Entertainment Inside Us (Insidus)

Mzansi Magic, the home of entertainment, is ready to wow audiences once again with its latest telenovela, My Brother’s Keeper. Premiering on Monday 23 October at 19:30, the 130-episode drama promises suspense, intrigue, and top-tier performances. Produced by the renowned Rhythm World team, My Brother’s Keeper promises a compelling story of family politics, ambition, exploring how far individuals will reach in their quest for power and acceptance, and the corrupting nature of greed.  Against the opulent backdrop of the Shabalala family empire, at the heart of this drama stands Nqubeko, Mshengu's ambitious love child, trapped in the shadows and yearning for his rightful place in the family.  Nqubeko, driven by both ambition and the need for validation, sees an opportunity to become more powerful, setting his sights on his sister-in-law Fakazile, the key to the Shabalala legacy. But as he navigates this dangerous path, he finds himself at odds with his siblings, especially

Play Room (stylised as Playroom) is a children's channel operated by Ngwato Nkosi Group which offers fun and learning with popular animated shows dubbed in Zulu alongside live-action shows. The channel is set to go live on all packages from November 6 on channel 300. During the week, we were able to piece out a part of the channel's schedule as tests are still underway particularly for the schedule. So it's likely that some content already confirmed for Play Room won't form part of the initial offering. We have shows like Game Shakers and Paw Patrol those were very much confirmed beforehand. But a majority of content such as Akili And Me, Jabu's Jungle and Bino And Fino are all based from Africa leading us to believe that Play Room may be looking to ramp its local offering. They already offer a local tween show Play Room Live with a selection of animated shows set to be dubbed in local languages. The idea of them sourcing out as much locally produce

In 2019, Nick Wilson the cofounder to African Animation Network unveiled plans to launch a 24 hour linear channel strictly for African produced animation with plans to get original content. From what is understood, some funding would be needed to get this off the ground. Prior to its rollout, they were plans to launch a dedicated programming block on numerous local broadcasters in the African market likely even DStv as sources sited these broadcasters as "major outlets". Following that instance, there's technically been no update. Nick Wilson and the rest of his team at African Animation Network have since then been producing Garbage Boy And Trash Can for Cartoon Network. They aren't looking to compete with their potential linear offering but as seen already strive with partnerships. In the coming months, MultiChoice and Ngwato Nkosi Group are set to unveil a new children's channel to their platforms, Play Room . Described as a fun and educational

For CBeebies, the pubcaster has commissioned Mojo Swoptops (52 x 11 minutes) from Blue Zoo and Tararaboom. The CG-animated preschool series stars an anthropomorphic vehicle who solves the problems in his local community by literally donning new headgear, such as helicopter blades. The series is based on Cindy Black’s book series of the same name. CBeebies has also greenlit the animated series Rafi the Wishing Wizard from BBC Studios Kids & Family Productions, about a family of modern-day wizards who face the challenges of living in a bustling city. And for the six-to-12 demo, CBBC has ordered Black Dog Television’s Pickle Storm (10 x 22 minutes), a live-action series about the adventures of a nine-year-old who has to leave his fantasy world and seek refuge in the UK. In renewal news, CBeebies has reupped Maramedia’s animated/live-action preschool series Olga da Polga (13 x 11 minutes) for a second season. It’s about an eight-year-old girl, her family and her pet guinea pig,

BBC Studios Kids & Family and CBeebies have commissioned new preschool series Hey Duggee’s Squirrel Club from Studio AKA. A spinoff of the London-based prodco’s Hey Duggee, the new 2D-animated series centers around a friendly dog who encourages his animal friends to try new things. A release date hasn’t yet been announced for the 26 x seven-minute show. BBC Studios Kids & Family and CBeebies have also renewed the original Hey Duggee series for a 20 x seven-minute fifth season, which will premiere sometime in 2025.  Since its debut on CBeebies in December 2014, several broadcasters have picked up Hey Duggee, including Nick Jr. (US), Tencent Video (China) and Cartoonito (Italy). The show remains popular—it was the most streamed CBeebies title on BBC iPlayer in 2022 and the second most-watched series on CBeebies between January and August this year, according to the pubcaster. Hey Duggee also made the leap from screen to stage this year with Hey Duggee The Live Theatre Sho

Hasbro has locked in ABC Australia as a new broadcast partner for its CG-animated adventure series Transformers: EarthSpark (26 x 22 minutes). The first 10 episodes of this family-friendly show from eOne and Paramount will debut in December on linear channel ABC ME and the ABC iview streamer. The remaining 16 episodes will air next year.  The show will join several other eOne series already in ABC’s lineup, including Peppa Pig and PJ Masks . Hasbro has been paving the way for EarthSpark‘s Australian expansion this month, launching toys related to the show at mass retailers throughout the country. The series premiered globally on Paramount+ in 2022, and eOne inked deals for the toon earlier this year with several international broadcasters, including Gulli (France), Channel 5 (Singapore), TV Cultura (Brazil) and Super! (Italy). In July, the BBC picked it up for CBBC and BBC iPlayer, where it’s among the top-10 most-watched shows on the app, according to a release.

Following the inception of Disney+, multiple Disney Channels have been closing down across the world as the company looks to consolidate their content to the streamer. They've also been looking at possibly selling their linear offering of course this is applicable to the United States. But from what this entails, Disney is working towards a deadline to the remaining linear offering with Asia set to close theirs by the end of the year with a lot of European countries still harvesting most channels and other regions which have yet to receive Disney+. Last month, Disney closed a number of linear channels across Asia and this included National Geographic and National Geographic Wild. They also managed the brands of the same name whose feeds had since then been managed within EMEA following these closures. Despite having its operations merged with Africa, National Geographic Wild to date still has varied offering from the rest of Europe which brings to question it's

Play Room (stylised as Playroom) is a children's channel operated by Ngwato Nkosi Group which offers fun and learning with popular animated shows dubbed in Zulu alongside live-action shows. The channel is set to go live on all packages from November 6 on channel 300. From what we've been able to uncover, MultiChoice lent Play Room the frequencies formerly used by one of their other TV channels, VUZU. An HD/SD feed is currently being test run on their platforms with various Movie Room holding slides. Bumpers/Idents/Promos/Banners Similar to Movie Room, MultiChoice and Ngwato Nkosi Group tease the launch of Play Room through various banners none of which relate to the programming. Schedule/Programming As mentioned, Movie Room holding slides are occupying the 24 hour lineup. Below is a drafted weekday schedule with weekends being occupied by the holding slides so we assume the channel will have a varied offering during those times alongside the weekday offering. 12 Oct

The Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) Max streamer will launch in 22 European countries in spring 2024 and France and Belgium later next year, the media outfit revealed today. Opening Mipcom Cannes with a keynote, interntional boss Gerhard Zeiler and EMEA Head of Streaming Leah Hooper Rosa brought highly-anticipated news of the rollout of the new streamer in the continent, which is rebranding from HBO Max with a bigger offering. The Nordics, the Netherlands, Iberia and CEE, which already have HBO Max, will gain access to the rebranded streamer in the spring. There will then be a “second wave” of launches later next year including in France and Belgium, which currently don’t have HBO Max, although WBD has an output deal with Amazon locally in France. The service launched earlier this year in the U.S. and other territories. It will launch later in the UK due to the pre-existing content deal between Sky and WBD. “The content breadth is so huge and we are enabling customers to find this