Movie Theaters Are DEAD: Warner Brothers Is Releasing Their ENTIRE 2021 Theatrical Slate Directly To HBO Max!
Warner Bros. is plotting a sweeping response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has shuttered movie theaters around the country. After announcing that Wonder Woman 1984 will go to HBO Max as well as theaters on Dec. 25, the studio has laid out a similar path for its 2021 slate amid uncertainty about when movie-going will get back to normal.
The studio announced Thursday day-and-date releases for its 17-film slate, which will hit HBO Max for a one-month window that starts the same day they will be available in U.S. theaters.
The studio's 2021 slate includes projects such as The Suicide Squad, The Matrix 4, Dune, Godzilla vs. Kong and Space Jam: A New Legacy. Other films include Little Things, Judas and the Black Messiah, Tom & Jerry, Mortal Kombat, Those Who Wish Me Dead, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, In The Heights, Reminiscence, Malignant, The Many Saints of Newark, King Richard and Cry Macho.
This is massive, MASSIVE fucking news not just for us as consumers, but for the movie industry on a whole. For us, it rules in the sense that we now get to see all these movies that we were looking forward to #1 on time and #2 without the risk of going to a theater. 2020 has been a drought for new movies and Warner Brothers just opened the flood gates for the rest of Hollywood to follow along and drop their content across the thousand streaming services all 2021.
On the other hand, this fucking sucks for theater owners and companies. Warner has been very clear in this announcement that it is a "pandemic-only" fix. Yea, right. To me, that sounds like when your girlfriend tells you you're "just going on a break". That relationship is donezo my friend. And for people like me and Jeff who genuinely love going to the theater this is something we've been fearing all pandemic. Movie theaters probably wont ever go complete extinct, but with tv technology advancing and streaming services ponying up every dollar they can scrounge together it doesn't take a lot to assume this will become the new normal long after COVID is done with us.
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We don't even have trailers for a lot of these, so we're going to be going from a drought to being FLOODED with new content. Again, this rules for us as consumers. But it may be a death rattle for the theater experience.