Forward

HBO after "Thrones"

"Game of Thrones" just ended. No spoilers here! Check CNN.com's Entertainment section for complete coverage...

First, a look back: "When the show debuted on April 17, 2011, few could have guessed it would be quite the media-saturating sensation that it's become," Esquire's Gabrielle Bruney points out.

This show has been an extraordinary accomplishment for HBO and the show's producers and stars. As Brian Lowry said on "Reliable Sources," it is "the perfect show for this age of television." Lowry: If "The Sopranos" and "Star Wars" had a baby, "it would be Game of Thrones."

How many tuned in?

Frank Pallotta emails: "Thrones" has been setting series viewing records all season. The current record is 18.4 million viewers, who watched last week's episode either live or same-day via linear TV or streaming. My guess for the finale? 21 million live or same-day. The overnight Nielsen #'s will be in around noon ET...

>> An HBO exec emails: "If it's not a new record, I'll join the White Walkers..."

What's next for HBO? (A lot)

If you've been on the media beat long enough, you've probably written a "whither HBO?" story. I know I have. WSJ's Joe Flint had a preemptive response to the next wave of those stories: "Fifteen years ago HBO's Sex and the City went out with a bang. Somehow the network carried on," he tweeted on Sunday.

Brian Lowry emails: The endings for "Game of Thrones" and "The Big Bang Theory" represent a one-two punch for TV viewing as a communal experience, but there are some misconceptions about what it all means, particularly as it pertains to HBO. It's worth noting that the pay network has always employed more of a quilt approach, holding on to subscribers with a hodgepodge of premium content, and that even in its most prolific days, "Thrones" was only around 10 weeks a year with originals. So while the show signing off is certainly a loss — and HBO is undergoing significant changes under AT&T's ownership — it's foolish to think that losing one series will somehow cripple a channel that consistently generates more than $1 billion in annual profit...

Coming up...

"We've got a lot of really great content coming online as 'Game of Thrones' winds down," AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson told investors earlier this month.

This chart via Bloomberg's Gerry Smith shows some of what's coming up:

"We do have a culture of nurturing talent and spending on talent, and we want a creator's vision to come to life," HBO programming prez Casey Bloys said.

Smith notes that HBO's subscriber #'s have climbed "when new seasons of 'Game of Thrones' kicked off and dipped when they ended. But the expectation over time, Bloys said, 'is there will be a net increase.'"

-- HBO's very first ad after the "Thrones" finale: "Watchmen"

-- Tom's Guide put out a list of "10 reasons to keep HBO after Game of Thrones ends." My No. 1 reason is "Westworld..."

-- A reminder: HBO's "Thrones" prequel series will start filming this summer...

...So stop saying there won't be another "Game"

Frank Pallotta emails: The "Thrones" finale is exciting, but it isn't the end of pop culture as we know it. Far from it! After "Thrones" we'll still have Star Wars, Marvel, Stranger Things, Watchmen, Westworld, Mission: Impossible, James Bond, Jordan Peele movies, Star Trek, DC, Pixar, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Fast and Furious and four Avatar sequels to talk about. That's not even counting more Thrones spinoffs and the story that's currently rattling around in someone's brain that could be the next big thing. There will always be an audience for great stories, no matter the competition in the media world.

🔌: I'll be on CNN's "New Day" bright and early, 6 a.m. ET, for "Thrones" post-game...

Holzhauer is back on Monday

"James Holzhauer will have the 'Jeopardy!' buzzer back in his hand Monday as he tries to break more records now that the two-week long Teachers Tournament has wrapped up," his hometown paper, the Napersville Sun, writes.

>> My favorite headline about his return to the show comes from his current home, the Review-Journal in Las Vegas: "James Holzhauer still must take out the trash."

WEEKEND PLANNER

-- Monday: Twitter's annual shareholder meeting...

-- Monday: The Collison tech conference begins in Toronto...

-- Tuesday night: Dana Bash moderates a CNN town hall with Beto O'Rourke...

-- Wednesday: Amazon's annual shareholder meeting...

-- Wednesday: "Live in Front of a Studio Audience: Norman Lear's All in the Family and The Jeffersons" airs on ABC, co-hosted by Lear and Jimmy Kimmel...

-- Wednesday night: Nancy Pelosi and Ivanka Trump will both be honored at the Internet Association's annual charity gala...

-- Thursday evening: "Aladdin" carpet-rides into theaters...

-- Friday: Memorial Day Weekend begins 🇺🇸

Mark Levin's hate-the-media book is No. 1

Right-wing commentator Mark Levin's book "Unfreedom of the Press" comes out Tuesday. Thanks to his numerous plugs on the radio and on Fox, he's at No. 1 on Amazon's hardcover and paperback book chart right now, ahead of Howard Stern's new book. His overarching message: You can't trust the press...

