Jane Fonda Warns the Netflix-Warner Bros. Deal Is a Catastrophic Mistake

Jane Fonda just weighed in on the Netflix–Warner Bros. Discovery situation, and subtlety was not invited. In a new op-ed, she argues the planned sale is less bold strategy and more wrecking ball for the business and the people who make the stuff we watch.

What Fonda is reacting to

Fonda wrote a piece for The Ankler about the sale of Warner Bros. Discovery, taking aim at Netflix and the other suitors that reportedly lined up with offers. Netflix has been pitching its agreement to buy WBD as something that will make the entertainment industry stronger. Fonda is not buying that framing, and she makes a broader point: even if some other company ends up taking the whole thing or carving it up, the end result of a mega-merger like this looks the same to her.

"Consolidation at this scale would be catastrophic for an industry built on free expression, for the creative workers who power it, and for consumers who depend on a free, independent media ecosystem to understand the world."

Her core argument, stripped down

Fonda, who is 87 and has seen a few cycles of this business, lays out a pretty stark chain reaction. In her view, fewer companies with more power equals fewer chances to make anything that is original, risky, or surprising. She drills down on the human part of the equation too: when one buyer controls more shelves, there are fewer slots for everyone else.

• Jobs: She says overall employment in film and TV takes a hit, from actors and writers to editors, designers, animators, and crew.
• Opportunities: With fewer buyers, there are fewer places to sell projects, pitch ideas, or build a career.
• Creative risk: Big merged companies tend to chase safer bets, so the oddball, ambitious stuff gets squeezed.
• News and information: She warns that consolidation narrows the pool of outlets and viewpoints people rely on to understand the world.
• Diversity of stories: With fewer gatekeepers deciding what gets made, she expects less variety in which stories get told and who gets to tell them.

Where it gets thornier

Fonda also connects this consolidation trend to politics. She claims the current administration is using these mergers as tools of pressure and censorship. As an example, she references incidents involving Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel getting suspended, tying those to the Skydance–Paramount merger and what followed it. That part of her argument is the most combustible: she is essentially saying the bigger and fewer the companies, the easier it becomes for political actors to lean on them.

The bottom line for her

Fonda wraps by putting the whole thing in constitutional terms. Strip away the First Amendment foundation, she says, and everything else we take for granted about American life starts wobbling. In other words, to her, this is not just a corporate chess move; it is a decision that could reshape who gets to speak, who gets to work, and what the audience is allowed to see.