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EVERY Warner Brothers Movie is Coming to HBO Max the Same Day It Lands in Theaters

HBO

Movie theaters are never going to be the same after COVID. Streaming has been so disruptive to media in general that it was only a matter of time before people who found linear television inconvenient started to question why they were leaving their house to go watch movies at a set time in a tiny room and spending roughly the same amount as a monthly subscription to any streaming service per person for the privilege.

COVID just highlighted this situation by taking it and saying “oh, and you might die because you went to see this movie.”

I would be shocked if there are any independent movie theaters open after the pandemic ends, and while the big chains like AMC, Cinemark, and Regal are acting like people are going to come flooding back into theaters to see films they are lying to themselves. If movie theaters were such a superior experience they wouldn’t be essentially begging for the scraps of PVOD profits from studios for shortened theatrical exclusivity windows.

The latest nail in the coffin of movie theaters is that Warner Brothers is sending all their 2021 theatric releases to HBO Max the same day they debut in theaters like they’re doing with Wonder Woman 84.

There’s no way people are just to shrug and go “oh well, I guess we’ll just start going back to the theaters to watch movies” when the pandemic is over. We all see that, right?

The biggest question now is when will Disney follow suit. They’re sitting on some of the most anticipated movies in the world and their business plan seems to be begging state governments to let them hold daily super-spreader events so they can hold on to those movies until they can squeeze every last penny out of them through the traditional release window which will be in 2022 at the earliest. Eventually, something will have to give because HBO Max just became a much better value than Disney+ even at twice the cost.

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