Streaming and the Power of the Prequel

Solo and Prometheus were the most notable prequels in recent times. The Phantom Menace, Attack Of The Clones, and Revenge Of The Sith blasted on to our cinema screens in the mid 1990s and in 1986 we experienced the origins of the feud of the Ewings and the Barnes' in Dallas: The Early Years. Outside of these, it's hard to really pinpoint any other notable prequels. For the past 30 years the power of the sequel has permeated pop culture....that is until now.

The rise of streaming as an industry unto itself has changed many things about global film & TV - not just the content we watch, but HOW we watch it. The plethora of content choices is only paralleled by the number of ways we can watch our content and more importantly WHEN we watch our content. The direct-to-consumer (D2C) industry has given more power to the consumers than ever before and whilst some analysts have stated TV has reached or is reaching its saturation point, our thirst for content has only increased and the competition for the subscriber dollar has never been more fierce than it is now. The basic fundamentals of the streaming business are subscriber acquisition and subscriber retention and in this high inflationary environment coupled with rising interest rates, retaining subscribers has never been more vital.

Intellectual Property Franchise Management (IPFM) has been the point of differentiation in such a content rich environment. IPFM has been the game changer for Paramount+ as the Yellowstone prequels 1883 and 1923 have taken centre stage in the TV drama stakes. More prequels in development/production based on the Yellowstone IP are 1883: A Bass Reeves Story, and rumours of another - 1944. Amazon's The Power of The Ring, and HBO's House of the Dragon provided audiences with incredible TV moments last year and other notable franchises have begun to follow suit with recent announcements of a prequel series for IT - Welcome to Derry, and Wonder Woman - Paradise Lost. In December 2022 Netflix aired The Witcher: Blood Origin.

Taylor Sheridan has created not just a TV story world but a Yellowstone TV UNIVERSE with Yellowstone, 1883 and 1923 and the popularity of those prequels has only continued. 1923 has been renewed for a second season. At HBO, House of the Dragon season 2 began production last week.

But why? Why the popularity? Audience driven, strategy and innovation driven, story driven, driven by necessity to provide new content but from an already successful source material? Is it the desire to see more drama on our screens that we have not seen for many years that broadcast TV can no longer provide as it too struggles for relevance in amongst the onslaught of streaming and the tight advertising margins? And what of digital-gaming IPFM as we could well start to see origin stories on our gaming consoles as well as TV for Assassins Creed, James Bond and Halo...to name a few.

One thing is for sure - the power of the prequel has certainly arrived on our screens and doesn't look to be slowing down anytime soon.