Back in 2018, FOX signed a five-year deal with the WWE for “Smackdown,” but earlier this year, Comcast announced it had signed a five-year contract with the WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) to bring the flagship show to the USA Network. 

This past Friday, the last episode of WWE’s “Smackdown” aired on FOX and since FOX has a next-day deal with Hulu, new episodes of many shows arrive on Hulu and Hulu On Disney+ the day after it airs.  However, this week’s episode hasn’t been added onto Hulu or Hulu On Disney+ as normal, which has resulted in Hulu’s online help taking to social media to inform subscribers of why this has happened.

Sorry for any disappointment! We’ve now received confirmation that this episode will not be available on Hulu. Our rights to offer new episodes of WWE Friday Night SmackDown have expired at this time.

However, due to the contract’s expiration between FOX and WWE, many of the previous episodes of WWE “Smackdown” have also been removed from Hulu and Hulu On Disney+. The remaining episodes will expire from Hulu on Sunday, September 8th, 2024.

From next week, new episodes of “Smackdown” will air on the USA Network and will be going to Peacock 30 days later.  Peacock already has an overall deal with the WWE for access to the “WWE Network” content, such as Premium Live Events like “Wrestlemania”.    In January, “RAW” will also be moving from the USA Network over to Netflix.   Another show, “NXT” is also moving home in October, heading over to the CW channel for five years.   While there are many WWE shows also available on Hulu, not everything is available on Hulu On Disney+ due to different licensing issues.

For the past two years, each September, WWE content has been flagged with an expiring notice on Hulu, only for the two companies to reach a last-minute deal to extend the deal. Earlier this week, most of the other WWE content was flagged with the expiration date, but it has now been removed, likely coming from another contract extension. However, it should be noted that “Smackdown” comes under a different licensing deal.

While WWE content still remains on Hulu, it will be interesting to see if this continues once the new deals with Netflix and CW come into effect.

Roger’s Take:   WWE is in a bit of an awkward stage with some of its contracts, especially RAW, since the USA Network did a short-term contract extension to keep the show until Netflix’s deal picks up in January, so I’d assume new episodes of RAW won’t be coming to Hulu once that deal comes into effect.

What do you think of “Smackdown” leaving Hulu and Hulu On Disney+?  Let me know on social media!

Roger Palmer

Roger has been a Disney fan since he was a kid and this interest has grown over the years. He has visited Disney Parks around the globe and has a vast collection of Disney movies and collectibles. He is the owner of What's On Disney Plus & DisKingdom. Email: Roger@WhatsOnDisneyPlus.com Twitter: Twitter.com/RogPalmerUK Facebook: Facebook.com/rogpalmeruk

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