RIP the original live-action Spider-Man. ALSO: Australia introduces streaming quotas. AND: TikTok keeps it real
Yesterday Australia passed its long-in-the-works legislation mandating streaming services produce Australian-made content.
The quotas require streamers with more than one million Australian subscribers spend 10% of their Australian expenditure, or 7.5% of their revenues, on local originals irrespective of genre.
Those platforms who meet the threshold are understood to be Netflix, Prime Video, Stan, Disney+, Paramount+, and Binge. How Prime Video is measured remains unclear to me as its subscription service is tied up as part of the broader Prime subscription offer from Amazon.
As per IF:
Streamers will face a three-year acquittal cycle, and failure to comply with the rules could see the them fined up to ten times their annual revenue.
Out to frustrate me is this quote from Federal Arts Minister Tony Burke:
“It helps us to better understand ourselves, our neighbours better and allows the world to see us,” he said.
“We have Australian content requirements on free to air television and pay television, but until now, there has been no guarantee that we could see our own stories on streaming services.
“Streaming services create extraordinary shows, and this legislation ensures Australian voices are now front and centre. Now, no matter which remote control you’re holding, Australian stories will be at your fingertips.
“When I was growing up, there was a production called Catch Kandy that was filmed in my local shopping centre. To see my own neighbourhood on screen was so incredibly important to me. I want Australian children to grow up being able to see themselves on screen.”
What the quotas don’t mandate is that stories need to be Australian (that might mean set in Australia, feature characters of Australian nationality, or imbue some spirit of Australian-ness.
So, no Mr Burke, you haven’t introduced legislation that ensures “Australian voices are now front and centre.”
The obvious current example of where this goes wrong is with the filmed-in-Melbourne Chicago-set American Peacock original All Her Fault. Sure, it gave Sarah Snook some work, along with some local crews, but there’s nothing about that show that suggests “Australian voices are now front and centre.”
I guess we’ll be able to see suburbs that look familiar, even if in the show they’re now located in Illinois with its car license plates, signage, etc).
I’ve been banging this drum quite a bit and I find it galling how few others are concerned about this.
In my lonesome corner is Peter Mattessi, president of the Australian Writers’ Guild (AWG), supporter of Save Our Arts and co-creator of ABC TV’s Return to Paradise:
“What we don’t want is a streamer being able to spend all their [obligation] on one huge, six-part TV show that maybe they film in the Gold Coast and has Chris Hemsworth in it, but that is a completely American production, with American writers and American directors and American cast,” he said.
“That would not, in our opinion, be achieving what the legislation sets out to achieve.”
(Source: ABC)
RIP the first live-action Spidey
My first exposure to Australian multicultural broadcaster SBS was in the afternoons they played a US-import called The Electric Company. The original incarnation of the show ran from 1971-76, but I was watching it as a kid in the late 80s.
The reason I would watch it was because it had a live-action Spider-Man segment.
Jim Henson-trained puppeteer Danny Seagreen starred as the silent Spider-Man in what was the first live-action depiction of the Marvel superhero.
I mention this today because Seagreen has died, aged 81.
In addition to being Spidey, Seagreen was a fill-in Big Bird for the late Carol Spinney.
This, as per THR:
Performing in pantomimed skits called “Spidey Super Stories,” Seagren’s web-slinger “was not above taking the day off from his exhausting and frustrating war against crime [to] catch the baseball game, where he’d sit in the stands, nonchalantly wearing his Spidey costume and, incongruously yet charmingly, a Mets baseball cap,” Elitz noted. “If you caught The Electric Company at just the right age, it served as an affectionate introduction to a beloved character.”
Seagren stuck around for the final three years of The Electric Company, working alongside the likes of Rita Moreno and Morgan Freeman while battling villains including the Funny Bunny, Mr. Measles, the Sitter, the Birthday Bandit, the Spoiler and the Prankster.
“I never felt silly,” he said. “I was focused on trying to be a superhero. I think before they cast me they saw some musclemen, but they couldn’t move. I had to be a little bit campy for the whole thing. I really enjoyed doing it. I always looked forward to the shooting days.”
News Desk
With Stranger Things debuting in the US prime time yesterday, it brought the service down for what Netflix self-reports as being around five minutes. This is why you debut shows in the biggest territory overnight… Read: THR
Daredevil s2 on Disney+ has been changed from a March 2026 release date to a more rubbery and general ‘2026.’ Read: Dark Horizons
It’s just so grim for fake, old TV
The key buzzword among those in the media has been ‘authenticity’ for the last couple of years. Why it gets so-often discussed is mostly because traditional media is so very fake and just can’t stop itself.
Now, clearly there are moments where artifice built into a TV presentation is welcome. But, those moments continue to become increasingly unwelcome.
A media conversation in the last year or two has been around the decline of US late night television - a format that thrives on that tightrope walk between artifice and genuine moments (and when those genuine moments happen… they can be glorious).
On Wednesday night Sydney hosted the Australian TikTok Awards. They were live-streamed on SVOD Stan and, obviously, on TikTok. I didn’t watch either.
I was amused (and horrified) reading
on trade site Mumbrella yesterday writing about the dissonance he saw between the TikTok crowd in the audience (and on-stage accepting awards) and hosts who came from old-school TV and radio.Mostly it didn’t come off. Smallzy mumbled his jokes and possibly made a reference to switching networks. He didn’t look or sound comfortable. When Karl Stefanovic and Sarah Abo appeared to hand out the Video of the Year award, we hit peak dissonance.
Stefanovic’s voice was slurred as he attempted to get down with the kids, making a joke about “being poleaxed” and generally sounding like a drunk uncle.
The Today show hosts handed the award for Video of the Year to make-up influencer Leah Halton for a behind-the-scenes video that had racked up 150m views (embedded below). As Halton accepted, the difference between the old wave and new became apparent: the Tiktokkers are just so much better at being natural.
A failure of producing and a sign of an out-of-touch once-dominant industry.
Happy Thanksgiving to my Australian readers. I guess we’ll be enjoying more US Thanksgiving content in our locally-produced TV shows soon enough.
To my Canadian readers, I apologise for missing your Thanksgiving last month. And to my Australian and UK readers, enjoy the rest of your week.
That’s the newsletter for today.
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As much as I believe there should be Australian content for Australian audiences and that from your description the contents of the legislation is that it won’t work. I also believe no matter how hard to try the streaming services will find a loophole