AT&T's Multiverse of Corporate Madness

Any competition between AT&T and Disney will not be symmetrical. AT&T is looking to capture the market segment that Disney (seemingly) has ignored or undervalued. DC comics will never go out of business. Its ownership may change hands, but it will never go under completely.

Per the article, it seems that AT&T is more interested in turning DC into a lifestyle brand to capture and retain younger and more diverse audiences.

The young people you see on shows like Collider Heroes are the target demographic. They are the vacuous, fast-talking, eternally smiling young people who can't seem to muster a bad word about anything in pop culture.

"Generation zeal," as I like to call them, always seems to have unlimited time to watch read and critique every bit of minutia related to geek culture. The fact that they do so consistently is a status symbol for their generation. They are Black, White, Latino, Male, Female, upwardly mobile, under-employed, completely jobless, and everything in between.

They are AT&T's weapon in fighting an asymmetric war with Disney.

Here's the pitch.

"Do you want to mass-produce high-quality T-Shirts with a Bat insignia front and center? Yes? Well, all you have to do is pay us our modest licensing fee in perpetuity and, you're off to the races. It would also be appreciated if you could pay up ten years in advance to help us fill this massive $164 billion chasm of debt we're staring into. The reason you should do this is that we've set up the Bat brand to mean indefatigable strength, cunning, and hyper-competency across all ethnic and gender profiles. Even a non-binary will feel good about wearing this shirt to the gym --- think Bat Person."

That's a simplified example. However, if you extrapolate it to movie rights, toys, and other lucrative, passive revenue streams, AT&T's intentions become more evident. They don't actually care about DC as a platform that can seamlessly span across media. To them, DC is a cow which they intend to milk --- to death.  Coy Jandreau will smile as he preaches the good corporate word about the new merch on DC Daily.

Of course, this isn't anything new in the history of DC (or Marvel comics for that matter). Where it does start to get interesting is that AT&T could execute this strategy piecemeal. Film rights could be sold off to any studio who is looking to compete with Disney.