HBOMax just dumped the awful Superintelligence on HBOMax as well as An American Pickle. Could they be doing the same with Wonder Woman because they know it's bad instead of waiting till next summer to release it?
shareProbably because AT&T has a partnership deal together with HBOMAX.
shareInteresting theory, its possible as the trailers don't look great (cheetah etc), they'll have obviously upped the hard feminist, Trump bashing, woke stuff to unbearable levels, (but then reviews would be great 90% RT etc )
shareIt's being sent there because the theaters are empty due to COVID. This was supposed to be the BIG movie of the holiday season and they don't want to delay it anymore if they can help it. This way they get the maximum audience possible.
shareExactly right.
I'm surprised they didn't go to CBS+ though -- I thought they were allied with Warner Bros. I guess HBO+ can deliver a lot more viewers.
AT&T owns WB and HBOMax, it's their own streaming service. Why would they put it on a competitor's service?
shareIf you own the service you are dumping it on then you are making no money at all. Think about it, if you have one operating unit paying another one then you aren't making any money at all unless you somehow think that by having it on HBOMax that HBO will get some huge number of new subscribers... and I can't see that happening. Most people that want HBO already have it, so I can't see Wonder Woman bringing in 1 million subscribers, and even if they did bring in 1 million what is the subscription fee going for right now 15 dollars a month? Not to mention you get a free trial so if you really wanted to see Wonder Woman and didn't want to spend anything you sign up and drop it after you watch it and it costs you nothing. For AT&T to be dropping it on their own service they must think it is a complete pile of shit. If it was worth a flip it would have been better for them to sell it to Netflix where they would actually be getting some real money from an outside source.
shareThey are building the streaming service up and looking for people to keep the service long term after the announcement yesterday that all 2021 releases will be on MAX as well. Even only $15 is more per person is more than they would get from a ticket sale after splitting with theaters, and the obvious desire is to vastly increases the new service and get millions of new subs. There is no free trial anymore so if you wanna watch, you're paying. This is how all streaming services work, and likely how movie releases will be going forward.
shareThe key is they are looking for people to keep the service, no guarantee anyone will. Even with no free trial it isn't going to magically get them more money than they would get if it was released in a theater. Assume it was only got 800 million which is a little less than the first one first one brought in. That means the studio took home about 560 million, they would need 37 million new subscribers to get that same amount. Given they already have about 28 million subscribers that means they think they will more than double the existing subscribers which is beyond wishful thinking. Hell by their own admission not even half of the ones that can get it for free because they already get HBO have even bothered to activate it. Their is no logic in doing this if they thought the movie was worth a shit.
They will however likely get sued by some of the people involved in the movie that had a deal with the studio to get a piece of the gross because they sold it to themselves which will lead to accusations that they didn't attempt to get the best price possible for it or if the contract excluded revenue for streaming and only included the actual box office gross it will be even more problematic. I doubt the people behind the decision thought through what the consequences would be for doing this.
I'm sure they've been thinking through this decision for months and this was the best course of action for them.
There is no end in sight for Covid restrictions, who knows when theaters will be fully open again. Even if they are, there will be a lot of people that won't go out of fear (a vaccine doesn't just eliminate the disease). The idea that any movie is making the kind of numbers it was making anytime soon is very unrealistic and WB likely knows that.
You clearly haven't worked in a large holding company. You assume the ones at the top that realize WB and HBO are owned by the same company are signing off on operating decisions like where Wonder Woman will be shown. I have worked in this size company and the operating unit normally dont give a shot about anything but their own profit and loss, odds are no one has even considered that any say of a movie from WB to HBO results in no real net income for AT&T,
shareAnd you don't understand how the situation works at all. They didn't just "sell" it to HBO, it's going to be on their brand new streaming company the entire entertainment division has been restructured to support. If you think AT&T just "sold" it to some random company you clearly have no idea of the situation.
shareI know exactly how it works. You have some executive in HBO cutting a deal with some executive in WB. While they both think they are cutting a good deal the fact is the deal means absolutely nothing to AT&T in terms of cash flow. If WB sold it to HBO for 1 dollar or 1 billion dollars it would mean not increase AT&T's cash flow because both companies are owned by AT&T. All it will do is make one operating unit look more profitable on paper than the other.
If AT&T was using thinking about it from a financial point of view they would have told WB to sell it to Disney+ or Netflix for a limited 1 month engagement, then they could sell it to HBO after that month. In that way they would have gotten some money from and outside streaming business which means it would have brought real cash into AT&T instead of just moving cash between operating units.
You can make all the scenarios up for how this is somehow going to help their subscription business but as I detailed earlier they are never going to sell enough subscriptions with this movie to justify sticking it on HBO. Their goal is only 50 million subscribers by 2025... even if they magically jumped to 50 million overnight because of WW it would really only be a net increase of 22 million over where they are now, so 330 million and you can't pretend those numbers will or should be given credit beyond a month because WW isn't a series that will hold subscribers it is only one movie that might attract someone for a month. But 330 million on a movie that cost 200 million would be a flop if it were outside money flowing in.. and here no money is going in, so really it is a loss no matter what HBO pays for it.
You are confusing HBO and HBOMAX. They are two completely different things. The fact is it will take a long time for theaters to rebound and this movie has been sitting for a year already. It's far more valuable to try to boost their new service where it's going to be the first in a line of big releases planned to keep subscribers long term.
shareSpot on.
shareYeah, their options are basically delay it indefinitely, or go for a big splash on streaming. The pandemic surge is going to last all winter and probably into spring, longer if people dont develop more sense.
I doubt it's terrible, given the director.
But by going to HBOMax it doesn't matter if 1 person watches or 100 million watch it, they get the same amount from HBO... So I don't think it is because they are worried about the numbers that watch it. Would make more sense to dump it on HBOMax if they thought it was a shit movie. If it was a great movie then it would have been more profitable to do it as a video on demand deal, or do it like they used to do the old boxing events where you had to pay a big price but it didn't matter because you were going to have a dozen friends over to watch and split the cost. Dumping it on a streaming service where you only get a lump sum payment pretty much means the studio has no faith in it.
shareYou realize that AT&T owns HBOMAX and WB, right? There's no lump sum, they're getting the money from all new subs not some outside party and there is no limit on how much they'll make.
shareIt was your mothers idea in not wanting guys to be gone to long at the movie. She has never been someone that wanted to share.
share
Bonus to home viewing: it's comfortable, you can pause the movie, and you dont have to pay $6.50 for milk Duds
The Bonus to theaters is the creation of jobs for teenagers, a good chance to get away from household distractions, and awful food that tastes great. Even Beer for some theaters.
If you want this movie to do well, rent it. If you're like me and dont care, let the fans support it and appreciate that they did what works for them.
Real question: do you want to see it?
It might also be a long-term move away from movie theaters. I think this is a bad move, similar to the mistakes the record industry made that lead to the awful state modern music is in today, but it also seems like exactly the shortsighted decision a major studio would make.
shareI think the real problem was since they made the villain a stand-in for Trump, the entire film was about to no longer be relevant in a few months and they had no choice but to dump it.
shareWell Warner Bros has just made the decision to send ALL their 2021 movies to HBO Max, so apparently the movie industry as a whole is giving up in US movie theaters for the coming year.
https://deadline.com/2020/12/warner-bros-2021-movie-slate-hbo-max-matrix-4-dune-in-the-heights-1234649760/
So I think that answers the question of "is this because it sucks" as definitively as it can be answered at the moment.