Sesame Street Removed By HBO Max
Sesame Street is one of the most beloved children's programs, and now it is being cut by HBO Max, as the content purge continues to remove popular shows.
This article is more than 2 years old
HBO Max has been suffering some huge losses lately. The Warner Bros. Discovery merger has caused many headaches for the streaming platform, but that is not the end of it. HBO Max will officially be going away as of summer 2023. Based on the short time that we have left with the popular streamer, the purging of programs has begun. The world was shocked to find out that Batgirl has been given the ax. Well, now even worse news has come about. Sesame Street is officially being removed from the streaming platform.
HBO Max has been purging its content by a larger margin, and now some 200 episodes of Sesame Street have disappeared off the streaming platform overnight. We do understand that there are a ton of episodes still available, but now the fan-favorite children’s show has a huge chunk of missing episodes from the earlier seasons. We are not sure if people are watching episodes from back in the 1960s, but some homes will no longer have that option. Also, it has been reported that several Sesame Street specials have been pulled as well. This is a huge loss for homes that have been accustomed to showing their children arguably one of the biggest programs that appeal to kids.
The reasoning behind so many programs and episodes being cut from HBO Max has everything to do with the streaming platform being combined with Discovery+. This action is set to take place in the summer of 2023. While we don’t understand why programs are going to be cut, it could have to do with licensing issues, and this new super streaming platform focusing more on reality show content. That is what Discover+ is mostly comprised of, and there was a rumor floating that Warner Bros. Discovery would be laying off most of its scripted content team. This is terrible news for most of the programs on HBO Max, but Sesame Street is still supposed to air its newer episodes through 2025.
The agreement to keep Sesame Street on HBO Max is clearly not going the way it was initially intended. Though there was an establishment agreement set in place, removing 200 episodes does not look good for the long-running series. However, the older episodes being taken down could be to save some money, while the new HBO Max and Discovery+ platform only stream the newest episodes. Either way, the content being taken down is going to severely damper the hope that HBO Max is going to keep anything older on the platform.
HBO Max has been dumping plenty of content over the past two weeks, and it is likely we are going to see more of that happening. Batgirl was the first of the newest DC content to go away, and now tons of children’s programming is being cut too. Also, HBO Max has been the home of the Harry Potter film series, and those movies are leaving too. We are not sure what is going to happen in the new few months, but if Sesame Street isn’t safe, then nothing is
