South Park has been in the midst of some major licensing turmoil for the past few months following the end of its streaming deal with Warner Bros., but the series has found and exclusive streaming home with a major new deal. South Park has been stuck in the middle of some major legal issues as when the streaming deal with Warner Bros. came to an end, Paramount had prepared to add the series as a new streaming platform for its classic and future episodes. But thanks to its upcoming merger with Skydance, there were some unexpected issues there as well.
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That’s all seemed to have come to an end as South Park creators Trey Stone and Matt Parker have signed a new deal with Paramount for the series’ future. This includes $300 million USD paid each year so that Paramount+ can be the exclusive streaming home for South Park’s episodes according to a new report from the Los Angeles Times. The deal has not been entirely finalized, but fans will be able to check out the new episodes with its new streaming home in the future.
What’s Going on With South Park?
According to the terms of this new deal, Paramount will be paying to $300 million USD each year for South Park’s exclusive streaming rights across a span of five years. This will mean that in total South Park’s library has been valued at $1.5 billion USD across this new deal. Notably as part of the new deal, Park County have also agreed to produce ten episodes a year. This likely also means that the specials that had been released over the last few years will be coming to an end as well as it was Paramount’s way of getting new content outside of the Warner Bros. deal.
Though South Park had been temporarily streaming with HBO Max following the end of the licensing deal with Warner Bros., there was reportedly an attempt to potentially stream the series as a non-exclusive with both HBO Max and Paramount+. Talks of this potential path forward had fallen through over the weekend, and Paramount then proceeded to go for this new deal all on their own. With both South Park Season 27’s premiere and their San Diego Comic-Con 2025 appearances fast approaching, it’s likely that Paramount and Skydance wanted to reach an agreement.
What’s Next for South Park?
South Park Season 27 is set to premiere its first episode this evening, Wednesday, July 23rd. New episodes of the animated series used to then be available for streaming with HBO Max shortly after their premiere, but it’s currently unclear as to where these newest episodes are going as of this time. With this deal still being finalized, it’s likely we won’t see these newest episodes hit Paramount+ until after the rest of the library makes its way to the platform in the United States. There have been some other concerns from fans as well.
South Park’s episodes had been suddenly removed from international versions of Paramount+ in the past few weeks in the midst of these licensing deal talks, and the new season was even delayed as a result of all of it as well. But it seems like these episodes are steadily being re-added back to the international platforms ahead of its shift in the United States. There are still even more questions, however, such as whether or not episodes will be banned from the streaming service. But thankfully, it seems like all the turmoil will be coming to an end soon.
HT – Los Angeles Times
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Image Courtesy of TOHO
