Sam Levinson signed with Amazon after Euphoria. Fans are congratulating HBO
An overall deal announcement usually reads as a win for the studio doing the signing. This one is being celebrated by the studio that got left.
Sam Levinson has signed an exclusive overall TV deal with Amazon MGM Studios, Deadline reported on October 13. The Euphoria creator will develop series for Prime Video alongside his producing partner and wife, Ashley Levinson, through their Tiny Goat Productions — ending a relationship with HBO that housed every TV project he's ever made.
Amazon's head of global television, Peter Friedlander, supplied the expected superlatives, calling Levinson one of the most daring and original voices in television. The reaction on r/television supplied the counter-programming:
"'We are richer for having lost him' - HBO"
— a commenter on r/television, writing the network's imaginary statement
That joke only works because of the last three years of Levinson's HBO output. The Idol, his 2023 pop-star drama with The Weeknd, arrived trailing production-chaos reports, was savaged by critics, and died after one season. Euphoria season 3 landed this spring after a four-year gap and drew the most divided reviews of the series' run, with the finale doubling as a quiet series finale — HBO confirmed the show was over the same day the last episode aired, May 31. The fans' autopsy is blunt:
"The Idol was pure trash, and season 3 of Euphoria was pretty shitty too."
— another r/television commenter
The numbers complicate the victory lap
Here's the inconvenient data point for everyone writing HBO's congratulations card: per The Hollywood Reporter, Euphoria's final season averaged about 25 million viewers worldwide — up from 21.5 million for season 2. The show collected 32 Emmy nominations and nine wins across its run, including two lead-actress trophies for Zendaya. Whatever the quality arguments, HBO just watched the creator of one of its biggest and youngest-skewing hits walk to a competitor, one week after the network itself changed owners.
That timing deserves its own line. Paramount Skydance closed its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery on October 6; Levinson's Amazon deal was announced October 13. He is the first marquee HBO creator to sign elsewhere in the Skydance era, and Amazon is openly building a young-adult bench to receive him — the deal lands the same month Prime Video launched Mike Flanagan's Carrie straight to the top of its charts.
Skydance has owned HBO for one week. The creator of its defining Gen Z hit spent that week signing with Amazon.
What Amazon is actually buying
Stripped of the Reddit schadenfreude, the bet is legible. Levinson at his best made Euphoria season 1 and the Malcolm & Marie-era visual signature that half of television has spent five years imitating; Levinson at his worst made The Idol. Amazon is paying for the variance, and Friedlander's statement pointedly promised the Levinsons creative freedom.
No first project has been announced. HBO, which retains the Euphoria library and whatever spinoff rights come with it, has said nothing — though if the network ever needs a statement, r/television has already drafted one.
Previously we wrote: "Thank God nobody touched this show": The Gilded Age season 4 trailer reassures HBO fans