FOR THE RECORD, PART ONE

-- Republican congressman Justin Amash's tweetstorm -- saying "Trump has engaged in impeachable conduct" -- went viral on Saturday. But how much will it still make waves on Monday? (Twitter)

-- Yashar Ali's op-ed about the Bryan Carmody case: "In San Francisco, an attack on press freedoms and echoes of autocracy..." (CNN)

-- Jim Rutenberg's Monday media column: "When it comes to disinformation, all signs point to a 2020 campaign that will make 2016 look like a mere test run..." (NYT)

-- The Netherlands wins! Rob Picheta has a Eurovision recap here... (CNN)

Steve Kroft's sign-off

"After 50 years in journalism, 40 years at CBS News, and 30 years at '60 Minutes' -- it doesn't seem possible -- I have decided to retire," Steve Kroft said Sunday night. "It's been a difficult decision, one that I've considered at the end of each of the past four seasons. Now feels like the right time. As my good friend and colleague, Morley Safer advised me a few days before he passed away, 'Don't stay too long.' There are still some things I'd like to do that I haven't done. I'm not getting any younger. I want to leave while I still have all of my marbles -- the energy to enjoy life and the curiosity to pursue some different things. I've done nearly 500 stories for this broadcast and that has taken up most of the past 30 years of my life. It's been a tremendously rewarding experience and I want to thank you for watching what is still the best news program on television..."

FOR THE RECORD, PART TWO

-- Anthony Mason and Tony Dokoupil join Gayle King on "CBS This Morning" on Monday... (Variety)

-- And the program is adding four dedicated correspondents: David Begnaud, Jericka Duncan, Anna Werner and Vladimir Duthiers... (Deadline)

-- Al Jazeera said Sunday that it had "suspended two of its journalists over video content produced on the Holocaust." The network sad the AJ+ video was "offensive" and produced without "due oversight..." (Al Jazeera)

Buttigieg on Fox

From the looks of my Twitter feed, Pete Buttigieg was mostly praised for his decision to participate in a Fox News town hall, just days after Elizabeth Warren very publicly rejected Fox's invitation. For a sampling, look no further than his comms chief Lis Smith's page. She's been retweeting all the support. Smith tweeted: "In case anyone out there is still asking whether @PeteButtigieg going on @FoxNews w/ Chris Wallace for a town hall was a good idea: Asked & Answered. We will continue to talk to every voter—no matter where they live or consume their news."

Mayor Pete called out Tucker and Laura...

As CNN's Dan Merica noted here, Buttigieg used the town hall to "slam two of the network's primetime opinion hosts, knocking both Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham by name on the network where they each host an hour." Fox had no immediate comment. But the network's execs have known to expect this.

--> Buttigieg has one answer to this question, and Warren has a different answer: Does one hour on Fox really make a difference on a network that's anti-Democrat every single day every morning and every night?

--> Media Matters, which campaigns against Fox, says "the problem" is that Dem town halls are "used by the president's propaganda network in its ongoing effort to sanitize its brand."

The primaries versus the general

I highly recommend the NYT's live chat about Buttigieg's town hall... Even if you're reading it hours later... There are lots of insights about how it went.

I second Maggie Haberman's Q from the chat: "My question remains as to how many regular Fox viewers are Democratic primary voters." I argued on SE Cupp's show over the weekend that the Democratic calculations about embracing versus shunning Fox are more relevant in the general election than in the primaries.

Did Trump watch?

If so, he probably wasn't pleased with the loud applause or Wallace's note about the big crowd size. Trump is trying to keep Fox in line -- he tweeted on Sunday afternoon that it's "hard to believe that @FoxNews is wasting airtime on Mayor Pete, as Chris Wallace likes to call him. Fox is moving more and more to the losing (wrong) side in covering the Dems. They got dumped from the Democrats boring debates, and they just want in. They forgot the people who got them there..."

--> Fox's Brit Hume replied and said, "Say this for Buttigieg. He's willing to be questioned by Chris Wallace, something you haven't done since you've been president. Oh, and covering the Democratic candidates is part of the job of a news channel..."

Monday will be day 70 since an on-camera White House briefing...

And, maybe not coincidentally, day 59 since Robert Mueller handed in his report to the DOJ.

So what's been lost now that the W.H. has stopped holding on-camera briefings? Won't Sarah Sanders just lie anyway? "Even if she just lies, she will lie on camera and she will lie on tape," former Clinton W.H. press secretary Joe Lockhart said on Sunday's show. And "the questions matter," regardless of the answers. More...

Trump tweets at Iran

The president's message -- "never threaten the United States again!" -- seemed to closely track a Fox segment about "U.S.-IRAN TENSIONS." Media Matters' Matthew Gertz noted the 4:16 p.m. segment was followed by Trump's 4:25 tweet...

"The profanity presidency"

Peter Baker's story in Monday's NYT: "His is the profanity presidency, full of four-letter denunciations of his enemies and earthy dismissals of allegations lodged against him. At rallies and in interviews, on Twitter and in formal speeches, he relishes the bad-boy language of a shock jock, just one more way of gleefully provoking the political establishment bothered by his norm-shattering ways." Read on...

