On Thursday, February 26, 2026, the long-simmering battle for control of Warner Bros. Discovery reached its dramatic conclusion. In a move that has sent shockwaves through Hollywood and beyond, the Warner Bros. Discovery board abandoned its earlier plans to sell the company to Netflix, instead embracing a rival takeover bid from Paramount Skydance. The decision, announced late Thursday, followed months of aggressive maneuvering, with Paramount ultimately offering $31 per share and agreeing to pay a staggering $2.8 billion breakup fee to Netflix to clear the path.
The stakes in this high-profile media merger are immense. According to reporting from Free Press, Paramount’s bid was not only financially superior but also politically charged. President Trump had openly expressed his preference for the company to end up in the hands of David Ellison—Paramount’s owner—and his influential father Larry Ellison, a well-known supporter of Trump’s MAGA movement. This backing added a layer of controversy to an already heated contest, raising concerns about the future of independent journalism and the broader media landscape.
Craig Aaron, co-CEO of Free Press, minced no words in his assessment of the deal’s dangers. “The Netflix deal was disastrous but this new one is even worse,” Aaron said in a statement on Thursday. “The idea that Paramount should be allowed to control CBS and CNN should be unthinkable, especially given their record of turning the Tiffany Network into a trash heap.” Aaron’s warning was dire: “The Ellisons have already promised the Trump administration that they’ll make sweeping changes to CNN given the chance, and we know what that means: firing journalists, spiking important stories, and replacing the news with empty propaganda.”
The numbers behind the deal are eye-popping. Paramount’s final offer valued Warner Bros. Discovery at more than $110 billion, a figure that reflects the company’s vast library of intellectual property—think Harry Potter, Batman, and a slate of hit TV shows like “The Pitt,” “The White Lotus,” and “Abbott Elementary.” The prize for Paramount is clear: a chance to transform its shrinking core television business, which includes CBS, Comedy Central, and MTV, and to revitalize its struggling Melrose Avenue movie studio. Paramount itself reported a $339 million operating loss in the fourth quarter of 2025, including $500 million in restructuring costs following David Ellison’s Skydance Media takeover in August.
For Warner Bros. Discovery, the past year has been anything but smooth. The company reported a $252 million quarterly loss for the final quarter of 2025, a figure that included a $1.3 billion write-down tied to ongoing restructuring charges from its 2022 merger with Discovery. Revenue fell 6% to $9.46 billion, with its traditional cable channels suffering a 12% drop to $4.2 billion. The loss of TNT’s NBA contract further dented advertising income, and adjusted earnings from linear channels dropped 27% to $1.4 billion. Despite these setbacks, there were bright spots: Warner’s streaming platforms, HBO Max and Discovery+, saw some growth, and 2025’s box office releases like “Sinners,” “Weapons,” and “A Minecraft Movie” generated $4.4 billion in theatrical revenue.
Still, the company’s legacy of debt looms large. Warner Bros. Discovery is saddled with $33.5 billion in debt as of February 2026, a direct consequence of the 2022 merger. CEO David Zaslav, who took the reins from AT&T nearly four years ago, acknowledged the challenges but remained upbeat during a Thursday call with analysts. “Our goal for Warner Bros. Discovery has been to make this great company the most innovative and exciting place to tell stories in the world,” Zaslav said. “Looking at 2025, it’s clear we fulfilled our ambition.” Yet the numbers told a more sobering story: movie and TV studio revenue dropped 13% to $3.2 billion, with adjusted EBITDA down 23% to $728 million.
As the dust settles, the impact on workers and the industry is becoming painfully clear. According to Free Press and Los Angeles Times reporting, thousands of entertainment workers have already lost their jobs amid ongoing reductions and a slowdown in film production in Los Angeles. The prospect of further cuts looms large, with Paramount expected to make deep reductions to satisfy Wall Street backers. “While a few Hollywood execs and sovereign-wealth fund managers in the Middle East might get rich from this deal, thousands and thousands of American workers will lose their jobs,” Aaron warned. “Allowing more mergers in the already highly concentrated movie business will harm filmmakers and industry workers when Paramount delivers on its promise to make deep cuts.”
The political implications of the deal are equally fraught. President Trump’s vocal involvement in the bidding war—at one point threatening Netflix to fire Susan Rice from its board or “pay the consequences”—has fueled fears about the future of press freedom and editorial independence. Aaron’s statement captured the anxiety felt by many in the industry: “This deal endangers our democracy by giving a family of pliant billionaires even more control of vast swaths of our news coverage, TV stations and movie studios.”
For Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders, the bidding war has been a financial boon. The company’s stock was trading at around $29 per share on Thursday, up from about $12 last summer—a 63% increase in value since Ellison launched the bidding in September, according to CEO Zaslav. “Our board continues to lead a rigorous, highly competitive and thorough sales process,” Zaslav said, noting that the company had held talks with four prospective buyers and received eight price increases over the course of the auction. Shareholders are set to vote on the preferred outcome by March 20, 2026.
But for those who work in the industry or care about the integrity of news and entertainment, the consolidation is a cause for alarm. The winner of this contest, whether Netflix or Paramount, will inherit not only Warner’s assets but also its burdens: more than $60 billion in combined debt and a mandate for years of retrenchment and cost-cutting. As Zaslav bluntly put it, “We canceled a lot of movies and a lot of [TV] series when we first got here. We canceled a lot of stuff ... that we didn’t think was going to be successful.”
With the deal all but sealed and the March 20 vote looming, industry watchers, workers, and free expression advocates are left wondering what the future holds. The Paramount Skydance takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery marks a new era of media consolidation—one that could reshape not just the business of entertainment, but the very nature of news, storytelling, and democracy itself.