Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news.
Speaker 2: Louis a family fand it is a dad, and Chili
Speaker 2: is the mom, and Bingo's the younger sister, Louie's oldest sister.
Speaker 3: It's a little blue dog healer dog h ee ei okay,
Speaker 3: And they have like adventures around their house and there's
Speaker 3: like a problem and then they like solve it. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: so they like snash philia.
Speaker 1: The kids are talking about Blue. That is the hit
Speaker 1: Australian animated TV show that premiered in twenty eighteen. It
Speaker 1: has millions of fans worldwide, and those fans are children, yes,
Speaker 1: but also grown ups. There are Reddit threads about if
Speaker 1: it's okay for childless adults to watch it. The answer,
Speaker 1: by the way, is a resounding yes. There are too
Speaker 1: many fan blocks to count, and articles and pages of
Speaker 1: vocal adult fans on TikTok. Blue is a big business.
Speaker 4: It's a behemoth. It was the number two most stream
Speaker 4: show in the US behind Suits Full Stop.
Speaker 1: That's Rayhan Hermancy. She's a senior editor at Bloomberg Business Week.
Speaker 4: I have two kids, four and six, and like over
Speaker 4: the past year, I couldn't help but notice they were
Speaker 4: coming home from school with Bluey mimeographed coloring pages. Every
Speaker 4: birthday party has some element of blue We have blue
Speaker 4: Cops in our house that I swear to God we
Speaker 4: didn't buy. So like it has permeated like young kids'
Speaker 4: lives in a really big way. So it felt like
Speaker 4: the financial and the scale of viewership was really extreme.
Speaker 5: I contacted Brand Finance, was just a company that does
Speaker 5: evaluations for brands.
Speaker 1: Devin Leonard is a senior writer on the global business team, and.
Speaker 5: They said it's worth as much as two billion dollars,
Speaker 5: but they also said that potentially it keeps on going,
Speaker 5: it could be worth as much as pepper Pig, which
Speaker 5: was sold to has Bro. I think it was twenty
Speaker 5: nineteen for a four billion dollars.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty three, Americans watched seven hundred and thirty
Speaker 1: one million hours of blue That is more than Ncis
Speaker 1: Cray's Anatomy, Gilmore, Girls or Friends, and each episode of
Speaker 1: the show is only seven minutes long. Now, you could
Speaker 1: chalk up the success of Bluey to its popular appeal
Speaker 1: to lucrative distribution deals, but it is also because of
Speaker 1: its creator. It's Joe Brumm. He is the soul of
Speaker 1: the show.
Speaker 5: He's his verice of earnest, kind of since a very
Speaker 5: funny guy. He just sort of imbused the show with
Speaker 5: all of that, and he wants everything to be perfect,
Speaker 5: you know, because he's kind of a perfectionist. It's his
Speaker 5: aesthetic and you know, reflection of his life.
Speaker 3: This episode of The Big Take is called Bluey's Big Business.
Speaker 1: How a kids show about a family of dogs became
Speaker 1: an international sensation And what's at stake for blue fans
Speaker 1: and its financial stakeholders as Joe Brum decides whether it's
Speaker 1: time to call it quits. What is it about the
Speaker 1: show that your kids like so much and that you
Speaker 1: like as well well?
Speaker 4: So it really isn't about them. They are at best
Speaker 4: indifferent to Bluey. But I during the Pandemic, we start
Speaker 4: watching Blue and you know from the jump it is
Speaker 4: like visually delightful and has a kind of it's like
Speaker 4: operating on a bunch of levels at once. I think
Speaker 4: that one of the things that makes it so appealing
Speaker 4: is that Bandit and Chili's daughter is Blue and Bingo.
Speaker 4: They're not gendered in the way that like a lot
Speaker 4: of children's entertainment is gender to like kind of pink
Speaker 4: unicorns and like Marvel Action figures, they play across a
Speaker 4: lot of different sphirits and they're very physical, and I
Speaker 4: think that it makes it really easy to watch and
Speaker 4: not really think about, like if you're a boy watching Blue,
Speaker 4: Like I'm watching a girls show, which I think can
Speaker 4: be a big deal for kids, and you know, it's
Speaker 4: like sweet and related in the kind of kids plot.
Speaker 4: And then the parents in it are pretty remarkable. They're
Speaker 4: just built for this age of parenting. I think they
Speaker 4: immediately start doing imagine or play with the kids, especially bandit.
Speaker 4: The dad and I bought this statue today from a
Speaker 4: shop and it turned out to be magic. Yeah. And
Speaker 4: it's both aspirational and also very real. The parents get frustrated,
Speaker 4: the kids get frustrated, and I think that that representation
Speaker 4: is very interesting and also feels of its time.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of episodes we could pull from here.
