Netflix Licenses Power Franchise From Lionsgate
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- Netflix acquired international rights to Power, Power Book II: Ghost, Power Book III: Raising Kanan and Power Book IV: Force from Lionsgate Television, plus domestic U.S. rights to the mothership series, with the four shows beginning to arrive in early November on a market-by-market schedule.
- Lionsgate Television retained non-exclusivity in the deal, keeping the ability to license the shows to other platforms in the territories where Netflix has them, and the agreement excludes Canada, where the Power franchise streams on Starz via its Bell Media partnership.
- Hulu is losing its long-held U.S. streaming rights to the original Power series — held since 2017 through a Lionsgate TV license — with all seasons moving to Netflix in November alongside the broader international rollout.
- Starz remains the primary U.S. home for the Power universe, continuing to carry all four series on its app and linear platforms, along with upcoming offshoots Power: Origins (an 18-episode Ghost and Tommy origin story now in production) and Power: Legacy, neither of which is part of the Netflix deal.
- Courtney Kemp, creator of the Power franchise, just delivered Netflix a breakout original in Nemesis, which logged 32.6 million views in its first month and a half after its May release and earned a Season 2 renewal, providing direct creative momentum for the licensing pact.
- Lionsgate previously licensed other former Starz titles to Netflix — Hightown and The Hunting Wives for the U.S. last year, with The Hunting Wives becoming a runaway hit and converting to a Netflix original — alongside older crossovers including Outlander, Black Sails and Heels.
Why it matters: Netflix now controls global streaming distribution for the first four Power series in most of the world, turning a Starz-anchored franchise into a Netflix-international property while Starz keeps U.S. primacy and Lionsgate preserves flexibility to license elsewhere. Hulu's loss of the original Power series after an eight-year run is the most concrete U.S. competitive casualty, and the deal validates Lionsgate's strategy of using Netflix as a release valve for former Starz content following the May 2025 corporate split.
