Marvel and D.C. comics might have dominated entertainment for the best part of two decades, but the next generation of entertainment hits will come from anime and the video game worlds, Sony Pictures Television chair Keith Le Goy has predicted.
In a keynote interview yesterday at MIPCOM, Le Goy was bullish about his studio’s chances of tapping into the growing demand for anime and games, titles thanks to its ownership of streamer Crunchyroll and its sister games biz, Sony Playstation. He added it was “becoming increasingly clear” that the sands are shifting in terns of IP trends.
“The U.S. comic book IP of Marvel and D.C. [is] not going away, but they don’t have the absolute pole position prominence that they had before,” said Le Goy, who is Chairman, Worldwide Distribution and Networks at Sony Pictures Entertainment. “What is going to drive the next phase of IP is anime and IP. Sony is uniquely well positioned given our strengths in anime as a producer, with Crunchyroll, our relationships with Japanese creators, and in video games through PlayStation, and its relationship with games producers.”
Le Goy pointed to Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Infinity Castle, the Crunchyroll film that has become the biggest ever Japanese film at the box office. Internally, Sony had predicted the film had predicted the film would be a success, but were still surprised by how much it has popped.
“The last movie had done very well, and the last seasons of the show have been a leading-two performing show on Crunchyroll,” said Le Goy. “As we saw it rolling out from Japan across Asia, we knew we had something special. Two of the leading five movies this year at the global box office – Minecraft, which is based on a game and the other Demon Slayer – just shows the power of video games, anime and track that is really engaging and inspiring audiences.”
He also pointed to how The Last of Us and Twisted Metal had cut through for HBO and Peacock, respectively, as examples of video game IP rising. Sony Pictures Television is a producer on both, and owner/publisher on the rights.
Elsewhere in the chat, Le Goy had the MIPCOM audience chuckling when he addressed how Sony has broadly avoided being subject of a M&A chatter that continues to follow some of its Hollywood rivals. “We pride ourselves on being boring,” he quipped, addressing “one of those massive changes that the business does from time to time.
“There is a lot of M&A activity,” he added, which was creating a “moment of significant change and chaos” in the entertainment business. “When there is chaos and transformation in the market, we are in place where we can take advantage with that.”
He pointed to how Sony had acquired Crunchyroll from AT&T when the telco was looking to reduce debt. “That has been an incredibly successful transaction for us,” he said. “Building it and putting it together with Funimation was a very powerful service that really super-serves a passionate audience.”
Hollywood is currently watching how Paramount’s pursuit of Warner Bros Discovery plays out. Sources here in Cannes say most are expecting a offer to be thrashed out, and many are questioning how more M&A will impact the market going forward. Le Goy predicted there would be “opportunities for M&A whether, frontline or from what shakes out’ elsewhere, but didn’t go into specifics.
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