Hollywood Is Trying to Screw You and the Launch of ‘Wonder Woman 1984’ Shows Exactly How

Wonder Woman 1984 is coming to HBO Max the same day it’s released in theaters, which just so happens to be Christmas Day. Patty Jenkins described it as something of a holiday gift for fans on Twitter.

THE TIME HAS COME. At some point you have to choose to share any love and joy you have to give, over everything else. We love our movie as we love our fans, so we truly hope that our film brings a little bit of joy and reprieve to all of you this holiday season.

And yeah, it’s nice. People who have HBO Max can watch the movie for free and people who don’t can get a free trial or pay what you’ll probably pay for a Blu-ray of the film.

It also highlights how the movie industry is designed to suck as much money out of your pockets as possible and put it into the pockets of as many different people as possible.

You see, Wonder Woman 1984 will only be on HBO Max for about a month, after which it will go back into the traditional release window. And that traditional release window is how you get fucked.

Let’s explore the life cycle of a movie.

First, movies are released to theaters, or as we call them today, super spreader events. The average movie ticket in the United States is around $9.15, and that’s per person. So if you and your spouse and your 2.5 children all want to see the new Avengers movie it will set you back around $41. Plus concessions, but the movie studios don’t care about that because they don’t get a cut. The traditional theatrical window lasts 90 days but studios are working on shortening that which involves paying bribes to the large movie chains so independent theaters are just going to be gone.

After the theatrical window is the home video release, where you can buy a movie on Amazon or iTunes for about $20 or get a Blu-ray for $25 if you want to actually own them and not lose access to them when Amazon has a fight with the movie studio.

After that comes the premium television window. This is where a show will end up on HBO or Showtime or a similar channel and, nowadays, maybe Netflix or Hulu instead.

This is the journey Wonder Woman 1984 will take before it ends up back on HBO Max. Why bother pulling it off HBO Max during all of that if it’s already on there? Well, studios are afraid you’ll go for the cheapest, most convenient option instead of paying the premium price they want you to pay. Most people don’t see movies in theaters they like the experience, they do it because they want to see the movie and don’t want to wait six months for the DVD or because they’re going to make out in the back row.

We’re seeing the end of the movie theater. Even with 10-20% of Americans denying COVID even exists, the vast majority of people aren’t in any rush to cram into a small space and breathe recycled air, even after there’s a vaccine.