The Outside Scoop's State of the Union

As Scott Mendelson's Substack enters year 02, a note on some slight changes (he says optimistically, even though announcing ahead of time is a surefire way to court doom)

Should old acquaintance be forgot.

By Sunday morning, we will have entered year two of The Outside Scoop. The site began on December 5, 2023. My youngest ended up home from school, so the Monday, Dec. 4 curtain-raiser got pushed to Tuesday. That sums up the year in terms of having less time than I hoped to write and running into unexpected scheduling snafus. Some of that is self-imposed, of course, but all in all a solid first year in terms of reacquainting myself to the old ways in a new format and in an industry just starting to stop self-sabotaging itself.

As noted on Thursday, I am thankful that theatrical has recovered to at least an extent that I can whine about a mediocre Disney animated sequel scoring massive opening weekend box office without feeling the need to add, “But thank goodness, because theaters have been dying.” I’d like to think the *final* phase of the great theatrical recovery, one *without* arbitrary or distributor-imposed stops-and-starts and barren periods, began in June with Bad Boy: Ride or Die and Inside Out 2. I’d like to think that, sans likely labor stoppages, no new pandemics and amid an industry finally realizing that streaming can’t be an all-purpose solution, 2025 will be the first year since 2019 where theatrical is not fighting with one arm behind its back.

Yes, we could see new problems as once-mighty franchises like Mission: Impossible, Jurassic World and the Marvel Cinematic Universe underdeliver compared to 2010s standards, and lord knows what the next Trump term will bring about, whether directly related to the industry or not. No, I don’t think we're going to automatically see a flurry of mergers and acquisitions, at least not right away. Nor can I predict how the industry will conduct itself (not just Disney) when a random pissed-off “Truth” post from the wrong person could very well spark tangible regulatory — or threats of regulatory — action. We could see a situation where every major film has the potential to become “the next The Interview.” But that’s a speculative, hopefully hyperbolic if-and-when concern.

More money = More emails = More value?

As we enter the second season of this endeavor, with the intention of running longer than your average streaming show, I am hoping to make modest changes in terms of what I write and how I write it. My fear of bombarding folks with emails has led to me arguably covering less of the industry and fewer as-they-happen industry stories than I had intended. The choice always seemed to be “giant day-long essay” or “giant day-long newsletter.” So, starting Monday, I’m going to hold my breath and hope most of you don’t mind more Outside Scoop emails on a regular basis. If you do, then I sincerely implore you to just ignore the ones you don’t care about.

No, that doesn’t mean I’ll be popping out five articles, and thus five emails, a day. But it does mean that if the day and my available time justify as much, you might get a surplus here and there throughout the week. You also might go a day without if there’s a longer piece that I’d want to spend two days digging into. Also, the headlines are going to be a little more “ignore the SEO” because I miss being silly. Unless it’s a straight news hit, in which case I might give you a news headline and hope that you actually want to hear my naval-gazing take on it. I assume since this is a subscription-driven platform, that it is mostly true.

Consequently, starting Sunday, December 1, subscriptions will run $7 for the month, $70 for the year and $175 for the “founding members.” I promise to be much more diligent about weekly paid subscriber chats, especially once I know my oldest’s school schedule. I also might set up a Patron for the site for those who (as seems to be the case for more than a few people) want to support the work without actually signing up for the Substack. I can’t promise tiers and T-shirts. Reviews will be free, as will The Box Office Podcast. The weekend box office reports will also start being… somewhat less paywalled to account for weekends where it’s best just to re-up the Friday analysis with updated numbers and stats.

On social Media-ing and Podcasting.

I’ll still play around in social media; yes, I’m on BlueSky more than Twitter and Facebook/Meta these days. But the ins and outs of dropping a post on those two still useful platforms have become a chore unto itself. So, I’ll just go back to sharing the link the old-fashioned way. If it gets buried by the algorithm, so be it. As such, sharing will be essential, especially for non-paywalled posts. My wife says I should be on TikTok. Perhaps if I can figure out how to not be that embarrassing, almost 45-year-old, balding white guy lecturing the kids on the industry. I assure you no dancing, no lipsyncing and no thirst traps, although using my cats as engagement bait is a line I’m willing to cross.

The Box Office Podcast will continue, albeit without Ryan Scott participating in every single episode. He has chosen to step back as a regular co-host, so we’ll start figuring out the right combination of guest journalists and guest industry folks to fill that fourth chair while we determine if we want a permanent fourth co-host. It worked for The Daily Show, and Leslie Jones has an open invite here as well. We may have ended up killing off a major character at the end of season one, but it was the kind of “fell off a cliff into the rocky shores below” demise that won’t require shower scene shockers and “the last twenty episodes were all a dream” retcons. Ask your parents about that one.

Beyond that, well, it’ll be business as usual for The Outside Scoop. To those of you who signed up and (especially) paid up, a hearty thank you and a hope that you’ll stick around during the critical new season of this enterprise. As evidenced by everything from Saw to the Star Trek movies to Lost and The X-Files, the second season/first sequel is the one that defines the series as a whole and gets deep into the mythology. Season one was about set-up, character introductions and copious monster of the week episodes. To quote a famous threequel baddie, the real game begins now. Here’s hoping that season two A) is better than season one and B) avoids the prototypical grimdark second-season finale cliffhanger.