Speaker 1: I wonder what your favorite one is.
Speaker 5: Well, I have like a sentimental favorite, because you know,
Speaker 5: there's a whole lot that I really like. But there's
Speaker 5: an episode called the Beach in season one. The Healers
Speaker 5: go to the beach and then Chili, you know Blue's mom,
Speaker 5: She wants to go to take a walk by herself,
Speaker 5: and I don't know it just it might be my
Speaker 5: wife just wanting to get feet away from the rest
Speaker 5: of us. But to me, it's sort of said the show,
Speaker 5: you know, it was about a little more than's just
Speaker 5: the kids.
Speaker 1: It struck me watching the beach, how much compressed wonder.
Speaker 1: There isn't a lot of these episodes. I mean, yes,
Speaker 1: they're seven minutes long. They never drag, and it seems
Speaker 1: like there's a lot in there.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I mean there's a lot of moments where
Speaker 4: they very true to life, pivot quickly from like boredom
Speaker 4: and anger to wonder. It really captures, I think, the
Speaker 4: feeling of a parent, just like trying to grapple with
Speaker 4: all of these big feelings and also the banality of
Speaker 4: it all.
Speaker 1: Do you have a favorite?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, well, sleepy Time. I feel like I'm
Speaker 4: going to get emotional talking about sleepy Dinner.
Speaker 2: I want to do a big ghost late to night.
Speaker 3: I'll wake up in my own bank.
Speaker 4: Sleepy Time is the episode where Bingo, the younger sister,
Speaker 4: starts having trouble falling asleep.
Speaker 1: You do your best, Toney, but remember I'm always here.
Speaker 1: If you need me.
Speaker 2: Okay, weet drains you. Now.
Speaker 4: From Chili's perspective, it's just kind of like, oh God,
Speaker 4: Like the kid keeps getting up and getting into my bed,
Speaker 4: and so you're there with them in this, and then
Speaker 4: it changes and becomes about the dreaming. In your dream,
Speaker 4: she sees her mother as the sun and she's orbiting
Speaker 4: around and she's like holding like a little stuffy and
Speaker 4: it's just like, I just think it captures how as
Speaker 4: a parent you don't even know what's going on in
Speaker 4: your kid's head, and so it's like both so big
Speaker 4: and so small. And what's amazing is that there's almost
Speaker 4: no steaks in this whole episode, and a lot of
Speaker 4: Bluey the steaks could not be lower. A lot of
Speaker 4: other animated shows use animation to just go to crazy
Speaker 4: places and like show extreme situations, and Bluey is very restrained.
Speaker 4: And how it.
Speaker 1: Approaches that, like that wonderful interplay between that the kind
Speaker 1: of cosmic dream and then what's happening in the bed,
Speaker 1: which is like punching and kicking, and you see how
Speaker 1: she's processing it. But also the parents are kind of
Speaker 1: living through this as well.
Speaker 4: So yeah, yeah, I mean I think that's why Sleepy
Speaker 4: Time has really stood out because it really just encapsates
Speaker 4: the whole experience.
Speaker 5: And also to the music of Gustav Holtz the Planet.
Speaker 1: Yes Yes, years before Joe Brum and his team weave
Speaker 1: the Planets by Gustav Holst into this ambitious and critically
Speaker 1: acclaimed episode Sleepy Time. Brum started Bluey with a clip
Speaker 1: capturing a simpler parenting scene.
Speaker 5: He and another animator they do this little clip Bandit
Speaker 5: takes Bluey to the playground, you know. Bandit's playing Fruit
Speaker 5: and Ninch on his phone while he's pushing Bluie on
Speaker 5: the swing and then blue goes around the swing set
Speaker 5: and comes down and clung them on the head. And
Speaker 5: he shows it to these guys, the founders of Luda Studio,
Speaker 5: which is a sort of small sort of TV production
Speaker 5: operation in Brisbane, and they like it, but they but
Speaker 5: they shop it around and they're able to raise some
Speaker 5: money from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation to do a five
Speaker 5: minute pilot.
Speaker 1: Brum took that I let to a big gathering of
Speaker 1: TV executives and it was a hit. Soon the production
Speaker 1: company had a deal with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and
Speaker 1: BBC Studios and some Australian government agencies. BBC Studios now
Speaker 1: manages Bluey's licensing rights outside of Australia.
Speaker 5: Last year, the BBC's revenues topped two billion pounds for
Speaker 5: the first time, and they're saying a lot of that
Speaker 5: had to do with the sale of Bluey consumer products.
Speaker 4: It seems pretty clear that, you know, when the BBC
Speaker 4: says they want to double revenue by twenty twenty eight,
Speaker 4: a big chunk of that has to be in part
Speaker 4: due to Bluey.
