Good morning,

It was an incredible week in these parts: Matt Belloni investigated all the machinations of Netflix’s $83 billion deal for Warners; Eriq Gardner considered the attendant regulatory conundrum; Dylan Byers captured the panic and euphoria within the remaining cable entity; Kim Masters documented the fate of Rush Hour 4; Scott Mendelson crunched the numbers on Zootopia 2’s China windfall; Julia Alexander detailed Amazon’s stealth streaming Vulcan chess; Bill Cohan studied the Epstein–Leon Black epistolary correspondence; Lauren Sherman got to the bottom of the Dario Vitale–Miuccia Prada mess; Rachel Strugatz detailed an Ulta Beauty sob story; Sarah Shapiro ventured into O.C. mall country; John Ourand assessed the fallout of the MLS-Apple divorce; Ian Krietzberg contextualized Trump’s latest A.I. fantasy; and Marion Maneker offered a talmudic reading of the $2.2 billion New York auction sales.

Meanwhile, Julia Ioffe threw the book at Pete Hegseth; Leigh Ann Caldwell measured Mike Johnson’s biological clock; Peter Hamby uncovered the Trump endorsement trap; and Abby Livingston surveyed the lessons from Tennessee.

Check out these stories, and others, via the links below. And stick around for the backstory on how it all came together.

A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR

Under RFK Jr., the Department of Health and Human Services is making decisions based on politics, not science. Gutting funding for rural hospitals, cutting resources for public school health programs, and canceling childhood vaccine grants causes chaos and confusion for patients and doctors alike.

Tell Congress to put health above politics.

Lauren Sherman gathers the tea on the Prada-Vitale beef.
and…
Rachel Strugatz investigates the Milk Makeup saga.
meanwhile…
Sarah Shapiro runs a channel check in the O.C.

Marion Maneker presents a data-fueled deep dive on the November auction results.

Matt Belloni provides the definitive analysis of the Netflix-Warners deal, and Eriq Gardner scrutinizes the regulatory conundrum.
and…
Kim Masters explains the Ellisons’ Rush Hour 4 fallacy.
meanwhile…
Julia Alexander reveals Amazon’s stealth path to streaming dominance.

Ian Krietzberg pores over Trump’s quixotic Genesis Mission.

Dylan Byers offers a final reflection on the Nuzzi–Lizza wars and documents some of the Zaz fallout.

John Ourand and MLS commish Don Garber review the Apple deal.
and…
Julia Alexander puts the 4 Nations Face-Off and Emirates Cup in perspective.

Bill Cohan shares CliffsNotes for the Epstein–Leon Black correspondence.

Leigh Ann Caldwell charts the House G.O.P.’s mounting woes.
and…
Peter Hamby untangles the Trump endorsement paradox.
and…
Julia Ioffe dissects the most recent Pete Hegseth nightmare.
and…
Abby Livingston uncovers a Mamdani aftershock.

Jim Kelly counts down the books of the year.
and…
Lorie Teeter Lichtlen remembers the heyday of the Concorde.

Dylan and Julia Alexander count their Spotify Wrapped revelations on The Grill Room.
and…
Ourand and Yahoo’s Ross Dellenger predict college football’s next economic shifts on The Varsity.
and…
Lauren and Sky High Farm Brands C.E.O. Daphne Seybold discuss the mission-led brand game on Fashion People.
and…
John Heilemann and retired Lieutenant General Mark Hertling enumerate Hegseth’s blunders on Impolitic.
and…
Matt and Bloomberg’s Lucas Shaw debate Netflix’s embrace of theaters on The Town.
and…
Peter and Leigh Ann weigh in on the G.O.P.’s midterm blues on The Powers That Be.

As a reminder, you can update your profile at any time to get more stories like these directly in your inbox. Click here to customize your email settings.

One of my favorite qualities about my partner Lauren Sherman is her punctiliousness. To wit: She usually delivers the earliest drafts of Line Sheet, her industry-defining private email devoted to the inner workings of the fashion business, the night before the issue is set to run. Occasionally, I’ll be tempted to look at a new draft the moment it arrives—perhaps while I’m distracted at a business dinner, or catching up on loose ends at home, preparing for the next day. Otherwise, as an early riser, I peruse her copy first thing in the morning—somewhere between the Moccamaster, double drop-off, and Peloton Tread.

