish the network over editorial decisions and coverage criticized by Donald Trump, creating a chill over programming choices.” In fact, “Beth Wilkinsonwent as far as to liken ABC’s situation to living under the guillotine during the French Revolution, arguing that the network is constantly watching its editorial decisions for fear of provoking government retaliation.”

Digiday Daily, Jim Cooper & Sara Jerde — Happy Advertising Week New York, first of all. Digiday has been on it. Today’s letter says that in the hallways and hotel lobbies populated by attendees, the biggest off-the-record chatter centers on Apple. Along with its mid-September iOS 27 release, the tech giant started cutting off ad-tech companies that track users across the web, picking up its long-running war with the digital advertising industry. QUOTE  “Ad execs at Advertising Week want to know one thing: are they on Apple’s block list?”

ADWEEK Daily, Lauren Johnson — The subject line on this letter was initially confusing: “Ferrero Goes Big on Sports.” Ferrero like… the chocolate company? Well, yes! It’s actually about sports-pegged advertising. The European confectioner is committing $50 million to sports marketing next year, booking two commercial spots in Super Bowl 2027 for Nutella and Kinder Bueno after Kinder Bueno saw a massive 140% sales volume surge following its Big Game debut in February. QUOTE  “It may only be October, but the Super Bowl is already around the corner for some of us.”

Axios Media Trends, Sara Fischer — Newsletter news! Local TV titan Sinclair is launching a subscription-focused national news brand on Substack titled The National Press. Partnering with New Media—a startup founded by veterans of Bari Weiss‘s The Free Press—the network will launch with free and paid tiers. QUOTE  “It’s a huge bet for the family-controlled local news giant as it looks to build trust and loyalty among users beyond the TV screen.”

Simon Owens’s Media Newsletter, Simon Owens — One of Skydance’s recent confirmations that HBO Max and Paramount+ will eventually merge into a single streaming platform. Mashing together distinct subscriber bases, complex licensing rights, and two massive content libraries into one cohesive brand poses serious technical and branding headaches, but that’s mergers for ya. QUOTE  “Skydance has officially confirmed that HBO Max and Paramount+ will become a single streaming service in the future… It remains to be seen whether that would include the creation of a new streaming service to host both of their libraries, perhaps named after Skydance, or if Paramount+ could come to host HBO Max’s library of movies and TV shows, or vice versa.”

Breaker, Lachlan Cartwright — Former Wall Street Journal managing editor Marcus W. Brauchli offered a reality check on Ellison’s promises to safeguard CNN’s editorial independence under Skydance. Drawing on his own experience during Rupert Murdoch’s takeover of Dow Jones, Brauchli labeled such executive pledges as “mostly symbolic.”

The Ankler’s The Wakeup, Sean McNulty — WNBA regular season television ratings delivered strong growth across major broadcast partners, rising 17% year-over-year on ESPN and 9% on CBS. Moreover, the recent first-round playoffs were the most-watched the league has ever had, averaging 1.3 million viewers over the 10 games spread across ESPN, Amazon Prime Video, and USA Network. QUOTE  “…although we’ll see if that continues into the 2nd round with Caitlin Clark’s INDIANA FEVER now out of the mix (and driving the biggest TV audience in that first round).”

Barrett Media’s Morning Edition, Jason Barrett — Barrett Media released its annual ranking of the Top 20 Local Radio Advertisers for the year. The results reflect votes from 144 executives spanning 61 media organizations across broadcast radio, podcasting, and ad agencies to highlight the key brands driving local audio revenue. Not going to spoil it for you. Get to clicking. QUOTE  “Lists are subjective, We recognize that. There is no perfect system for presenting a collective snapshot of an industry. However, recognizing businesses, brands and individuals who invest in the audio industry matters as much as celebrating those who create content and connect with listeners. Our goal is to showcase the best of the audio advertising industry as recognized by media sales, management, and business professionals.”

Breaker, Lachlan Cartwright — The Ringer’s Editor-at-Large Bryan Curtis launched a new media newsletter, Now They Tell Us. The newsletter will hit at the intersection of sports, media, and pop culture. Yes, One Sheet has subscribed and will be including it in the stack going forward.

Morning Brew — Billionaire Warren Buffett is spending his evenings in retirement in a pretty understandable way: going down YouTube rabbit holes with videos like Uzbekistan’s Got Talent clips.

Breaker — Filmmaker John Waters once famously advised, “If you go home with somebody and they don’t have books, don’t f*ck them.” Remember when Strand had all that merch with the quote on it? A new Washington Post report suggests singles took all those tote-bag slogans to heart: whether or not a potential partner reads has started become a top dating dealbreaker.

The Ankler’s The Wakeup — Microdrama app ATWIST is leaning into Halloween with a wildly eclectic slate of celebrity shorts: Mario Lopez in Honey, I Think Our House Is Haunted, Paris Hilton in Unboxing the Killer Doll, and Jesse Tyler Ferguson directing Theater Kids vs. Zombies.

WHAT GOT MISSED?

Status, Oliver Darcy — Yahoo “announced a major reorganization,” Darcy reported, per “a memo from chief operating officer Matt Sanchez that was obtained by Status.” He added, “As part of the shuffle, Yahoo News will move into Yahoo Media Group, which currently houses Yahoo Finance and Yahoo Sports. Yahoo News head Kat Downs Mulder is leaving the company.”

Status, Oliver Darcy — Status has been up and down One Sheet today, something that certainly merits a NOTD nod. In addition to the team’s reporting on Ellison and Skydance, there are plenty of compelling kernels embedded throughout today’s newsletter. On the Skydance side, the company announced “Laurene Powell Jobs, Ynon Kreiz, and Bobby Kotick as directors. The company also added Tony Blair as an advisor.” Elsewhere, Darcy noted that 60 Minutes “topped 10 million viewers for the first time this season, drawing a strong 10.2 million for its Sunday broadcast and posting its strongest audience since March.” There’s plenty to take a gander at in today’s Status.

This newsletter was produced by Lindsey Ellefson.

The post The Media Grapples With the Reality of Skydance as Entertainment Megamerger Enters Day 2 first appeared on Mediaite.

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