If there’s one thing Hollywood has never lacked, it’s ego. But even by Hollywood’s inflated standards, Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison’s latest move lands somewhere between hubris and full-tilt delusion.

Paramount Skydance’s hostile takeover bid for all of Warner Bros. Discovery—yes, the entire thing—is the kind of stunt you pull when you’ve convinced yourself the industry is a sandbox and every legacy studio is a toy you’re entitled to own. Ellison has spent months trying to buy WBD at ever-increasing numbers, and each rejected offer seems to have driven him deeper into his own reflection, whispering that only he can “save” the business. Now, backed by his father’s fortune, Middle Eastern sovereign wealth funds, Jared Kushner’s investment vehicle, Tencent, and a mountain of borrowed money, he’s decided that if he can’t win WBD’s heart, he’ll buy the whole body instead and call it fate.

This isn’t leadership. It’s narcissism with a term sheet.

Paramount Skydance vs. Netflix: Who Hurts Filmmakers?

And yes, let’s get this out of the way: the Netflix deal is deeply concerning. Extremely concerning. Anyone who works in entertainment—or cares about art, physical media, or the preservation of cinema—knows Netflix acquiring Warner Bros.’ studio, HBO, and HBO Max is a recipe for vanished archives and even more consolidation-driven erasure. Netflix has canceled finished films and pulled originals, but filmmakers could still shop their work to other buyers. Warner Bros., under David Zaslav, went a step further—killing completed projects for tax write-offs and burying them permanently. Asking them to be stewards of Warner Bros. is like asking someone who keeps losing their keys to manage the National Archives.

But even with those worries, Ellison’s scorched-earth tantrum is its own flashing red warning sign. Paramount Skydance swears its offer is “superior” because it’s all cash and allegedly faster. Please. That sales pitch collapses the second you clock the $24 billion from foreign sovereign wealth funds (Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Abu Dhabi), the Kushner money (always a great omen), Tencent’s involvement, and a $54 billion debt grenade waiting to explode on impact. Ellison claims none of this should spook regulators because the foreign investors won’t have governance rights. Right—because history is full of examples where massive ownership without oversight turned out beautifully.

Who Really Pays the Price

This is not about shareholders, workers, or Hollywood’s future. It’s about Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison wanting his name etched onto the Warner Bros. water tower. It’s an ego project masquerading as a strategic vision, the corporate equivalent of a kid pounding on a locked door because he believes the party can’t start without him.

Meanwhile, what gets lost in all of this billionaire chest-thumping is the actual human cost. Entire divisions. Thousands of jobs. HBO—one of the last sanctuaries of premium storytelling on television. The Warner Bros. film library, one of the most valuable and culturally important in history. Newsrooms, unions, production crews, creatives whose livelihoods don’t hinge on bragging rights or vanity acquisitions. They are the ones who get trampled when executives play empire.

And let’s not pretend the geopolitical financial cocktail behind Ellison’s bid is no big deal. Netflix may be flawed, but its funding sources aren’t a grab bag of sovereign wealth funds and political dynasties looking for leverage. Paramount Skydance’s backers read like the guest list for a national-security panel, not a media strategy session. The industry doesn’t need new puppet strings. It needs stability.

If Warner Bros. Discovery must be acquired—and the fact that this is even on the table is a scathing indictment of modern entertainment economics—then the buyer should be someone capable of stewardship, not someone auditioning for the role of “visionary mogul” in his own biopic.

Paramount Skydance’s Ellison may genuinely believe he’s the hero of this story. But from where I’m sitting, this looks less like a rescue mission and more like the hostile takeover of common sense.

And if Warner Bros. is choosing between Netflix and Paramount Skydance’s debt-soaked, geopolitically tangled vanity project? Even with all my reservations, I can’t blame them for not returning Ellison’s calls.

You don’t pick the deal you love. You pick the one you can survive.

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