What would've been one of the biggest Hollywood mergers in recent memory is now likely dead and buried.

Paramount and Skydance Media, which had been in talks for a mega-merger for several months, have officially called off negotiations.  There were all kinds of complications to the deal, many of them coming from Shari Redstone, Paramount's controlling shareholder.

The collapsed merger calls into question the future roll for big, legacy movie studios in Hollywood.

Jonathan Taplin is a veteran TV and movie producer, he's a former Merrill Lynch VP of media mergers & acquisitions .. and he's the author of the book "THE END OF REALITY."