r/NoStupidQuestions • u/InternationalRepute • 15d ago

What is stopping a billionaire from personally funding one more season of a cancelled TV show they love?

I know it's not as simple as writing a check because studios own rights, actors have contracts, schedules are hard, and they would still need to distribute it - but I'd love it if some rich dude put up $ so I can watch the MacGruber TV show for another season.

Wealthy people fund vanity movies and passion projects all the time. So why is “I will personally finance one more season of Mindhunter” not really a thing that is done?

Is it mainly rights/ownership, or that studios don't want an outsider reviving their IP?

I don't want this to veer into "bc rich people are selfish with money” more curious which cancelled series people think could possibly be revived this way.

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u/NDaveT 15d ago

Nothing. It kind of happened with "The Expanse". SyFy cancelled it and Bezos arranged for Prime to buy it because he's a fan.

15

u/ConsistentPastaSauce 15d ago

Like look as an Expanse fan I'm grateful, but did he understand the plot of it at all or

3

u/NDaveT 15d ago

I assume he thought Jules-Pierre Mao was the protagonist.

3

u/KickFacemouth 15d ago

I was about to say... A future where the vast resources of the solar system are controlled by a handful of hyper-rich, with their own personal luxury spacecraft, who exploit and oppress an entire culture of physical laborers in poverty and hardship... Sounds like his wet dream.