But Line Sheet is also a dynamic, vibrant brand within Puck. On Thursday morning, as I was reading Lauren’s Inner Circle edition on the challenges within the multibrand retail game, she messaged the team that major news was afoot. Prada, which recently consummated its acquisition of Versace, had just defenestrated its new and popular creative director, Dario Vitale. She was switching gears ASAP. I encouraged her to plow ahead.

A MESSAGE FROM OUR SPONSOR

Under RFK Jr., the Department of Health and Human Services is making decisions based on politics, not science. Gutting funding for rural hospitals, cutting resources for public school health programs, and canceling childhood vaccine grants causes chaos and confusion for patients and doctors alike.

Tell Congress to put health above politics.

I’ve long worked adjacent to the fashion business, but Lauren has been a true steward of my education. And one of her great and enduring lessons has been about the industry’s multilayered operating model. On one hand, these are some of the largest multinational conglomerates within the public markets. On the other, fashion is a personal product—a reality that often bleeds into the boardroom. And Vitale, a former Miu Miu designer, had history with the Prada family, for better or worse.

In The Brief, Wondrous Appointment of Dario Vitale, Lauren explains the beef between the designer and his old boss. Was Vitale, who recently drew raves for his first Versace collection, going to be a sacrificial lamb as part of this $1.4 billion deal? Had his departure from Miu Miu created a personal animus that rendered his future employment at the mothership unsustainable? “I’ve never seen something like this happen before, and I am not sure we will again,” Lauren wrote. “For now, though, let this be a lesson about the industry and how it might stand 10 years from now. There will be dozens of essays and Instagram posts about the tragedy of Vitale’s exit, citing the lack of patience and foresight among executives. But when it comes down to it, this is an emotional business, and an emotional product: Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. But you’ve got to take risks.”

As you surely know, the Vitale affair wasn’t the only major news to come across the transom on Thursday. That evening, Netflix and Warner Bros. Discovery agreed to a historic $83 billion deal that has become an obsession here at Puck. More than a decade ago, current Netflix co-C.E.O. Ted Sarandos famously uttered his succinct business strategy to become HBO before his rival could emulate the streamer. Now, in a fitting denouement, Netflix appeared to have eaten its erstwhile rival whole.

As the news hit, my partner Matt Belloni pivoted topics for his extraordinary What I’m Hearing newsletter and delivered the definitive word on the deal—at least as it stands at this moment. (God only knows if the Ellisons will go hostile and take a larger per-share bid directly to shareholders…) Is the Netflix-Warners Deal Really Such a Disaster?, his masterstroke summation of the deal, is the quintessence of Puck: brilliant, funny, charming, provocative, persuasive, and impactful to industry constituents and onlookers, alike. I couldn’t recommend it more.

Of course, the WBD saga has been one of the leitmotifs of Puck. Both companies came to market around the same time, and not every media observer at the time predicted that we’d gracefully outlast them. And yet, the final stages of this deal will become a fitting preoccupation. In fact, it’s already become one. Peter Hamby and Eriq Gardner dissected Netflix’s forthcoming regulatory scrutiny in Can Trump Kill the Netflix-WBD Deal? Dylan Byers weighed in with the view from RemainCo with CNN’s Bari Christmas. And the peerless Bill Cohan will have more tomorrow. (Sign up here to make sure you read his extraordinary private email, Dry Powder.)

After all, the WBD saga touches on all the power centers of Puck—it’s a story about insurgent technology, legacy media, regulatory scrutiny, and deal flow. And, like the Prada-Vitale beef, it’s personal, too. It is, indeed, perhaps the greatest business story of our time, and precisely what you can always count on to read about at Puck.

Have a great weekend,

Jon

Need help? Review our FAQ page or contact us for assistance. For brand partnerships, email ads@puck.news.

You received this email because you signed up to receive emails from Puck, or as part of your Puck account associated with {{customer.email}}. To stop receiving this newsletter and/or manage all your email preferences, click here.

Puck is published by Heat Media LLC. 107 Greenwich St., New York, NY 10006