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But the most appealing feature is affordable access to HBO’s back-catalogue of content. While users won’t be able to watch the latest episodes of Game of Thrones or any HBO show still airing, CraveTV gives access to The Sopranos, The Wire, Hung and even HBO mini-series like Band of Brothers and The Pacific. Due to the absence of HBO Go in Canada — HBO’s mobile streaming U.S.-only streaming platform — CraveTV is also the only way to legally access HBO content in Canada without a traditional cable subscription to HBO, or a costly subscription to another Bell Media owned property, The Movie Network (TMN). TMN is priced at approximately $20 a month depending on your service provider (although TMN does have an app that gives users access to on-air series like Game of Thrones).

All of this might sound very promising, and it is, especially given CraveTV’s $4 a month subscription fee, a price tag significantly under Netflix’s and shomi’s $8.99 a month cost. Unfortunately, much likely shomi — arguably even to a greater extent given the Bell television subscription requirement and reluctance to budge on this restriction — not opening up the service to everyone will be a significant issue for most people interested in subscribing to CraveTV and also limits the platform’s audience.

While CraveTV is apparently available to all television providers, Telus Optik, Bell Fibe TV, Bell Aliant FibreOP TV, Bell Satellite TV, Eastlink, Northwestern, are Bell Media’s only current participating partners. But the main issue with the platform still remains, users still need to have a traditional television subscription to access CraveTV.

If the idea behind CraveTV was to move Bell Media into the Internet-streaming video future, then the company has certainly failed at its goal.

Much like shomi, a wait-and-see policy is likely the best way to approach CraveTV right now. The HBO content is a huge selling feature of the platform, as is its price, especially if you’re already a Bell television subscriber.