RIP: Hulu! The streaming service goes dark at the end of the year.

[thewayne]

Disney is shuttering Hulu. They're migrating its content to Disney Star, which is apparently its home for more adult-themed content.

Hulu began almost twenty years ago in 2007 as one of the older streaming services. But, of course, Disney can't leave good enough alone and has got to absorb it into its own branding. We began watching Hulu a while back with Only Murders In The Building and a couple of other shows, but we haven't been watching much in the way of television of late. I've been wanting to cut down on our streaming subscriptions, and ABC/Disney cancelling Kimmel was a good excuse. Their bringing him back wasn't nearly enough for me to consider paying again for a service that we don't watch enough.

https://www.pennlive.com/life/2025/10/disney-to-officially-shut-down-hulu-after-20-years.html

Comments

[ranunculus]

Darn.
Hulu was one of the services (I think) that carried some of the Brittish shows. Brit Box has apparently decided to cut out almost everything except murder mysteries. Certainly it cut three of the five programs that I want to watch. Not for Brittish audiences, just for American ones. I'm quite cranky about this.

[thewayne]

Oh, I agree!  It sucks when they cull things like that.  Have you checked Acorn?

[ranunculus]

I have an Acorn account and am enjoying several things there. They don't have any of the programs I like from Brit Box though. Specifically I want Gardner's World (easy to find) Beechgrove (available on Roku) Landward (only available for purchase on Amazon whom I don't use) and Make it At Market (Only on Brit Box, I think. Might be on Amazon too.)
I'll probably get a Roku setup next year.
The other option is to go in through a VPN that masks where in the world I'm sitting. I have mixed feelings about that. Having worked in theatre and film industries I like to see the people who make a product paid. If these programs were available for purchase I'd do so.

[thewayne]

I wish the UK government was looser about BBC fees so people outside of the UK could pay directly and get access to programming.  I hate paying Disney to get Dr Who, and I'd LOVE to get Radio 4 directly.

[ranunculus]

It seems to me that the UK gov is missing out on what might be a quite large revenue stream by sticking their head in the sand and ignoring the audiences outside of Britain. Like you I would be happy to pay for access to BBC and I'm decidedly not interested in paying Disney or Amazon for the privilege.

[dewline]

Ugh.

"Maximizing shareholder value" can be a pain...

[kaishin108]

That is so sad. I used to love Hulu. It was the first streaming channel I had, way back when. :( :(

[disneydream06]

My question is, if I am currently paying for a combination Disney+ and Hulu, am I going to now get a lower price on my bill?
LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hugs, Jon

[ranunculus]

Not!!!

[disneydream06]

SHOCKING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
NOT...

[thewayne]

I would expect they'll just shift Hulu billing to Disney Star billing, but I don't know.

[disneydream06]

I'm not holding my breath for any sort of discount. :o :o :o

[thewayne]

No, highly unlikely.  After all, they did a rate increase just after they suspended Kimmel.

[disneydream06]

I hadn't heard that. :o :o :o

[thewayne]

Oh, yeah!  Like two days after suspending Kimmel, they announced a price increase for Disney+!  Utterly stupid timing.  'Hey!  Let's make a really unpopular PR move, and then double-down with ANOTHER bad PR move!'

[disneydream06]

UGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[silveradept]

That doesn't surprise me. After all, Hulu was originally conceived of and operated as a partnership between Disney, Fox, and Paramount, I believe, but since everyone now believes they can charge premium dollar for access to just one of those networks' offerings, the partnership was bound to fall apart.

Greedy cusses.

[thewayne]

I did not know that it was originally formed by a troika, interesting!  I know some people were quite fond of it, but we never subscribed until a few months ago when my wife wanted to check out Only Murders In The Building.

[silveradept]

It was actually NewsCorp and NBCUniversal, but Disney bought in and eventually bought enough to push NBC out when it acquired Fox, then bought out Warner and Comcast's stakes.

It's been solely Disney since 2023.

[halfshellvenus]

Oh, no!

I only watch Hulu once in a blue moon. I mean, we watch The Bear and Futurama on there, and I loved being able to see all of Twelve Monkeys. But it's not a regular streaming service for us. Great for stuff that isn't streaming elsewhere.

HalfshellHusband, though... what will he do without daily access to the Colin Firth "Pride And Prejudice"? Admittedly, he watches it over lunch when he knows he'll nod off and won't miss much. But he's pretty attached to it!

[thewayne]

The content will still be there, just under Disney's Star-branded streaming service. Since Disney owns Star, I expect they'll be moving subscriptions over unless you opt out.

[halfshellvenus]

It's the fear of eventually being forced over to a Disney subscription that I worry about. There's almost nothing I want to see on Disney, and I'm pretty unhappy with them right now.

Also mad at Paramount+ over the Stephen Colbert thing and the self-censorship, even though I really want to see S3 of Strange New Worlds and S2 of School Spirits.

Did you see the Barbie movie? There was a blip in there where it showed components of a lifestyle "rut", and one of the things that flashed by was that version of Pride and Prejudice. I went to see it with our son, and LOLed at that part. The rest of the theater must have thought we were nuts.

[thewayne]

LOVED the Barbie movie!  Saw it in the theater, but couldn't get Russet to go.  Eventually got her to watch it with me on DVD and she really enjoyed it.