On Monday, July 13, Disney+ and Hulu are co-launching Rabbit Hole, a 10-episode variety series packing 36 digital creators with a combined 675 million followers into one show. It's the biggest creator collab ever booked into premium streaming. Pocket.watch built it, Disney is just paying for the reach. Legacy TV, meet your new talent agency.
⚡ Key Takeaways
- Disney+ and Hulu co-premiere Rabbit Hole on July 13, a 10-episode creator variety series, and a first for the Disney flagship.
- 36 digital creators, 675M combined followers, headlined by Topper Guild (118.8M), Zhong (90.8M), and Josh Peck (38M).
- Pocket.watch built the show around the creators' existing brands, not around a TV format. The Nickelodeon playbook is dead.
- Wider slate: 240 half-hour episodes across 53 creator brands with 1.2B subs on Disney+ and Hulu at launch.
- YouTube CEO Neal Mohan already called it: 'YouTube is the new television.' Disney's answer is to just hire the creators.
- The durable creator win is to use TV for distribution and monetize the fanbase directly on your own storefront (Fanvault: 8% fee, 92% to creators).
What actually happened?
The show was co-created by pocket.watch chief content officer Albie Hecht and head of development Carin Davis, greenlit by Hulu in October 2025 as a creator-led variety format (Deadline). By December, the cast list dropped, headlined by Topper Guild (118.8M) and Zhong (90.8M) and anchored by Nickelodeon alum Josh Peck (Tubefilter). On June 23, Disney and Hulu confirmed a July 13, 2026 dual-platform US premiere (Hulu Press).
| Cast member | Combined followers |
|---|---|
| Topper Guild | 118.8M |
| Zhong | 90.8M |
| ZHC | 65M |
| Collins Key | 48.7M |
| Jesser | 46.2M |
| That's Amazing | 40M |
| Dan Rhodes | 38.3M |
| Josh Peck | 38M |
| Sofie Dossi | 28.6M |
The Disney+ slot is the twist. After Disney completed its full Hulu buyout in June 2025 (Streaming Media), it now has full control of both distribution brands. A creator-led variety show inside the Disney+ flagship, alongside Marvel, Star Wars, and Pixar, is a first for that platform. That's not a Hulu experiment anymore, that's a Disney bet.
Why does this matter for creators?
Pocket.watch didn't build Rabbit Hole around a TV format and stuff creators into it. It built the show around the creators' existing brands and let production wrap around what they already do on YouTube and TikTok. That's the opposite of the Nickelodeon and Disney Channel model that produced Josh Peck himself. Hecht was blunt about the shift.
"The first wave of linear TV was like, 'Oh, you're popular, we'll make you a host,' or, 'You're popular, we'll make you an actor.' That's not what we do. We look at what the creator's brand is and create a format around that. We don't have a [pre-existing] format and then stick them into it."
Albie Hecht, Chief Content Officer, pocket.watch
For a decade, the majors treated creators as raw material to be reshaped for a network audience. Now a top-tier studio is showing up, wrapping production around what creators already do, and paying for the reach. That flips the leverage entirely. A creator with a few million followers is no longer auditioning for a network deal, they're programming inventory being bid on.
What's the bigger picture?
Pocket.watch isn't a boutique operation. The company (founded in 2017 by ex-Maker Studios CAO Chris M. Williams) now claims 53 creator brands reaching a combined 1.2B subscribers (Deadline). That's a bigger audience than any single US broadcast network. Disney isn't licensing one show here, it's leasing a whole creator network.
The deal isn't a one-off either. Individual series from 8 of the cast members are already streaming, and the full pocket.watch slate on Disney+ and Hulu totals 240 half-hour episodes at launch (Animation World Network). This is programming infrastructure, not a novelty booking. Legacy TV finally admitted where the audience actually lives.
The admission was already public. In February 2025, YouTube CEO Neal Mohan declared "YouTube is the new television," with TV screens overtaking mobile as the primary YouTube viewing device in the US (TheWrap). The living room is now the contested screen for every major streamer. Rabbit Hole is Disney's answer, and the answer is: hire the creators.
What does Fanvault think?
Rabbit Hole is a huge win for creator leverage and a reminder that streaming platforms will always be renting the audience, not owning it. Disney gets 10 episodes of 675M-follower reach. The creators get a check, exposure, and back-end residuals gated by studio math. The 2026 winners will treat TV deals as distribution and monetize the fanbase directly, on their own storefront, at their own take rate.
Fanvault takes 8% and creators keep 92% across subscriptions, paid DMs, and authenticated memorabilia auctions, with Stripe-backed payouts. That's what a durable creator business looks like once the season wraps.
Disney rents the audience for one season. The creator's storefront keeps it forever.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Rabbit Hole and when does it premiere?
Rabbit Hole is a 10-episode half-hour variety series co-launching on Disney+ and Hulu in the US on
Who is in the cast?
36 digital-native creators with a combined
Why is Disney betting on creators instead of building the next Nickelodeon star?
Because the audience already moved. YouTube CEO Neal Mohan publicly called YouTube 'the new television' in early 2025, with TV screens overtaking mobile as the primary US YouTube viewing surface (TheWrap). Disney can't build a 675M-follower cast from its own IP lineup, so it's licensing the creators instead.
What is pocket.watch's larger deal with Disney?
Rabbit Hole is the flagship. Individual series from 8 of the cast members are also streaming on Disney+ and Hulu, with pocket.watch's overall slate totaling
What does this mean for creators without a TV deal?
The Rabbit Hole cast will use the show as distribution. A 10-episode Disney+/Hulu run boosts a creator's existing follower base but doesn't own it. The durable move is monetizing the fanbase directly on a storefront the creator controls. Fanvault takes