Noticed fewer big premieres on streaming in the last couple of years? After years of production halts, things are finally starting to pick up.
Streaming during the the covid pandemic was a party. Major series arrived one after another, and many films premiered directly on streaming platforms.
Several factors fueled the surge, not least the rise of new streaming services trying to take on Netflix, while cinemas around the world were forced to shut down.
Covid and Hollywood strikes
In the years that followed covid, the party gave way to long waits for new seasons of shows like Stranger Things, The White Lotus, The Last of Us, Severance, and The Mandalorian (which is instead being turned into a film).
The pandemic from 2020 to 2022 brought filming to a standstill, with crews unable to work together either locally or abroad for extended periods.
Then, in 2023, came the Hollywood strikes, once again freezing TV and film production for nearly half a year.
These two events disrupted both ongoing and upcoming projects. It resulted in a massive production backlog that needed clearing before anything resembling normal output could resume. When series and films get delayed, it cascades through the schedules of actors, directors and crews.
Around the same time, the industry's rapid growth began to cool, prompting most streamers – except Netflix – to scale back content spending.
It is little wonder then that 2023 and 2024 have felt more like a hangover than the party streaming was before and during the pandemic.
Stranger Things returns soon on Netflix. Here's a first look at the fifth – and final – season. Photo: Netflix
The outlook is finally improving
Signs of recovery have already begun to show in 2025, and the outlook is clearly improving across both streaming platforms and cinemas. Now and in the coming months, we will see some of the biggest premieres in years.
This summer, Disney+ is rolling out several major series and films, including The Bear, Ironheart and Alien: Earth. (HBO) Max is also regaining momentum with new seasons of HBO hit shows, and soon a Harry Potter series. Netflix's slate speaks for itself, with Stranger Things 5, Squid Game 3 and Wednesday.
The top executive of Apple TV+ puts it plainly:
- "I finally feel like we're at the point where our slate hasn't been impacted by the strikes or by COVID," Eddy Cue, SVP of Services at Apple, told Hollywood media outlet Variety in June.
Also read: Apple TV+ announces new movies and series – and first 'haptic' trailer
Big movies are also making a strong return to the big screen, with titles like A Minecraft Movie, Thunderbolts*, Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning, F1: The Movie, Jurassic World: Rebirth, and not least Avatar: Fire And Ash.
It is not just production capacity that has returned. The willingness to invest is back too, with the effects expected to become even more visible in the second half of 2025 and 2026.
