By the time you read this article, Walt Disney Co. and DirecTV may have already settled their dispute. Or maybe not, leaving 11 million customers still without access to ESPN, local ABC stations and many other channels.

In the media giants’ power struggle, DirecTV subscribers missed Aaron Rodgers’ return to the New York Jets’ “Monday Night Football” matchup with the San Francisco 49ers after a season-ending injury last year, unless viewers chose to switch providers or opt out of YouTube TV or Hulu + Live TV. Those options were a major source of Disney’s leverage in this dispute, as they have been in similar disputes in the past, including last year’s standoff with Charter.

Once the issues are resolved and both sides declare victory, there will be plenty of time to analyze who came out on top and which company entered the battle with the best cards.

Was it the Burbank-based entertainment giant with its must-have sports and kids programming? Or was it the long-struggling El Segundo-based satellite TV operator that had every reason to hold on because its subscriber numbers were already in free fall?

As many have noted, including my colleague Meg James, the conflict came at a particularly ominous time for the pay-TV business. Viewers are rapidly canceling their cable and satellite packages. DirecTV needs sports programming from companies like Disney, the only thing it needs to keep the traditional pay-TV package afloat. Unlike Charter, which has a lucrative broadband arm, DirecTV has no other business to fall back on.

Disney wants higher fees from DirecTV to cover rising programming costs, which stem from the increasing amounts Disney has to pay the NBA and NFL to broadcast games. The company also wants to enforce minimum penetration thresholds for its channels to keep subscriber numbers high. At the same time, Disney is shifting much of its entertainment content out of the bundle to streaming services Disney+ and Hulu, and plans to sell flagship channel ESPN directly to cable-holding consumers.

Taken together, this is a recipe for conflict.

But one of the darkest omens for the entertainment industry in recent times came in connection with another case: the legal battle over Venu Sports, a yet-to-be-launched joint venture between Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery and Fox Corp.

As a reminder, the three media conglomerates announced Venu in February to allow people without cable subscriptions to access their sports programming. The company planned to charge $43 per month.

Fubo, a streaming service that bundles live sports-focused channels, filed suit, arguing the strategy was anticompetitive. Fubo claimed its contracts with the programmers prevented it from launching a sports-focused “skinny bundle,” but now those same companies are launching their own sports-only offerings that could threaten the company’s business.

That was unfair, Fubo said, and a federal judge agreed last month, temporarily blocking Venus’s launch on the grounds that Fubo was likely to prevail on the case.

That alone is bad news for Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery and Fox. But the ruling in the Fubo case may be even more consequential than it first appears. In her ruling, U.S. District Judge Margaret Garnett took a swipe at the widespread practice of bundling channels in bulk, calling into question a strategy that forms the foundation of the pay-TV industry as we know it.

“It is difficult to escape the conclusion that these practices are, on balance, bad for consumers,” Garnett wrote in her ruling. “These ridiculous costs not only burden the wallets of sports-loving consumers, who must pay for non-sports channels they do not want to watch, but also those customers who only want entertainment channels but must pay significantly higher costs because they must pay for sports they do not watch, the most expensive of all content.”

Of course, the practice at issue here—that providers, and therefore consumers, have to pay for a bunch of channels they don’t watch in order to get the limited selection of content they actually want—has been the practice in the television business for decades. But Garnett makes clear that in granting Fubo’s request for a preliminary injunction, she isn’t really ruling on the legality of bundling as a whole. That’s a decision that should be made in a trial. Moreover, throughout the ruling, she is careful not to lean too far in one direction or the other.

But even the subtle questioning of the legality of bundling is likely to raise eyebrows in Hollywood.

Indeed, Garnett’s comments have not gone unnoticed by analysts at MoffettNathanson, who are among the closest chroniclers of the package’s gradual but accelerating demise. “It’s not just likely that Venu will never see the light of day,” the analysts wrote in a note to clients published last week. “It’s possible that Venu’s heavy-handed go-to-market strategy has set the ball rolling for the complete collapse of the pay-TV model as we know it.”

