What discovery+ Titles are Likely to Be Included, Excluded from Merged HBO Max Streaming Service?
With Warner Bros. Discovery recently announcing plans to keep discovery+ as a standalone streaming service while also merging a large percentage of its content library with HBO Max into a yet-to-be-named service, customers are faced with the question of which shows will cross over from one service to the other, and what titles will remain discovery+ exclusives.
While WBD plans to move most of discovery+’s shows, specials, and movies to a combined streamer, a certain amount of content needs to remain on discovery+ in order up its value beyond just being cheaper than the eventually combined service. While it’s already been confirmed reported that “Shark Week” content and shows from the Magnolia Network will live on the platform (Magnolia programs are already part of HBO Max), it’s unclear what else will be. So what shows will be included and excluded from the new, merged Warner Bros. Discovery streamer?
What discovery+ Shows Could Move to the New WBD streaming Service?
‘Naked and Afraid’ and Its Spinoffs
With HBO’s proclivity for more adult content, it seems like this scintillating survival show may be too perfect of a match to cross over. And with the popularity of “Naked and Afraid” combined with the existence of its spinoff, “Naked and Afraid XL,” this show is a great gain for any network. Do they dare air an un-blurred version of the series?
discovery+ also is currently the home for the spinoff dating series “Naked and Afraid of Love” which could fill the extremely adult dating show gap on the service left by WBD licensing “FBoy Island” to Tubi and Roku.
Naked and Afraid
What happens when you put two complete strangers - sans clothes - in some of the most extreme environments on Earth? Each male-female duo is left with no food, no water, no clothes, and only one survival item each as they attempt to survive on their own.
Guy Fieri’s Entire Series Archive
When it comes to the world of TV food shows, no name shines quite as brightly these days as Guy Fieri. The frosted-tipped chef and host’s brand of culinary expertise, passion for food, and Vegas-style showmanship is incredibly entertaining.
Starting with the now iconic “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives,” Fieri has become a nearly omnipresent figure on the Food Network and discovery+ and the breadth and depth of his series would add a lot of bingeable hours to the new service. In addition to “Triple D,” there is also “Guy’s Grocery Games,” “Guy’s Ultimate Game Night,” “Tournament of Champions,” “Guy’s All-American Road Trip,” and many others. With the recognizability of the celebrity host combined with the easy watchability of his series, adding the Flavortown library to the service would be — as Fieri says — “out of bounds” (but in a good way).
Guy’s Grocery Games
Guy Fieri sends four talented chefs running through the aisles in a high stakes, high skills, grocery store cooking competition. The chefs are hit by real-world challenges like finding workarounds when all the essential ingredients are suddenly “out-of-stock” or having to create a masterpiece when you can only cook with “5 items or less” or on a $10 budget. In the end, the food does the talking, as the last chef standing has the chance to make some serious dough!
Family-Led Home Renovation Shows Set in Small Towns
“Fixer Upper” is the show that started it all for Chip and JoAnna Gaines, leading to the launch of Magnolia Networks. The perfect way to complement the Magnolia programming on the unified service would be to bring the spiritual successors of “Fixer Upper” along as well.
For example, “Fixer to Fabulous” follows Dave and Jenny Marrs as they restore historic homes in and around Bentonville, Ark. It has a comfortable combination of home renovation and country cuteness that will draw in a wide assortment of viewers, especially those already predisposed to enjoying Magnolia programming
Though not officially under the Magnolia umbrella, other series that followed the “Fixer Upper” model of heart-warming home renovations like “Hometown,” “Hundred Day Dream Home,” and “Unsellable Houses” would fit in perfectly as complements to the type of home reno shows that will make the move to the new service from HBO Max.
Fixer to Fabulous
Dave and Jenny Marrs are a couple who renovate and sell historic houses in their hometown of Bentonville, Arkansas.
‘Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy’
This recently canceled CNN show has so much going for it. From its recognizable and extremely charismatic star to its exotic and beautiful locations to the smorgasbord of delicious foods, this would feel like a can’t-miss for Warner Bros. Discovery.
Staley Tucci is a five-time Emmy-winning — and Oscar and Tony-nominated — actor who has multiple films currently streaming on HBO Max. Adding his celebrated travel and cooking show to the new streaming service would hit a number of important, prestige quadrants for WBD. It’s unfortunate for Tucci and his fans that the series was canceled at CNN amidst a change in focus at the cable channel, but this future unified service would not only be a great home for the series library, but future seasons as well.
Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy
Stanley Tucci travels across Italy to discover the secrets and delights of the country’s regional cuisines.
Baking Championship Series
Through Magnolia programming and other Max Originals, including “Brie’s Bake Off Challenge” and “The Big Brunch,” there will already be cooking and baking shows on the upcoming combined service. Perhaps the perfect way to bring a vast library of similar shows to the streamer would be for it to include the many seasons of the Food Network’s flagship baking competitions.
