In November 2023,The Marvelshadthe worst ever box office openingof any MCU picture at that time.

Warner Bros. released a trio of low-performing movies inBlack Adam,Shazam!

Fury of the GodsandThe Flash.

Billy Magnussen dressed in a silver superhero suit and helmet for HBO/Sky comedy The Franchise

Disneys Bob Iger started talking about shrinking the Marvel slate.

Which is exactly what the HBO comedy had to do too.

Theyre in a period of uncertainty.

Cast of HBO’s The Franchise on the set of a film

Thats a good question, I dont know.

They dont tell me!

Im assuming that there is someone,hopefullythere is.

Cast of HBO’s The Franchise (Richard E Grant, Darren Goldstein, Lolly Adefope, Himesh Patel, Daniel Bruhl, Aya Cash, Billy Magnussen)

Maybe there isnt and were in real trouble?

Maybe no-ones been checking anything?

Something that did keep the HBO comedys legal team busy was its use of fictional superhero characters.

Trying to generate fake superhero names is harder than you might think, says Brown.

There are hundreds of thousands!

Well, can we call him Many Man?

And they were like, you’ve got the option to call him Many Man.

It would be this thing of going through these iterations.

So, what if we take the n off and call him Tecto?

Okay, youre allowed that.

That was a challenge.

The Franchisewill be available on Sky and NOW from 21st October.

The first three episodes will air on the 21st with new episodes released weekly.