HBO Max Will No Longer Produce Live-Action Kids And Family Programming

HBO Max has canceled its comedy Gordita Chronicles, a move the streamer says is motivated by a change in strategy at its parent company.

The show, which centers on a 12-year-old Dominican girl (Oliva Goncalves) in 1980s Miami, debuted its full first — and now only — season on June 23. An HBO Max spokesperson said in a statement that the show fell victim to a change in priorities for the streamer.

“Live-action kids and family programming will not be part of our programming focus in the immediate future, and as a result, we’ve had to make the very difficult decision to end Gordita Chronicles at HBO Max,” the statement reads. “The series earned critical acclaim and a loyal following, and we are proud to have worked with creator Claudia Forestieri and our two powerhouse executive producers, Eva Longoria (who also masterfully directed the pilot) and Zoe Saldaña, to bring Cucu’s journey to the screen. We thank them and the talented cast and crew for creating such a heartfelt, groundbreaking show that connected deeply with a very important demographic.”

Sony Pictures Television produced the series, which creator Forestieri based on her own life. The cast also includes Diana Maria Riva, Juan Javier Cardenas, Savannah Nicole Ruiz, Noah Rico, Cosette Hauer and Dascha Polanco. Brigitte Muñoz-Liebowitz served as showrunner.

“We are heartbroken by the larger programming changes at HBO Max that will not allow our special show that is Gordita Chronicles, showrun by Latinx comedy powerhouse Brigitte Muñoz-Liebowitz, to have a second season at its original home,” executive producers Longoria and Saldaña said in a statement. “As producers and storytellers who are continually seeking out the authentic and original stories that highlight our community’s joy and talent, we are so proud to have worked on this piece of magic. We continue to be blown away by the overwhelmingly positive critical response coupled with our growing audience numbers, which prove that viewers recognize the importance of this show’s existence and the crucial space it is filling for Latinx content in the media landscape.”

Since HBO Max’s parent, WarnerMedia, and Discovery completed their merger in the spring, Warner Bros. Discovery has made a number of changes in strategy, most notably at its cable channels TBS, TNT and TruTV — where an ongoing move away from original scripted programming has accelerated. The company is all-in on a streaming first strategy, but family programming hasn’t had a huge presence in the two-plus years of HBO Max’s existence. WBD will continue with development of animated projects aimed at younger viewers via its Cartoon Network and Warner Bros. Animation arms.

HBO Max has also gone one and done with a Head of the Class reboot, and a decision on The Garcias, a follow-up to the 2000-04 Nickelodeon series The Brothers Garcia, has yet to be made. HBO Max has renewed its Gossip Girl redo and just debuted Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin, both of which are aimed at young adults.

Forestieri, Muñoz-Liebowitz (via her Bons Mots Emporium), Longoria (via her UnbeliEVAble shingle) and Saldaña (via Cinestar Pictures) executive produce Gordita Chronicles along with Josh Berman, Jennifer Robinson and Chris King of Osprey Productions and Cinestar’s Mariel Saldaña and Cisely Saldaña.

Credits: Deadline

The Controversial History Of WWE's Most Prestigious Wrestlers, The Fabulous Moolah

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Roundups #79: Eragon Live-Action Series In Development For Disney+, iCarly Renewed On Paramount+ For Season 3 And Upcoming Disney Channel Series Hamster And Gretel Gets Season 2 Renewal

Eragon coming to Disney+

Disney+ is developing a live-action television series adaptation of Eragon, based on Christopher Paolini’s popular YA book series The Inheritance Cycle. Eragon is the first book in the series.

Paolini will co-write the series and executive produce with Bert Salke executive producing via his Co-Lab 21 banner as part of his deal with Disney Television Studios. 20th Television is the studio.

In the series adaptation, a teenage boy becomes magically joined with a newly-hatched dragon. Together, they must learn what it means to be dragon and Rider as they fight in the resistance against a tyrannical king.

iCarly remains active

iCarly fans can breathe easy: It appears the major Creddie cliffhanger at the end of Season 2 will be resolved. Paramount+ said Wednesday that it has renewed the hit revival series iCarly for a third season. Production will get underway later this year for a 2023 premiere on Paramount+.

The original iCarly series, produced by Nickelodeon, ran from 2007-2012. Starring Cosgrove, Trainor, Kress and Jennette McCurdy, it followed a group of best friends creating a webcast while grappling with everyday problems and adventures. During its original run, iCarly became a pop-culture staple and regularly broke viewership records among audiences of all ages.

iCarly is produced by Nickelodeon Studios and is executive produced by Ali Schouten-Seeks (Young & Hungry, Diary of a Future President) and Cosgrove, with Schouten serving as showrunner. Trainor, Kress and Alissa Vradenburg (The Simple Life) serve as producers.