From “Spring Baking Championship” to “Halloween Baking Championship” to “Holidays Baking Championship” to “Kid’s Baking Championship,” discovery+ has 265 episodes to offer the new streamer — not counting other ancillary spinoffs like “Spring Baking Championship: Easter.” Though competitive in nature, these series fit more naturally into the same vein as “The Great British Baking Show,” which has been an important addition to Netflix’s library for years. These creative contests are filled with the type of tasty, feel-good competition that streaming viewers tend to routinely flock to.
Spring Baking Championship
Eight bakers compete, preparing delicious springtime desserts for the chance to win the grand prize of $50,000.
Which discovery+ Shows Shouldn’t Make the Jump to WBD’s New Streamer?
‘Planet Earth’
The extensive nature documentary series is one of the most popular and educational titles on discovery+, and the streamer may see reason to keep this catalog of BBC produce, David Attenborough-narrated looks at the beauty and wonder of our planet to itself.
Even if HBO Max were to occasionally get some “Planet Earth” titles for a limited time on a rotational basis, the entirety of the series would be worth keeping to discovery+. While they are a different type of documentary series that what otherwise appears on the service, the “Planet Earth” programs fit nicely amongst the reality, unscripted fare that dominated discovery+.
Though the elevated nature of the titles could allow them fit in amongst HBO Max’s additions to the service, keeping some of that high-quality content on discovery+ should certainly draw some extra eye balls to the service.
Planet Earth
David Attenborough celebrates the amazing variety of the natural world in this epic documentary series, filmed over four years across 64 different countries.
‘House Hunters’ Franchise
This extremely popular and long-running series is an iconic part of HGTV and exemplifies what viewers love about discovery+. There have been 204 seasons of the flagship “House Hunters” series amounting to nearly 1,800 episodes, and that is not factoring in the series’ 17 official spinoffs including “House Hunters International,” “House Hunters on Vacation,” “House Hunters Renovation,” “House Hunters: Million Dollar Homes,” and more.
With that many episodes, “House Hunters” is an ideal candidate to remain a discovery+ exclusive. WBD executives have long talked of the lifestyle streamer as being a source of “lean-back” content, where viewers could turn on the service and let it familiar, comforting content play while only having to somewhat pay attention to appreciate the program. That is the opposite of the often high-stakes “lean-forward” style of shows currently found on HBO Max.
So, keeping the entire “House Hunters” cinematic universe on discovery+ feels like a great way to attract a certain subset of viewer looking for exactly what the service has to offer.
House Hunters
Hosted by Suzanne Whang, the show takes viewers behind the scenes as individuals, couples and families learn what to look for and decide whether or not a home is meant for them. Focusing on the emotional experience of finding and purchasing a new home, each episode follows a prospective buyer and real estate agent through the home-buying process, from start to finish.
‘90 Day Fiancé’
This drama-filled reality series is one of discovery+’s most popular offerings, and with its extensive back-catalog as well as its numerous spin-off series, which includes “90 Day Fiancé: Happily Ever After,” it offers discovery+ a way to draw in a very different type of viewer than some of its more family-friendly fare.
Also, this “basic-cable” type of dating and romance show would feel out of place, and well… “basic” when put on a platform next to some of the Emmy-winning, high-brow titles that other arms of Warner Bros. Discovery would bring to the service. So, letting this admittedly guilty pleasure remain as a discovery+ exclusive feels like it could be a good choice.
90 Day Fiancé
Getting through customs is just the beginning. With just 90 days to wed on a fiancé visa, follow international couples as they attempt to overcome cultural barriers and family drama while in search of true love that knows no borders.
“MythBusters”
MythBusters ran on the Discovery Channel from 2003-16 before moving to corporate sibling Science Channel from 2017-18. This show that blends entertainment, urban legends, stunts, and science is a huge part of the Discovery brand. The show’s fun and intellectually curious vibes fit in perfectly with the family-friendly corner of the discovery+ library.
Plus, by keeping possession of one of the most well-known brands means under the Discovery umbrella, discovery+ will be able to stake a claim to the legacy that it is bringing from cable to streaming.
MythBusters
MythBusters is a science entertainment television program created and produced by Australia’s Beyond Television Productions for the Discovery Channel. The show’s hosts, special effects experts Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, use elements of the scientific method to test the validity of rumors, myths, movie scenes, adages, Internet videos, and news stories.
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discovery+
discovery+ is a video streaming service that offers more than 70,000 episodes of 2,500+ current and classic shows from several popular TV brands including Discovery, Investigation Discovery, HGTV, TLC, Food Network, A&E, Lifetime, and History.
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Max
Max is a subscription video streaming service that gives access to the full HBO library, along with exclusive Max Originals. There are hubs for content from TLC, HGTV, Food Network, Discovery, TCM, Cartoon Network, Travel Channel, ID, and more. Watch hit series like “The Last of Us,” “House of the Dragon,” “Succession,” “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” and more. Thanks to the B/R Sports add-on, users can watch NBA, MLB, NHL, March Madness, and NASCAR events.
