HBO has decided to stream the pilots of Ballers and The Brink on Facebook. The premiere episodes are available now. You will find the first episode of Ballers on Dwayne Johnson (The Rock) Facebook page. The Brink can be found on the Facebook page created for the series. Both shows premiered June 21st and will be shown on Sunday nights. Facebook will only be streaming the first episode of each new HBO Original series. Facebook has exclusive access to stream the pilot episodes. From there you can sign up for a free trial of HBO NOW to continue watching.
We had an opportunity to watch both shows using HBO NOW yesterday. The first episode of Baller’s took some time to set everything up for the series. We enjoyed the show and look forward to watching as the series moves forward. The Brink was a nice surprise. We hadn’t heard much about it other than that the shows stars Jack Black and Tim Robbins. We were happily surprised by the series. It’s all about the laughs and delivered several in the first episode. Both series are intended for an adult audience with nudity and plenty of adult language.
Game of Thrones (GoT) made HBO NOW an instant hit in April but season 5 ended earlier this month. That leaves a gap for HBO to fill. Not that they don’t have other popular series. True Detectives in quickly gaining in popularity but they could still use some new hits to round out their collection of Original series. Deciding to stream the first episode of Ballers and The Brink for free on Facebook should help HBO get millions of extra views and potential new customers for HBO NOW.
This isn’t the first time HBO has helped promote new series. I don’t remember them streaming the first episode of Game of Thrones on Facebook but they turned a blind eye for the first few years as GoT grew into the most pirated show. Torrent users helped make the show an outrageous success that has since gained accolades and helped build HBO into an even stronger company that provides perhaps the best original content. That’s saying something with other tough competitors like Netflix and Amazon working on their own creative efforts.
HBO NOW is a stand-alone streaming service that HBO launched in April. They introduced the new service just days before the Game of Thrones season 5 premiere. No longer would customers need a cable or satellite subscription to watch their favorite HBO shows. Instead they could simply sign up for HBO NOW which was originally priced at $14.99 a month. We expect HBO NOW discounts will be introduced in the months to come. They are hinting at prices as low as $8.33 a month. That would be a great price for a la carte access to HBO shows and movies.
Slide on over to Facebook and watch the first episode of Ballers and The Brink for free. We have links to each premiere episode at the top of the post. From there if you enjoy the series you can sign up for a free trial of HBO NOW to continue watching them. I also recommend you check out Silicon Valley and True Detective. HBO NOW will also give you access to every episode of popular series like Game of Thrones and Boardwalk Empire so enjoy binge watching the very best HBO has to offer.
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