Hollywood Is Dead: Why AI Destroys The Industry In 12 Months

The movie star is extinct. They just don't know it yet.

I looked at the box office numbers from last month. It’s a bloodbath. Massive budgets. Zero return. Marvel is tired. Disney is bleeding.

Everyone is blaming "superhero fatigue." They are wrong.

The problem isn't the costumes. It’s the math.

The traditional studio model is a dinosaur staring at a meteor. That meteor is Generative AI. And it makes impact in 12 months.

I’ve spent the last decade analyzing media trends. I’ve never seen a disruption this violent.

Here is why Hollywood collapses next year.

The Economics Are Broken

To make a blockbuster today, you need $200 million. You need another $100 million for marketing. You need 5,000 people on a payroll. You need three years.

That is a gamble. Studios are betting the house on every single release. When one flops, people get fired. When two flop, studios merge.

Now look at the alternative.

I spoke to a creator yesterday. He uses Midjourney for storyboards. ElevenLabs for voice. Runway for video.

His budget is $60. His team is one person. His timeline is three days.

Is his quality at IMAX level yet? No. Is it good enough for an iPhone screen? Yes.

That is the metric that matters. Most content is consumed on a six-inch glass rectangle. Hollywood is optimizing for a canvas that nobody looks at anymore.

Tyler Perry just halted an $800 million studio expansion. He saw OpenAI’s Sora. He did the math. He realized he doesn't need to build sets. He just needs to type.

When the billionaires stop building physical studios, the industry is over.

The Gatekeepers Have No Keys

For 100 years, Hollywood sold permission.

You needed permission to pitch. Permission to cast. Permission to distribute.

Agents. Executives. Distributors. A line of people saying "No."

The barrier to entry for high-end visual storytelling has dropped from $50 million to a monthly subscription.

This terrifies the industry. It should. Their value proposition was access to capital and equipment. Capital is now irrelevant because the equipment is software.

We are about to see the "YouTuber-ification" of cinema. A 19-year-old in a basement in Ohio will make a sci-fi film that looks like Dune.

He won’t need Warner Bros. He won’t need a union crew. He won’t need a permit to film on location.

He will prompt. He will render. He will publish.

The monopoly on "looking expensive" is gone. When everyone looks expensive, the only thing left is the story. Hollywood forgot how to tell those years ago.

The Death of the "Asset"

Actors are assets. Sets are assets. Props are assets.

In the old world, these were scarce. You had to fly Tom Cruise to Dubai. You had to build the Titanic.

In the new world, these are just data.

I’ve seen the contracts. Studios are already scanning background actors. They pay them once. They own their digital likeness forever.

This is the tip of the spear.

Soon, you won’t license a movie. You will license the actors' data packs. "I want to watch a rom-com starring a young Harrison Ford and Marilyn Monroe."

The unions are striking against this. They are fighting gravity. You cannot strike against code.

The physical production supply chain—catering, trucking, set design, makeup—is about to evaporate. If you work in physical production, you need a pivot plan. Now.

The Prediction: The Era of Infinite Content

Here is the hard truth nobody wants to say.

We are moving from "Shared Culture" to "Personalized Culture."

Right now, we all watch the same Game of Thrones. We talk about it at work. It is a water cooler moment.

That ends.

In 12 months, streaming services will shift. They won't just host files. They will generate them.

You will log into Netflix. You won't browse a library. You will talk to a bot.

"Show me a mystery movie. Set in Tokyo. Cyberpunk style. Make the detective cynical. Make it 90 minutes."

There is no box office. There are no opening weekends. There is only retention.

We will lose the ability to have a shared cultural language. We will gain the ability to see exactly what we want, instantly.

The studios that try to fight this will go bankrupt. The ones that become "AI Platforms" will survive.

Hollywood isn't a place anymore. It's a server farm.

If you could generate a sequel to any movie right now, what would it be?