It's quite easy to promise dirt cheap services and get paperwork signed.
These studios are doing a lot of roto and comp work. It's highly touched up and edited.
... Have you watched YouTube (without attempting first-party ad blocking) recently? The ads created with AI are pretty obvious, and pretty bad.
Also, if the viewer doesn't recognize or care, then it's a moot point.
This is going to be the "bad chromakey" of this particular time period in terms of weirdly prolific visuals in media. Or if you prefer, the ads you used to see on late-night TV that were clearly broadcast from a poor quality VHS.
Cheap bullshit has always hung around our media apparatus, and it's just that: cheap bullshit. Tbh I just note it in the same way I've always done: well, that's a company I'm going to avoid doing business with if at all possible.
What projects are these studios doing for HBO? Its shows generally have high enough production value that AI slop in intros would be a no-no (unless this has dramatically changed under Zaslav's leadership).
Meanwhile back in reality it's Google that is massively ahead of literally everyone.
Several medium sized studios I've talked with are bidding $50k for projects (eg. Netflix, HBO, Proctor & Gamble are typical clients) they used to bid $400k on, and they're winning more contracts. They don't need to shoot in person in Venice for pharma ads or animate elaborate TV show intros anymore.
This is having a huge impact to the fundamentals of how they do business. They haven't laid anyone off yet, but they're talking about the ramifications if this gets cheaper.