Disney Plus is about to get even better
Love documentaries and got Disney Plus? You’re in luck…
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If recent trends are anything to go by,Disney Plusis about to strengthen its claim to the title ofbest streaming servicein 2022.
As first spotted byDejaView,Huluhas added almost 30 National Geographic documentaries to its ‘expiring’ page for the end of March – and given that Disney’s streamer boasts its own dedicated National Geographic hub, we expect many of these non-fiction features to land on Disney Plus next month.
Disney hasn’t confirmed as much just yet, but with both Hulu and National Geographic now majority-owned by The Walt Disney Company, it’d be a big surprise to see these documentaries – many of which are already available on international versions of Disney Plus – move elsewhere.
These aren’t small independent features, either. Hugely popular long-running series like Nazi Megastructures appear on Hulu’s list of outgoing documentaries, as well as newer projects like 9/11: One Day in America (which was recently commissioned to coincide with the twentieth anniversary of the September 11 attacks).
Check out the full list of titles below:
As we alluded to earlier, some of the documentaries on this list already exist on Disney Plus in non-US regions – Nazi Megastructures, for instance, has been available to stream on the UK version of the service for some time – which makes us even more confident that they’ll be making the switch from Hulu to Disney Plus in the very near future.
This also comes just a week afterDisney confirmed that former Netflix showsDaredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, The Defenders and The Punisher will be joining Disney Plus' back catalog ofMarvelTV shows on March 16.
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Analysis: a frenzy for factual drama
The battle between platforms like Netflix, Disney Plus andHBO Maxto stock the best movies and TV shows is well documented, but more and more emphasis is being placed on creating quality documentary content in all corners of the streaming wars.
Buoyed by the pandemic-era popularity of series including Tiger King and The Last Dance, Netflix has enjoyed particular success in producing some of thebest documentariesof the last few years. The approach has paid dividends, too – for a time,The Tinder Swindlerranked as thebiggest movie on Netflix(outperforming much more expensive feature-length projects on the service).
Disney, on the other hand, hasn’t dedicated as much in-house resources to producing new documentary content, but its acquisition of National Geographic has outsourced the task to arguably the best filmmaking hands in the non-fiction business (Free Solo won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2019, while 2021’s The Rescue is nominated at this year’s ceremony).
The arrival of 30 more documentaries, then – on the US version of Disney Plus, at least – further increases the value of a streaming service that poses the biggest immediate threat to the long-standing supremacy of Netflix.
Axel is TechRadar’s UK-based Phones Editor, reporting on everything from the latest Apple developments to newest AI breakthroughs as part of the site’s Mobile Computing vertical. Having previously written for publications including Esquire and FourFourTwo, Axel is well-versed in the applications of technology beyond the desktop, and his coverage extends from general reporting and analysis to in-depth interviews and opinion.
Axel studied for a degree in English Literature at the University of Warwick before joining TechRadar in 2020, where he then earned an NCTJ qualification as part of the company’s inaugural digital training scheme.
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