Speaker 1: And it goes beyond Bluey the show. There are Bluey
Speaker 1: themed books, live shows, toys, pajamas and in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: Disney won a bid to stream Bluey on Disney Plus.
Speaker 5: Disney tested the show in American kids. They love the accents.
Speaker 5: And then along with that, as Joe put a Disney
Speaker 5: you know, put into gazumping offer that blew away all
Speaker 5: the other of the other contenders.
Speaker 1: If we look at this as a pie, BBC's obviously
Speaker 1: gotten a lot out of this. I watched it on
Speaker 1: this Plus. How does that giant entertainment company fit into
Speaker 1: all of this? And how much of that pie are
Speaker 1: they are they getting?
Speaker 4: I mean, We've been joking that Bluie ends up being kids'
Speaker 4: first lests and intellectual property because for American audiences it's
Speaker 4: a Disney show. Like when they go to Disney theme
Speaker 4: parks and they can't see Bluey like, they get upset.
Speaker 4: But Disney has benefited greatly from this show, and.
Speaker 1: They're just licensing this. They're just licensing it.
Speaker 4: They do take a piece of the merchandising, so they're
Speaker 4: not wholly cut out. But I do think it creates
Speaker 4: a little bit of friction when you have so many
Speaker 4: people who identify Blueye as like this generation's like iconic
Speaker 4: children's television, piece of intellectual property, and Disney can only
Speaker 4: license it. Disney cannot control the rights. They can't exploit
Speaker 4: them in the way that you would imagine that they
Speaker 4: would like to.
Speaker 5: On top of that, the company is considered buying you know,
Speaker 5: blue out right several times. It's unclear why a deal
Speaker 5: has the Mae Lubis Studio controls Bluie. They say it's
Speaker 5: thought for sale a little though, you know, for the
Speaker 5: right price, you know, who knows. But I think the
Speaker 5: problem is what is it worth without Joe Brumm.
Speaker 1: A question that's now front and Center. A surprise episode
Speaker 1: last weekend confirmed a fan theory that the Healer family
Speaker 1: is moving out of their house and maybe fans speculate
Speaker 1: off of TV. The creator has been coy on whether
Speaker 1: he'll stick with the show, and while it could technically
Speaker 1: continue without Joe Brum, would Blue be as valuable if
Speaker 1: he steps away? That's after the break Demn, could you
Speaker 1: tell us about Joe Brum, the mind behind Bluie? How
Speaker 1: did he come up with the idea for the show itself?
Speaker 5: Well, it's sort of funny because he was an animator.
Speaker 5: He wasn't somebody who wrote TV. But he would listen
Speaker 5: to people talking on the writers' room doing kids shows,
Speaker 5: and the writers role older and they were trying to
Speaker 5: draw on experience, is trying to remember things that they've
Speaker 5: done with their kids. But in his case, it was
Speaker 5: all right there. You know, he's working for home, he's
Speaker 5: just two little girls, and everything's really really fresh. He's
Speaker 5: just having those experiences, so he basically draws on that
Speaker 5: for his scripts. It's all drawn, you know, right from
Speaker 5: his own life.
Speaker 1: How much has the wild success of this changed both
Speaker 1: his life and the production company that latched onto this
Speaker 1: Early on.
Speaker 5: We'll do the production company first. They went from like
Speaker 5: a five person operation to like a fifty or sixty
Speaker 5: person in operation. Blue has become the sort of global,
Speaker 5: multi platform enterprise for them. But I think for Joe
Speaker 5: it's a bit more complicated because he has said Bluie
Speaker 5: is going to end at some point. I have other projects.
Speaker 5: I want to do projects for, you know, older kids,
Speaker 5: and then his own daughters are older. But I also
Speaker 5: just get the sense that like he just keeps wanting
Speaker 5: to do shows that are better and better and better
Speaker 5: and aggregate, you know, to use his term. He doesn't
Speaker 5: want to repeat himself. He just seems like somebody who
Speaker 5: is it's a true creative person.
Speaker 4: I mean, I feel strangely moved by the difficulty of
Speaker 4: managing success. He is really a guy living in Brisbane,
Speaker 4: Australia who happened to make something that ties together like
Speaker 4: ten major cultural threads at once golden age of television.
Speaker 4: It's in age where like tours, the tours are really
Speaker 4: the showrunners, the people who are writing and creating their
Speaker 4: own work. I think of a Jesse Armstrong like succession.
Speaker 4: You know, they don't want to be locked into their
Speaker 4: own success. And right now you have Joe Bram where
Speaker 4: he technically doesn't control the rights of Blue you have
Speaker 4: the fates of like BBC and to some degree, Disney.
