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Face it, stans: It was inevitable. After seeing its release date pushed back no less than three times, Wonder Woman 1984 will debut in US theaters and on HBO Max on December 25. That means you might not get the popcorn-filled Summer Weekend blockbuster grand opening that you would have loved – and Diana Prince probably deserved – but you will get to see the sequel from director Patty. Jenkins. 2017 shot Wonder woman, and you can watch it from the comfort of your sofa if you want.
It’s probably for the best. As much as any movie fan worthy of the name wants to get her butt in a stadium seat with a soda that’s too expensive to watch a superhero movie, Covid-19 is still tearing the country apart, and the only Wonder Woman villain can’t lasso is’ rona. The United States averages over 150,000 new cases per day, and as winter sets in, the number may worsen. Half of the cinemas nationwide are closed, and movie chains are frustrated that studios are delaying their major releases this year. (A spokesperson for the National Theater Owners Association declined to comment for this story.) While fans are urged to look forward to other films that had been prepared for a 2020 release, such as Dune or the James Bond movie No time to die, seeing the last standing movie of the year on any platform is a bit of a respite.
Warner Bros. called for release Wonder Woman 1984 in cinemas and on its streaming platform at the same time “historic”. It could also turn out to be an indicator. Even before the pandemic, wars continued to heat up. Every content production company with a back catalog – and even some without (ahem, Apple TV +) – was launching its own service, closing its own garden of movies and TV shows. Now, as movie theater attendance plummets as Americans quarantine, services like Disney +, Peacock and HBO Max are allowing their business owners to test whether to go straight to consumers with movie releases. major the very day they hit the big screen is a viable option.
Whether the results of this strange experiment are what Warner Bros. wants to see is another story. Wonder Woman 1984 Originally intended to be a billion dollar blockbuster. The release is unlikely to have that kind of performance now, but it could have a significant impact on HBO Max’s subscriber count at some point – the holiday season – when people are home and looking to get together. to entertain. When Disney released the live-action remake of Mulan on Disney + last summer, downloads of the app are said to have increased by 68%. HBO Max might see a similar spike, especially from the new Wonder woman will be available to all Max subscribers automatically. (Disney charged $ 30 for Mulan in addition to the regular monthly subscription fees.) WarnerMedia has also just made a deal to get HBO Max on Amazon Fire TV devices, opening up a whole new market of potential customers. (If they could do the same with Roku, which makes up about half of the smart TV market, they’d be swimming, but this deadlock continues.)
Look, generally speaking, this isn’t an ideal situation for anyone. Sitting in the air conditioning in mid-July to watch a movie at the multiplex is fun, and extended movie theater closings caused by Covid-19 are not good for the film industry in general. But according to Ann Sarnoff, head of the WarnerMedia group that oversees Warner Bros., it was the best way for the studio to move its business forward while appeasing fans and weathering a pandemic. Sure, Warner could have pushed the film into 2021 like most other big 2020 releases, but at some point something has to give. The problems caused by the coronavirus may not end next year; studios should try their luck on alternative exit strategies. If Wonder Woman can’t bring moviegoers to a new way of life, maybe no one can.
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