Upcoming show gets season 2 on Disney Channel

Hamster And Gretel is the upcoming new cartoon on Disney Afternoon Mornings on Disney Channel along with Big City Greens,Amphibia,The Owl House Specials,The Ghost And Molly McGee and Moon Girl And Devil Dinosaur and we have more exclusive news

3 months ago series writter Jim Bernstein confirmed that the series will debut in 2022 after that we got contacted by Jim and he told us thats the expected date for the crew to air, but the month and day is still to be decided by Disney.

Yesterday Dan Povenmire answered some questions on Tik Tok where he answered that the series is coming in 2022, however month is still to be decided, our best bet is Fall 2022 like The Ghost And Molly McGee with a Season 2 Renewal, Chibi Tiny Tales, Soundtrack, Guest Star List and Disney Channel FanShop Merch.

New WWE Network Series Premiering Amidst SummerSlam Weekend

WWE took to YouTube earlier today to release the trailer for their new upcoming show on the WWE Network and Peacock TV. The show is called “This is Awesome” and will focus on moments in WWE’s past that made fans shocked, totally speechless, and even brought to tears.

This is Awesome will be hosted by Greg Miller and different WWE superstars as they go back and check out moments throughout WWE history that made the WWE fans chant, “This is awesome!” Some potentially awesome moments were referenced in the trailer as we saw glimpses of Ric Flair vs. Shawn Michaels at WrestleMania 24, ‘Macho Man’ Randy Savage, and Ms. Elizabeth’s wedding, TLC 2, and The Rock vs. Hollywood Hulk Hogan.

 

This is Awesome will join shows already on the WWE Network and Peacock TV, such as WWE Evil, Ruthless Aggression, Table for 3, and Stone Cold’s Broken Skull Sessions. How many episodes we will see, how long each episode will be, etc., is unknown, as not much is known about the series beyond the premise.

For those who don’t know Greg Miller, he is an internet celebrity and voice actor, best known for his time in IGN, where he hosted some of their podcasts, most notably, Up At Noon. Miller also started his own YouTube channel, GamesOverGreggy, which he and a couple of his former IGN coworkers rebranded to Kinda Funny. Kinda Funny is also the name used for the company that Miller and his coworkers started in 2015. Miller also has voice-acted in many video games, namely the Lego games. He appeared in Lego Marvel Superheroes 2 as Howard the Duck, Lego DC Super-Villians as Polka-Dot Man, and Lego Marvel’s Avengers as the voice of Aldrich Killian. Miller has also provided voice work for Oddworld: Soulstorm and The Solitaire Conspiracy.

WWE’s “This is Awesome” debuts on Peacock TV in the US and the WWE Network everywhere else this Friday.

Marvel Reveals Phase 6 MCU Plans, Including 2 New Avengers Films

After beginning its Saturday Comic-Con panel by revealing that Phase 4 will end with this year's Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Marvel Studios blew through Phase 5 announcements, right into its post-2024 plans with some Phase 6 updates.

Yes, that's right, we got updates on three Marvel Cinematic Universe phases from Marvel.

Similar to The Infinity Saga -- the name given at the end of Phase 3 to refer to the first phases of films -- the next trio now has a name of its own (thanks in part, we assume, to Kang!): The Multiverse Saga.

 

Just three films were shown onscreen during the Phase 6 announcement, however, including two Avengers films:
•Fantastic Four will release Nov. 8, 2024
•Avengers: The Kang Dynasty on May 2, 2025
•Avengers: Secret Wars on Nov. 7, 2025

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige told Deadline after the panel that the Russo brothers aren't involved with the next Avengers project. Feige also declined to name the "thematics" of the announced phases, telling Deadline that the studio doesn't usually like to discuss each phase until it's complete, because "all of our stories are both interconnected and hopefully stand apart."

