Media

Paramount Skydance announced on August 14, 2026, that it has received all required regulatory approvals across 68 countries for its approximately $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, including a final clearance from Mexico. A July 24 court-filed stipulation covering a California-led 12-state antitrust lawsuit and a Writers Guild case bars the deal from closing until five days after a merits ruling or June 1, 2027, whichever comes first, with a 12-day trial scheduled to begin March 2, 2027. The regulatory finish line is confirmed; whether the merger closes depends entirely on that litigation outcome.

Netflix and EverWonder Studio filed a combined anti-SLAPP strike and Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal motion on August 14, 2026, seeking to eliminate all five claims in Tyra Banks's federal lawsuit over the America's Next Top Model documentary, with a hearing set for October 30 before Judge André Birotte Jr. in Los Angeles. Banks alleges that editing her roughly three-and-a-half-hour interview down to about 16 minutes created false implications about her knowledge of and response to an alleged assault of former contestant Shandi Sullivan. No ruling has been issued, and a discrepancy between the docket's case-specific briefing deadlines and the Central District's standard local-rule intervals remains unresolved.

The End of Oak Street earned $8.1 million on Friday from 3,446 theaters, putting its three-day domestic opening on track for roughly $20 million — within Warner Bros.' own projection of $18 million to $23 million but at the low end of earlier trade tracking of $20 million to $25 million. The film received a B CinemaScore and carries a reported production budget of $80 million to $92 million net. If the estimate holds, it would be the studio's eighth consecutive 2026 release to open below $40 million domestically, compared with seven straight openings above that threshold in 2025.

Dentsu Group's updated Mid-Term Management Plan targets the elimination of 70–80 international entities in FY2026, with a further 50–80 under consideration by FY2028, continuing a consolidation that already halved its international entity count from over 1,000 between 2021 and 2026. The company also aims to reduce Global HQ costs by approximately 30% versus its FY2026 plan, with savings partly redirected to AI and Data & Technology investments. Financial targets for FY2028 include a 16% operating margin and 0–1% full-year organic growth guidance for FY2026, with the plan using the qualifiers 'around' and 'consider' for the entity-reduction figures.

On 14 August 2026, France's Constitutional Council struck down Article 1 of a law that would have barred children under 15 from social media platforms starting 1 September 2026, ruling the blanket prohibition disproportionate and insufficiently protective of privacy because it would have required all users, including adults, to prove their age without adequate legal safeguards. The Élysée has tasked the Prime Minister with drafting a constitutionally sound replacement, with a political target of spring 2027, but no replacement bill has been filed and no operative date confirmed. The ruling also highlights tension with EU Digital Services Act requirements, which prohibit processing additional personal data solely to verify a user's age.