Disney Wants The TV Rights Back To STAR WARS After Selling Them to Turner Broadcasting

With Disney about to launch their streaming service, they want to be able to include all the Star Wars films on it for their subscribers. The only problem is... they already sold the TV rights to the Star Wars films to Turner Broadcasting and they need to get them back before that can include the films on their streaming service!

Bloomberg reports that Turner Broadcasting holds an 8-year deal for the movie to air on channels such as TBS and TNT. Disney is hoping to reclaim the rights to Star Wars, but it's not going to be cheap! You see, Turner paid $275 million in 2016 for the eight films in the Star Wars saga that have been made so far. Turner has the rights to air the films on its cable networks and online until 2024, and it's said that not only would they want financial compensation but replacement content as well should it sell.

Sources say that Disney has already made a “preliminary inquiry” but was met with resistance from Turner. Obviously Disney didn't know they would be launching a streaming service when they sold the TV rights of Star Wars to Turner. Now they are having sellers remorse.

According to the report, talks haven’t really advanced beyond the first initial inquiry. I'm sure that Disney is trying to figure out what they could offer Turner to get the rights to those films back. It'll be interesting to see if they can actually make a deal to get the TV rights to Star Wars back. If not, Disney is just going to have to wait.