We may also get more insight into those open dates at D23 this September, but for now, we might as well bask in the possibilities. Earlier in panel, Marvel announced its Phase 5 schedule as well:
 

•Ant-Man & The Wasp: Quantumania : Feb, 17, 2023
•Secret Invasion (Disney Plus show) : Spring 2023
•Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3: May 5, 2023
•Echo (Disney Plus show) : Summer 2023
•Loki, season 2 (Disney Plus show): Summer 2023
•The Marvels: July 28, 2023
•Ironheart (Disney Plus show) : Fall 2023
•Blade: Nov. 3, 2023
•Agatha, Coven of Chaos (Disney Plus show, name changed from Agatha: House of Harkness): Winter 2023-24
•Daredevil: Born Again (Disney Plus show) : Spring 2024
•Captain America: New World Order : May 3, 2024
•Thunderbolts: July 26, 2024

We'll have a lot of Marvel to get through in the coming years.

Russia's RT Channel To Launch South African Hub

Russia's RT channel has embarked on expansion plans in Africa, starting to set up headquarters on the continent in South Africa where the Kremlin-funded TV channel is carried and supported by China.

Paula Slier, the South African TV reporter who previously worked for SABC News and who was posted in Jerusalem, Israel, as RT's correspondent for that region, is now overseeing the set-up of RT's African headquarters in South Africa and will be managing the bureau.

On Monday an RT spokesperson told News24 ; "We are indeed currently focused on developing our English-language Africa hub in South Africa, headed up by Paula Slier – a South Africa native, RT's longtime correspondent and formerly head of RT's Jerusalem bureau".

"We will be releasing more updates about the particulars of this operation at the appropriate time," RT said.

 

According to an insider, the RT South African newsroom is currently being set up although it's still unclear how many South African staff, camera operators and reporters RT plans to hire as it takes a page from the playbook of what other global TV news channels like CNN International, Al Jazeera, BBC World News and China's pro-Beijing CGTN have done in Africa.

The African expansion of Russia's state-backed TV channel comes amid Russia's unprovoked invasion and ongoing war in Ukraine and widespread global condemnation of the pro-Russia and anti-Ukraine misinformation and propaganda on the channel over the past few months.

RT banned by EU
Earlier this year RT was banned by the European Union (EU), as well as in Canada and in the United Kingdom by Britain's broadcasting regulator Ofcom.

Imposed EU sanctions also meant that RT abruptly went dark in South Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa on 2 March. This was the date when Luxembourg-based companies like Intelsat and SES SA flipped the kill-switch on the satellite uplinking of RT's channel feed to their satellite transponders like Intelsat's IS-20 on which a pay-TV operator like the Randburg-based MultiChoice leases bandwidth to bring the channel to DStv subscribers.

 

Google and other companies also blocked the propaganda channel's YouTube streaming.
Two-and-a-half months later, RT surprisingly flickered back on South African TV screens on 11 May – this time thanks to Chinese support.

The MultiChoice pay-TV rival, StarTimes Media – running the StarSat pay-TV service in South Africa and StarTimes elsewhere in Africa – added RT to its TV channels line-up in mid-May, using SES S.A.'s SES-5 satellite transponder on which StarTimes/StarSat is leasing space.

SES S.A. is a satellite and terrestrial telecommunications network provider also based in Luxembourg in Europe. SES S.A. told News24 that it "engaged with European regulatory bodies to suspend the distribution of specific Russia Today channels and Sputnik across Europe" and had turned off the designated signals on 2 March.

"While the channel in question – Russia Today Global – is being delivered via SES-5 (a satellite that SES owns) over sub-Saharan Africa, it is our customer who has leased our bandwidth and is distributing the channel over the leased capacity."
"SES also notes that this channel is not one that has been banned by the European Union."

 

"We have been engaging with our customers and regulatory authorities to assess both what we can do and must do under the various legal regimes to which we are subject. SES is prepared to take immediate action and implement any instructions we receive from regulatory authorities,” the company said.

StarTimes told the press in May that as a pay-TV service it "takes pride in sourcing relevant and current content to enhance our packages, thus we regard RT Global as a 24-hour English-language news channel that focuses on all major economic, political and social issues of our time".

Move from Kenya to SA
While RT's original plan was to get a localised foothold on the African continent by establishing its African bureau in Nairobi, Kenya where the African headquarters of China's CGTN has also been set up and based for the past few years, RT has now switched from the East African country to South Africa where it won't be directly competing with CGTN for newsroom resources.

It's unclear if RT's move away from Kenya to South Africa to set up its first localised African hub is possibly a tit-for-tat move to get out of CGTN's way, after StarTimes' decision to sign a channel carriage agreement to showcase RT on channel 260 of the Chinese pay-TV platform.

In February RT still posted adverts for journalist positions who would have had to work and be based in Nairobi.

The RT spokesperson didn't comment on the African location change, how many South African staff RT plans to hire, or why RT is interested in creating a regional headquarter in Africa.