Speaker 4: As Devin points out in the story, Disney's streaming has
Speaker 4: been a major money loser for the company. Bluie is
Speaker 4: a real bright spot. We can make some informed speculation that, like,
Speaker 4: if Joe Brom was like, I'm good for ten seasons,
Speaker 4: Disney would be like, bam, like we we want to
Speaker 4: be in the blue business, you know. But I think
Speaker 4: everyone seemingly understands the singularity of this guy's vision, Like
Speaker 4: what sells it is how personal it feels, and so
Speaker 4: just strategically, how are you going to scale such a
Speaker 4: personal thing?
Speaker 1: Last weekend a surprise episode called Ghost Basket Drop. This
Speaker 1: is the one about the Healer family, moving ahead of
Speaker 1: a much longer episode everyone is waiting to see, called
Speaker 1: The Sign. It is four times as long as a
Speaker 1: usual episode, and it's sets premiere this Sunday, April fourteenth.
Speaker 1: So far, there's been no announcement about a fourth season,
Speaker 1: and unsurprisingly that has stirred up a lot of speculation
Speaker 1: about the show's future.
Speaker 4: The Sign is interesting because it's coming out simultaneously in
Speaker 4: the US and other places, which is usually not the case.
Speaker 4: And I think that there's a lot of anticipation about
Speaker 4: what it is, obviously with the fans, but I think
Speaker 4: also for Joe Browm in his camp, it is the
Speaker 4: closest thing to a Bluey movie, which has also been
Speaker 4: long rumored to exist.
Speaker 1: That latest episode seem to confirm a theory among blue
Speaker 1: fans that the Healers are selling their house, But does
Speaker 1: it signal an even bigger move that Bluey could be
Speaker 1: coming to an end.
Speaker 5: The Little Guy said that specifically, you know, a lot
Speaker 5: of it depends on like what the response is, what
Speaker 5: happens after the sign So I kind of speculate towards
Speaker 5: towards the end that if he's going to go forward,
Speaker 5: he wants to know he can top that or you
Speaker 5: do something better, he says, you know, it's just a
Speaker 5: magical episode. It's an episode that sums up what we've
Speaker 5: been trying to do for three seas is now so
Speaker 5: so I think I just think he sets to the
Speaker 5: bar really, really high for himself, and that's why the
Speaker 5: show's so good.
Speaker 1: We've talked about through the anxiety of fans how much
Speaker 1: nervousness is there on the commercial side of this in
Speaker 1: this vacuum period between season three and whatever might come
Speaker 1: next for the BBC Disney what's at stake here?
Speaker 4: I mean, David, I don't know about if you know
Speaker 4: about the media industry, but we're not exactly in a
Speaker 4: good state right now in general. So I would imagine
Speaker 4: that if I were the BBC and I was attached
Speaker 4: to the biggest children's show in the world with one
Speaker 4: of the biggest merchandising horizons possible, I would be very
Speaker 4: anxious about that. Ending from Disney side. You know, Disney's
Speaker 4: a ginormous company as many and many things going on,
Speaker 4: but it's streaming service has been the source of a
Speaker 4: lot of issues.
Speaker 5: You know, Disney Plus actually lost some subscribers in the
Speaker 5: last last quarter. But you can just imagine how many
Speaker 5: of those subscribers are subscribing primarily for Bluie. If if
Speaker 5: Blue's accounting for almost a third of the TV views
Speaker 5: on Disney Plus, that's a really important show for them.
Speaker 5: They can't afford to lose it. Unfortunately. You know, it
Speaker 5: may not be you know, it may be when their
Speaker 5: power to keep it going.
Speaker 4: At this point, I feel anxiety about it continuing, and
Speaker 4: I feel anxiety about it ending. Yeah, I think it's
Speaker 4: really again, like there's something about making something that is
Speaker 4: so good and like operates so well on so many
Speaker 4: different levels, commercial, creative, et cetera. That like the feeling
Speaker 4: of like can you keep going? Can you top it?
Speaker 4: And like at what point do we call it? You know,
Speaker 4: because you can't make the same thing forever and keep
Speaker 4: it as good. I think that's like the creative challenge
Speaker 4: of television.
Speaker 3: This episode was produced by Thomas Low and Jessica Beck.
Speaker 2: It was edited by the club Beat Store.
Speaker 3: It was also our executive producer. It was mixed by
Speaker 3: Veronic Coo Retriguez. Our senior producer is Naomi Sham. Elizabeth
Speaker 3: Ponso is our senior editor. Sage Bauman is our head
Speaker 3: of Podcasts.
Speaker 1: This is the Big Take from Bloomberg News. I'm David
Speaker 1: Gerra Special thanks to Reinica, Gregory Abel, and Mave.
Speaker 3: Please follow and review the Big Take. Whenever you listen
Speaker 3: to podcasts, how's the listeners find this stuff? Thanks for listening.