Nobody Wants to Run the Trailer for Alex Gibney's ‘Musk' — Not YouTube, Not TikTok, Not Meta, and Certainly Not X

Here's a twist: that four-hour Elon Musk documentary can't get its trailer onto most of the internet.

According to THR, Bleecker Street, which is distributing "Musk," has been turned away by YouTube, TikTok and Meta (Facebook and Instagram) in its attempt to buy ads for Alex Gibney's doc. X has also refused, which isn't surprising given who owns it. The other three are the real head-scratchers, and Bleecker Street reportedly doesn't fully understand their reasoning either.

The explanation the platforms gave is "political content." TikTok and Meta don't allow political or campaign ads. The real question is whether the trailer actually constitutes a campaign spot. The "political" material amounts to a shot of a 2024 Trump rally and a mention of the 2024 election at the end.

Bleecker Street is appealing to all three. Meta has already said no again, while TikTok and YouTube haven't ruled yet. X, meanwhile, won't deal with the distributor at all, not on "Musk" and not on any other title on Bleecker Street's upcoming slate. So you won't be seeing any ads on X for upcoming Bleecker films such as Mike Leigh's "Tender Loving Care" or Anton Corbijn's "A Talent for Murder."

This matters for the film. A documentary relies on word of mouth, and today that mostly happens online. Being shut out of the major platforms two weeks before the October 9 theatrical release is a real problem for Bleecker.

This whole drama comes only a few weeks after Universal, which is handling "Musk" internationally, reportedly considered backing out of distribution before public pressure pushed it to say it stands by the movie. It hasn't said much beyond that.

I've seen "Musk," which opens October 9, and it's certainly not unbiased. It takes a clear position against Musk and even theorizes that his stint in government gave him access to Americans' personal information, which could be fed into AI to "corrupt" the upcoming midterm elections.

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