Here Are the 14 Non-Marvel/Pixar/Star Wars Shows Disney Is Licensing to Netflix

Brian Welk
·4 min read

Can Netflix do for a show like “Reba” or “The Resident” what it did for “Suits?” That’s what we’ll find out next year when Disney begins licensing series to Netflix as part of a non-exclusive arrangement stretching through 2025.

Disney Entertainment and Netflix are in the works on finalizing a licensing agreement that will bring 14 different series from ABC, Fox, FX, and even ESPN to the streamer across 18 months, an individual with knowledge told IndieWire. At the time of this writing, the deal was not signed. Among the titles that will eventually make it are shows like “The Wonder Years,” “This Is Us,” “30 for 30,” “How I Met Your Mother,” “Lost,” “Archer,” “Prison Break,” “Home Improvement,” and more.

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“The Hughleys,” D.L. Hughley’s sitcom that began in 1998 and ran for four years, will hit streaming for the first time on any platform. And Netflix and Disney are also extending its license on “Grey’s Anatomy,” which currently lives on Netflix and Hulu and continues to air on ABC heading into Season 20.

All of these shows will have a window in which they will appear on Netflix and on their existing platform under the Disney bundle, be they Disney+, Hulu, or ESPN+. “Grey’s Anatomy” in particular will be available on Disney+ once the Hulu tile launches on the app in March (a beta version went live last week to select subscribers). And all of the shows will remain on other streaming or AVOD services they’re currently licensed to.

Some of these shows are bonafide hits that would do well with a resurgence of attention from a new audience on Netflix. But you’ll notice they don’t include any Marvel, Star Wars, or Pixar series, not to mention shows that have performed well on Hulu like “Family Guy” or “The Golden Girls.” Disney CEO Bob Iger recently said the company was in discussion with Netflix on licensing, but he made clear those core brands were off the table.

“Those are real — obviously — competitive advantages for us and differentiators,” he said last month. “Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, for instance are all doing very, very well on our platform. And I don’t see why, just to basically chase bucks, we should [license them out] when they are really, really important building blocks to the current and future of our streaming business.”

For Disney, licensing out shows to Netflix accomplishes what it also does for HBO and Warner Bros. Discovery or NBCUniversal: it brings in a significant licensing fee (financials of this deal weren’t disclosed) and does more for the company than it would just collecting dust on a shelf or on their own streaming platform. And if Netflix does generate another “Suits” example, it can increase the value of the franchise’s IP and create new opportunities down the road. For Netflix, it keeps people coming back for more and helps grow their audience for that person who really does want to watch “The Hughleys” and never could.

Iger in fact has been thinking a lot about how Disney’s own content helped make Netflix what it was in the days before Disney+ and countless other streamers launched and started hoarding content for themselves.

“Disney was licensing movies to Netflix, and they were building, helping to build their platform…on the back of our movies, and having the direct relationship with the consumer and building this global subscription business, which they did a brilliant job of, really. They deserve a lot of credit,” Iger told the New York Times back in January 2022 before he returned as CEO. “While they were doing that, they were using some of the circulation that we helped them create and the subscription growth to fund their own television and movie production, directly competitive with us for talent and stories. And I woke up one day and thought, we’re basically selling nuclear weapons technology to a Third World country, and now they’re using it against us.”

See the full list of shows newly coming to Netflix (excluding “Grey’s Anatomy”) throughout 2024 and early 2025 below:

  • “The Wonder Years”

  • “This Is Us”

  • “My Wife & Kids”

  • “ESPN 30 for 30”

  • “The Resident”

  • “White Collar”

  • “Reba”

  • “Archer”

  • “How I Met You Mother”

  • “Lost”

  • “Prison Break”

  • “The Hughleys”

  • “The Bernie Mac Show”

  • “Home Improvement”

Deadline first reported the news.

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