A federal judge cleared Paramount’s $110 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery, drawing a sharp rebuke from actor Mark Ruffalo who called the merger a bad deal for America.
U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín issued an order allowing Paramount to close its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery after the company settled with a California-led coalition of state attorneys general. The ruling rejected objections that sought broader restrictions and described the outcome as a reasonable resolution of the dispute.
Fox Business reported that Ruffalo, a longtime Hollywood opponent of the deal, took to X to denounce the result and keep pressure on Democratic officials who had once vowed to fight it.
The states had sued in July, arguing the combination would reduce competition and hand the new company too much power in film distribution and basic cable programming. On Sept. 21, they announced a settlement instead. The judge’s Wednesday order then cleared the final major legal roadblock, with the companies expected to close around Oct. 6.
Ruffalo did not soften his tone. He framed the fight as bigger than one corporate deal and cast the winners as billionaires trampling ordinary workers.
In posts highlighted in the Fox Business account, Ruffalo wrote that the merger “will stifle creativity, weaken free speech, and cost people their jobs, it is a bad deal for this country and should never have been approved.” He called the outcome “incredibly disappointing” for “the hundreds of thousands of us who stood up to block it,” then added that the grassroots effort would not fade.
“This was never about just one merger: this was about fighting back against corrupt oligarch billionaires trampling the interests of everyday people to line their own pockets,” he posted. “We're still in that fight. Join us.”
Days before the settlement, he had already leaned on California Attorney General Rob Bonta, posting, “Don’t you dare @AGRobBonta, do not cave.” Bonta’s office later said the settlement resolved the states’ claims and locked in production promises. The public pressure campaign did not stop the deal from moving forward.
Fox Business also reported that Paramount slammed Ruffalo for invoking antisemitic tropes in the dispute, and that the actor fired back by calling those accusations appalling and fundamentally dishonest. The clash put a familiar Hollywood pattern on display: a wealthy celebrity railing against “oligarch billionaires” while a court-approved settlement was already tying the buyer to concrete U.S. production spending.
Entertainment-industry fights rarely stay confined to one studio lot, as seen when Kara Swisher vowed to leave CNN after the same merger cleared its final hurdle.
Martínez-Olguín did not treat the consent decree as a giveaway. In language carried across multiple outlets, she called the deal a “reasonable factual and legal resolution” and said objectors’ hopes for tougher terms did not rise to legal violations that would justify rejecting the parties’ bargain.
The Washington Examiner reported that she found the proposed consent decree “a fair, reasonable, and good faith approach to address the competitive harms alleged in the Complaint,” and that it did not violate law or public policy. The same account noted the approval came just before an Oct. 1 ticking-fee deadline that would have cost Paramount millions each day it slipped.
A California Department of Justice spokesperson, quoted in other coverage, said the settlement “resolves our antitrust concerns,” protects competition and consumer choice, and “centers the needs, concerns, and futures of California workers.” That is a long way from the maximalist block Ruffalo demanded.
Courtroom drama and celebrity claims often collide in public life, a dynamic also familiar from coverage of Sunny Hostin’s disputed holdout-juror account in a high-profile New York trial.
The terms Bonta’s office described are specific. Paramount committed to releasing at least 30 movies a year in each of the first two years, then 32 movies a year over the next three years. At least four films each year must be independent releases. The company also agreed to spend at least an additional $1.5 billion on U.S. film production over five years compared with its 2025 spending levels.
Reuters reported that the combined company must keep a heavy theatrical slate for five years and that failure to meet production benchmarks could put Miramax at risk of sale. The same dispatch said Paramount named Mattel CEO Ynon Kreiz as co-CEO alongside David Ellison as the deal heads toward an Oct. 6 close.
Just the News noted that the merger would combine major streaming and news assets, including Paramount+ and HBO Max, while giving Paramount control of CNN and CBS News under an independence board structure described in the settlement framework. In other words, the states traded a collapse of the deal for enforceable output and spending rules plus governance promises around news properties.
Breitbart reported that Kreiz is set to join on Oct. 5 as co-CEO with Ellison, underscoring how quickly the corporate side is staffing the combined company now that the judge has signed off. Martínez-Olguín again stressed that wishes for a harder decree “do not rise to the level of legal violations upon which the Court can reject the parties’ negotiated resolution.”
Hollywood news moves fast from boardrooms to obituaries and back again, including the recent loss of Nickelodeon alum Christy Knowings at 46, another reminder that the industry’s public story is always bigger than one transaction.
Stack the timeline and the contradiction is plain. Democratic attorneys general filed suit in July on competition grounds. Ruffalo publicly warned Bonta not to fold. The states settled on Sept. 21 with production floors and spending mandates. A federal judge then called the bargain reasonable and refused to revise it for activists who wanted more.
Ruffalo’s preferred story is oligarchs versus “everyday people.” The court record shows elected state enforcers took a deal, locked in U.S. production dollars and theatrical minimums, and won judicial approval over objections that the decree did not go far enough. A movie star’s X feed is not an antitrust remedy. A signed consent decree is.
When celebrity activism treats every merger as a morality play, voters still get to watch what the filings, the settlement math, and the judge’s order actually say.
Hollywood can rage about billionaires on social media. Judges still close deals on evidence, not applause lines.
