I completely agree. I suspect that we’re seeing them trying to avoid the sunk cost fallacy, but there may be political decisions there, too. My partner was in the industry, and there’s a lot that goes on (literally in this case) behind the scenes.
I was more just observing that what we might be seeing (on a much smaller scale) is the .com collapse when the free money dried up. I don’t think it’s going to be as big a dislocation as that was, but I do think that studios will both increasingly look to either bundle with other services or license their content out to third parties (like Netflix), as well as draw down some of the more speculative investments.
Personally, I want to live in a world where Our Flag Means Death gets made and studios take chances on shows like Hello Tomorrow, but I do suspect that a new balance is going to have to be discovered.