Amazon Prime is grabbing Hotel Transylvania: Transformania in a deal with Sony said to be worth $100 million

Hotel Transylvania: Transformania is the fourth film in the successful family-friendly franchise, but with no vaccine for 12 year olds, Sony is taking an alternate route to its audience. First reported by Variety, the first three films have grossed in excess of$1.3 billion since 2012. As Sony has no streaming service of its own, it’s gone to the market (we don’t know if others were involved, or did they go straight to Amazon Prime) and it’s an interesting move.

It’s not clear how Amazon will measure success — yes they can look at viewing figures, and yes it may arrive as a paid for add-on for a period, but will that recoup the investment in a useful timescale? The movie itself brings back Selena Gomez, Andy Samberg, David Spade, Steve Buscemi, Kathryn Hahn, Jim Gaffigan, Molly Shannon, Keegan-Michael Key and Fran Drescher. More relevant it isn’t bringing back either Adam Sandler or Kevin James — Dracula and Frankenstein will now be voiced by Brian Hull and Brad Abrell.

On the plus side (for Amazon) it brings another piece of content; on the minus side (for consumers) is this a subscription they want. We suspect all is fine short term while Amazon bundles Prime Video as part of the Amazon Prime delivery subscription. We wonder when that might change.