That’s not exactly true. He’s talked about buying it for a little bit and was trying to buy enough shares to be on the board. The board essentially made that impossible so that’s when he put out the joke offer to buy it outright. But then he entered legitimate legal proceedings making that offer official and agreed to pay a certain amount in damages if he withdrew the offer. Then he tried to withdraw the offer saying it was a joke. Then they said “ok, pay us the damages you agreed to” and he tried to pretend that wasn’t real. Then eventually agreed to buy to get out of paying damages (and getting nothing out of it) because he knew his excuse would never hold up in court.
So he wasn’t forced to buy it, he was forced to meet one of the two stipulations he agreed to in a contract, one of which was buying it.
Game of Thrones was the most popular show in the world not too long ago and is more complicated. House of the Dragon is also complicated and did well just last year. There have been tons of complicated dramas that have been popular. This is just a dumb excuse