Gaming Wall Street

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Gaming Wall Street
Gaming-wall-street docu-series hbo-max poster prodigium-pictures biltmore-films gunpowder-sky tobias-deml scaled-down.jpg
Poster
Genre
Directed byTobias Deml
Starring
  • Harvey Pitt
  • Keith Gill (archival)
  • Ramona Ortega
  • Dennis Kelleher
  • David Wenger
  • Tobin Mulshine
  • John Fichthorn
  • Tommy Cooperman
  • Susanne Trimbath
Narrated by Kieran Culkin
Composers
  • Kate Bacich
  • Ian Rees
Country of origin United States
Original languageEnglish
No. of seasons1
No. of episodes2 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producers
  • Floris Bauer
  • Janet H.A. Brown
  • Van Toeffler
  • Joanna Zwickel
  • Justin Li
  • Max Deml
Producers
  • Tessa Byford
  • Burke Koonce
  • John Fichthorn
Cinematography
  • Olga Vazquez
  • Tobias Deml
Editors
  • Tom Patterson
  • Rich Hyatt
  • David Tillman
  • Rachael Wax Taber
  • Brian Kallies
Production companies
Release
Original network HBO Max
Original releaseMarch 3, 2022 (March 3, 2022)

Gaming Wall St is a HBO Max Original documentary miniseries directed by Tobias Deml and narrated by Kieran Culkin. [1] [2] The 2-episode series explores the causes that lead to the 2021 GameStop short squeeze, and the dark underbelly of Wall Street that the phenomenon unearthed: payment for order flow, creative accounting, abuses of the short selling mechanism like naked short selling, corporate overvoting and failures to deliver (FTDs). [3]

Contents

Production

The series was initiated by Prodigium Pictures, a production company owned by director Tobias Deml, in late 2020. [4] In its earliest form, Deml and producer Tessa Byford conceived of a documentary that would follow the rowdy online community Wall Street Bets. Once the GameStop phenomenon—popularized by that community—became a #1 global headline however, the focus shifted more towards the tug-of-war around meme stocks, and the financial markets phenomena underpinning this highly unusual event. Filming began on February 1, 2021, in Nevada. Due to multiple documentaries being announced on the subject, [5] the team chose to stay completely stealth and evaded any publicity. Prodigium teamed up with Biltmore Films (who had produced Betting on Zero a few years earlier); principals Burke Koonce and John Fichthorn were instrumental in elevating the documentary from a human interest piece with wild online culture wars to an investigative analysis of the darker corners of the financial system that the movement around GameStop exposed. [6]

The companies won the support of Biltmore's prior distributor, Gunpowder and Sky, for the project. The series was then pitched to HBO Max, and the streamer green-lit a two episode structure in the fall of 2021. The show was edited in secrecy on a highly compressed timeline of only 3.5 months with a team of 6 editors working in parallel, and a globally distributed animation team readying both narrative and schematic visualizations. [7] Deml and Byford concluded filming during post-production in early January 2022.

Gaming Wall St was announced with a trailer on February 26 [8] and released on March 3, 2022. [9]

Director Tobias Deml, having worked extensively in the space of Social Impact Entertainment [10] and intending to spread financial literacy [7] has stated that during the course of production, he "saw a great need for access to education about investing. We have the opportunity to right a decades-old wrong created by powerful firms that have been gaming the system to the detriment of society." [11] and "I hope that viewers will feel empowered to see themselves as investors and be part of a much-needed reform." [12]

Episodes

No.TitleDirected byOriginal release date
1"Risky Bets"Tobias DemlMarch 3, 2022 (2022-03-03)
2"Lifting the Veil"Tobias DemlMarch 3, 2022 (2022-03-03)

Reception

ShowBiz Cheat Sheet has called the series a "Must-See" [2] while TV Guide criticized that the series "doesn't go deep enough on the culture or the alleged crimes". [13] Decider gave it a "Stream it!" recommendation, explaining "If you loved the mix of harsh language and financial market minutiae that defined The Big Short , then from its narrative to its visuals, you'll dig on Gaming Wall Street's whole entire groove." [14]

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References

  1. ↑ "'Gaming Wall Street' HBO Max Review: Stream It or Skip It?" . Retrieved 2022-03-18.
  2. 1 2 Mullen, Amanda (2022-03-05). "'Gaming Wall Street': HBO's GameStop Stock Documentary a Must-Watch". Showbiz Cheat Sheet. Retrieved 2022-03-18.
  3. ↑ "'Money's all belief': the docuseries unravelling the GameStop chaos". The Guardian. 2022-03-03. Retrieved 2022-03-18.
  4. ↑ "Gaming Wall Street". Prodigium Pictures. Retrieved 2022-03-18.
  5. ↑ Welk, Brian (2021-02-15). "Make It GameStop! All the Competing Film and TV Projects in the Works About the WallStreetBets Saga" . Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  6. ↑ Koonce, Burke. "Let's talk about the new GameStop doc on HBO Max". Capitalism Maven — Exploring The Forces That Shape Our Lives. Retrieved 2022-03-18.
  7. 1 2 "'Money's all belief': the docuseries unravelling the GameStop chaos". the Guardian. 2022-03-03. Retrieved 2022-03-21.
  8. ↑ "'Gaming Wall Street' Trailer Goes Inside the GameStop Stock Market Scandal with Narration by 'Succession's Kieran Culkin". Collider. 2022-02-26. Retrieved 2022-03-18.
  9. ↑ "Gaming Wall Street Trailer Examines Gamestop's 2021 Stock Phenomenon". ScreenRant. 2022-02-27. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  10. ↑ "The Lonely Islands of Social Impact Entertainment". Muse by Clio. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  11. ↑ "Gaming Wall Street Trailer Hopes GameStop/Reddit Film Will Spark "Much-Needed Reform To Wall Street"". GameSpot. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  12. ↑ "Full HBO Trailer for Doc 'Gaming Wall Street' About GameStop Stock | FirstShowing.net". www.firstshowing.net. 25 February 2022. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  13. ↑ "Gaming Wall Street Review: HBO Max's GameStop Stock and Reddit Doc Is Mostly in the Red". TV Guide. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
  14. ↑ "'Gaming Wall Street' HBO Max Review: Stream It or Skip It?". Decider. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
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