Amazon gets streaming rights to Wallace & Gromit; “Amazon has streaming video?!” says America
Indomitable inventor Wallace and his silent dog Gromit are coming to Amazon Prime’s streaming service, a fact that should delight you, unless you, like seemingly everyone else in America, didn’t realize that Amazon even had a streaming service. “Why isn’t this on Netflix?” you might ask, befuddled. “I would like to watch Wallace & Gromit, maybe with a Hannibal or The Americans chaser,” you might say. “They should be on Netflix.” But they’re not on Netflix, you might be informed. They’re on Amazon Prime, which has a yearly subscription fee, rather than a monthly one, but actually works out to be a bit cheaper. You frown. “But I have Netflix,” you say. “They should be on Netflix.” Somewhere, probably, Jeff Bezos silently fumes, his fingers playing over the head of his cane, which we have to imagine is a totally awesome skull. “They can’t get this skull cane on Netflix!” thinks Bezos. “They’ll have to come to The Everything Store for that!”
Joining the ridiculously delightful Wallace & Gromit on Prime are other projects from Aardman Animation, the studio that produces the shorts, including the children’s series Shaun The Sheep and Timmy Time. Also, the deal includes the classic series Rex The Runt. We hadn’t heard of it before now, but the Deadline report we are rewriting for this article lists it as “classic,” so we’ll take their word for it. The deal doesn’t appear to include Aardman’s various movies, including the acclaimed Chicken Run and the Oscar-winning Wallace & Gromit film (which is, you have to admit, a little confusing).
The Aardman productions join other Amazon exclusives like Justified, Downton Abbey, SpongeBob SquarePants, Under The Dome, and a whole mess of HBO series that you probably didn’t realize weren’t on Netflix and wouldn’t be on Netflix for at least several years. “I’ll wait until it’s on Netflix,” you say, and so does the rest of America.