DirecTV cited Garnett’s decision in a complaint filed with the Federal Communications Commission over the weekend, claiming Disney acted in bad faith during negotiations. The document alleges, among other things, that Disney asked DirecTV to forego a lawsuit, potentially preempting a case similar to Fubo’s.

Similar to Fubo, DirecTV wants the ability to offer its customers smaller packages of channels that are cheaper and better tailored to viewers’ tastes and interests. The company says Disney “wants to force DirecTV to offer a ‘big package’ of less attractive Disney programming – while offering cheaper, ‘leaner’ packages of the programming consumers want.”

Disney denies these allegations and has said DirecTV misrepresented the facts about their negotiations. In a recent statement, Disney entertainment chairmen Dana Walden and Alan Bergman and ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro said they “believe there is a path to a fair and flexible agreement that strikes this critical balance and works for all parties, especially the consumer.”

Such disputes tend to be fraught with vitriolic press releases, especially when high-stakes soccer broadcasts are involved. But given the current state of affairs at DirecTV, Disney and the industry as a whole, this is clearly not just any old broadcast dispute.

Things we wrote

Univision news anchor Jorge Ramos is leaving the station at the end of the year. Ramos and Univision are parting ways after mutually agreeing not to renew the popular journalist’s contract.

Why ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith brings his sharp views on politics. “I love being there.” The “First Take” star tackles topics beyond sports on his podcast and on cable news networks, some of which have also offered him a contributor role, he says.

To finance new films, the producer of “American Psycho” turns to the masses. Pressman Film, the studio behind “Thank You for Smoking” and “The Crow,” is looking to raise money for its upcoming development projects through crowdfunding, a variation of a tactic used by other companies.

Prosecutor in Rust shooting case asks judge to reopen Alec Baldwin’s manslaughter case. Nearly three years after Alec Baldwin accidentally shot “Rust” camerawoman Halyna Hutchins, a prosecutor is asking the judge to reconsider her dismissal of manslaughter charges against the actor.

In case you missed it:

KLOS-FM fires Kevin Ryder and Doug “Sluggo” Roberts
NBC cuts Fallon to four nights a week
Investor questions Murdoch’s long-standing control of News Corp
Apple touts latest AI tools for iPhone 16

Number of the week

Big money, big influence.

Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people, will become a majority shareholder in Paramount Global once the long-awaited deal with his son’s entertainment company Skydance Media is completed, subject to regulatory review. After the transaction, Ellison’s investment vehicle Pinnacle Media will own 77.5 percent of National Amusements Inc., the Massachusetts-based company that holds the Redstone family’s voting Paramount shares.

The remaining 22.5 percent of NAI will go to a company called RB Tentpole, which is controlled by Gerry Cardinale’s private investment firm RedBird Capital Partners, the Ellisons’ partner in the Paramount deal.

Ellison contributed the majority of the $8.4 billion that makes up the Skydance-Paramount deal. $2.4 billion of that is earmarked for compensation for Shari Redstone and her family, and the other $6 billion is earmarked for other Paramount shareholders and the company’s balance sheet. Under the deal, Paramount will acquire Skydance for a value of $4.75 billion. The company is currently undergoing a major cost-cutting process.

The filing was triggered by FCC regulations that require potential Paramount acquirers to obtain federal approval for the transfer of control of the company’s licenses to operate its 28 owned-and-operated television stations and those operated by CBS.

The Ellisons and RedBird argued in their complaint that the cash infusion from the deal will “strengthen and revitalize” the broadcast services currently offered by Paramount. They said the acquisition would not “cause any reduction in competition or other harm” because the two parties do not currently own any other broadcast stations.

Filming

According to FilmLA data, production in Los Angeles was essentially flat week-over-week and down significantly compared to last year.

Finally …

Check out The Times’ excellent interview with musician Nick Cave about his new album with the Bad Seeds, Wild God.

In the “One for Me” section, I enjoyed the latest from Phoenix death metal band Gatecreeper, called “Dark Superstition.” Use it to power through your final workout, but please make sure you stay hydrated.