Why the Paramount-Skydance Merger is "F*cking Up ‘South Park’"

The Town with Matthew Belloni

The Ringer

Society & Culture

4.3 • 847 Ratings

🗓️ 7 July 2025

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Matt is joined by Bloomberg’s Lucas Shaw to discuss the standoff between ‘South Park’ creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker and Paramount amid the looming merger between Paramount Global and Skydance Media. They break down the details of this public fight, why the new season of ‘South Park’ is delayed, and how the Trump-Paramount settlement could affect this situation (03:23). Matt finishes the show with a prediction about Jesse Eisenberg potentially returning for the sequel of ‘The Social Network’ (26:23). For a 20 percent discount on Matt’s Hollywood insider newsletter, ‘What I’m Hearing ...,’ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠click here⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. Email us your thoughts! ⁠⁠⁠[email protected]⁠⁠⁠ Host: Matt Belloni Guest: Lucas Shaw Producers: Craig Horlbeck and Jessie LopezTheme Song: Devon Renaldo Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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0:00.0	If you care about Hollywood, and I assume you do if you're listening to the town, you should really be getting the whole story about Hollywood.
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1:06.2	It is Monday, July 7th.
1:08.8	Amid all the hoopla and the hand-wringing over the paramount sale to Skydance,
1:13.5	most of it involving the FCC and the president and CBS News,
1:17.5	the settlement we talked about last week,
1:19.2	there is another fight playing out behind the scenes of this merger,
1:22.4	with billions of dollars implicated.
1:24.8	It involves South Park, the 28-year-old Comedy Central show that was supposed to premiere
	...

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