Westworld is another casualty in the game David Zaslav is playing at Warner Bros. Discovery, though it seems like it’s not all on Zaslav on why Westworld is ending as it looks like the masterminds behind the series opted out of making a fifth season for a lot cheaper.
THR reports that showrunners Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan saw an offer to produce a fifth season on a reduced budget for Warner Bros. Discovery’s own upcoming FAST platform but decided to pass.
For those who don’t know, a “FAST (Free Ad-supported Streaming TV)” is the new way companies are selling their AVOD (ad-supported video on demand) content. These services usually come with no subscription fee but do contain ads. Think of something like FreeVee, Roku Channel, or Pluto TV.
With Westworld ratings reportedly having fallen from 1.8 million an episode to a horrid 0.03 million viewers for the fourth season, Zaslav and WBD opted to cut its losses and felt they could use the show as a FAST tax write-off. An unnamed source tells THR, “The FAST service would allow them to have their cake and eat it, too. Get the write-off of pulling the show from the main service and do something new with it, too.”
While there’s no longer a fifth season of Westworld in the works, the actors for the show will still receive pay. As for the showrunners, Joy and Nolan have already moved on to crafting a Fallout adaptation over on Amazon.
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