Warner Bros. Puts Itself on the Auction Block In $40B Thirst Trap Aimed Squarely at the Ellisons

“5 billion, 5 billion, 5, do I hear 6? 6 for Barbie, Batman, and 40 billion in debt. 6, 6.5, David Ellison jumps in at 40, 40 going once, 40 going twice, sold to the nepobaby in the back!”

That’s about the energy pulsing through Warner Bros. Discovery (+9%) this week after the studio all but yelled “We’re open for business!” to Hollywood’s biggest spenders.

The home of Barbie, Batman, and one of the most expensive balance sheets in Hollywood ($40 billion in debt, to be exact) says it’s received “unsolicited interest” from multiple buyers. Translation: Zaslav’s out here doing everything short of waving a “Take Me, Daddy Ellison” banner over Burbank.

CEO David Zaslav (a man who’s been on a Dave Ramsey bender all year) confirmed the company is expanding its “strategic review.” Which in Lawyereze means: We’re not saying we’re for sale… but like, if Netflix (or David) wants to take us out to Ruth’s Chris, we’ll hear them out.

Earlier this year, Zaslav announced plans to split the company into two… Warner Bros. (housing the studio and HBO Max) and Discovery Global (home to CNN and everyone’s favorite shark documentaries). The idea was to unlock more value by separating streaming from old-school cable. But then David Ellison and Paramount-Skydance slid into their DMs with a lowball offer, and suddenly everyone in Hollywood started eyeing Warner Bros. like an estate sale.

(Source: The Hollywood Reporter)

Now, Netflix and Comcast are both peeking over the fence… though Netflix has made it clear they don’t want to touch “legacy media” assets (translation: no one’s fighting over Wolf Blitzer). Still, even if they’re not ready to buy, they’d rather see Warner Bros. end up in a museum than in Paramount’s hands.

And that’s the thing… whoever lands WBD gets the ultimate collector’s set of franchises: Harry Potter, The Dark Knight, Game of Thrones… the Park Place, Boardwalk, and Jail of pop culture.

Zaslav claims the breakup’s still happening (“mid-2026 or bust”), but between the lowball bids and Wall Street hitting the “BUY” button again, I’m starting to wonder if he’s just enjoying the attention.

And let’s quit playing dumb… Zaslav, Ellison, and everyone with a functioning frontal lobe knows exactly how this ends. This whole “strategic review” is just foreplay to make David jealous enough to go beg Daddy Larry for a few extra billion. Expect the headline soon.

At the time of publishing this article, Stocks.News holds positions in Netflix as mentioned in the article.