Trump versus "Thrones"

He taped an interview with Fox's Steve Hilton last Wednesday... It aired on Sunday opposite "GoT..." But Trump initially got the time wrong on Twitter:

FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE

-- A weak move on Tulsi Gabbard's part: She poo-poohed questions about her campaign being "boosted by Putin apologists" as "a whole lot of fake news..." (Twitter)

-- A must-read from Kevin Poulsen: Four former OANN employees describe a channel that's a "slurry of fake news mixed with genuine reporting; internet conspiracy theories blended with far-right rhetoric and drizzled with undiluted Kremlin propaganda..." (Beast)

-- My intro to Sunday's "Reliable Sources" examined why news outlets mostly just shrugged when Trump recklessly talked about "treason..." (Twitter)

QUOTE OF THE DAY

"Freedom of the press and of expression is an important indicator of the state of a country's health. Let's not forget that one of the first things dictatorships do is remove freedom of the press or mask it, not leaving it free."

--Pope Francis in an address to the Foreign Press Association in Italy...

Alabama's biggest papers make a statement

The Birmingham News, Huntsville Times, and Mobile Press-Register all had the exact same cover story on Sunday: "It's time to hear Alabama's women." The cover package featured the views of 200 women -- a pointed response to the male-dominated debate in the state legislature that resulted in the passage of the country's most restrictive abortion law.

"In my mind, sometimes the single most powerful thing we can do as journalists is simply elevate the voices of those who are unheard or lost in conversations," Kelly Ann Scott, the VP of content for the Alabama Media Group, told me. "We can make the space for people to be heard. And that's exactly what our newsrooms did with this work."

The power of religious broadcasters

On Sunday's show, I spoke with Catherine Hadro, the host of "Pro-Life Weekly" on the Catholic network EWTN, about the role of religious outlets in the abortion debate. Hadro described how her audience is "closely following pro-life legislation" across the country. Watch the segment here...

"Political debate" versus "factual debate"

Irin Carmon told me that news outlets have to carefully separate the "political debate" about abortion from the "factual" and medical debates. Carmon and Jane Coaston also discussed the reasons why some conservatives think the bills are morally right but strategically wrong. Here's the video...

"Reliable" notes and quotes

-- "If you didn't know any better," Oliver Darcy said, "you'd almost think that Bill Barr is one of the opinion talking heads on Fox News."

-- What are Trump's accusations about Big Tech bias really all about? Carmon, Coaston and Darcy weighed in...

-- And I spoke with the NYT's Susanne Craig about how news outlets once inflated Trump's businessman image, and are now digging deeper...

Catch up on Sunday's show

Watch the video clips on CNN.com... Listen to the podcast via Apple Podcasts or your preferred app... Or check out the full program via CNNgo or VOD...

FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR

-- "Running Scared:" Here is John Koblin's recap of TV upfront week... (NYT)

-- Scarlett Johansson and Colin Jost are "officially engaged after two years of dating..." (AP)

-- ICYMI: Alec Baldwin and friends sang "Don't Stop Me Now" on the "SNL" season finale... (CNN)

-- During "Weekend Update," Leslie Jones tore into the Alabama abortion law: "You can't tell me what to do with my body..." (CNN)

-- And DJ Khaled and John Legend gave a touching tribute to Nipsey Hussle in an "SNL" performance... (CNN)

Counter-programming!

Megan Thomas sent along four Sunday night viewing alternatives to the "Game of Thrones" finale:

For those who prefer comedy to violence...
"Wine Country" -- Amy Poehler's directorial debut is very Gen X and damn funny. Paula Pell steals every scene -- with an all-star cast.

For those who prefer a really dark comedy...
"Dead to Me" -- Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini are fantastic in this quick-binge series that is full of surprises.

For those who prefer more reality than dragons with their drama...
"The Chi" -- Lena Waithe's Chicago-set coming-of-age drama is gripping -- every episode.

For those who prefer playground games...
"Big Little Lies" Season1 -- rewatch and prep for the June 9 return of the Monterey 5 + Meryl Streep.

Ego-massaging at Disney

Brian Lowry emails: Although I joked on Twitter about Disney having to tiptoe around James Cameron now that the "Avatar" movies are within the fold -- as "Avengers: Endgame" passed it at the domestic box-office, and looks poised to do the same internationally -- it does raise an issue for the studio: With so many high-profile franchises under one roof, Disney is going to have to engage in some ego-massaging diplomacy in regard to release dates and marketing, convincing its children that it loves them all equally...

"Rocketman" countdown

In Monday's NYT, Brooks Barnes counts all the reasons why Paramount's "Rocketman" -- out May 31 -- "could have wide ripple effects." Check it out...

Thank you for reading! Email me with additions, corrections, suggestions, tips, complaints -- anything! -- anytime. See you Monday...