Sony has announced they are delaying the releases of all their summer 2020 movies until 2021. This decision includes such high profile releases as Morbius and Ghostbusters: Afterlife. The move comes on the heels of industry-wide delays related to the shutdown of movie theaters during the coronavirus pandemic.
The impact of the pandemic stemming from the coronavirus, COVID-19, is being felt the world over, and the entertainment industry is just one of many businesses that's trying to adapt. To help slow the spread of the virus, world governments are ordering non-essential businesses closed (like movie theaters) and encouraging their citizens to keep their distance from one another. The longer these shutdowns go on, though, the less likely it appears movie theaters will reopen until mid-summer, forcing many studios to reshuffle the release dates for their upcoming movies. Some films, like Universal's F9, have been pushed back a whole year, while others, like Warner Bros.' Wonder Woman 1984, are optimistically only holding off until August.
Sony Pictures has now joined in by delaying their upcoming slate significantly. Of their upcoming summer 2020 movies, Morbius has been delayed from July 31 to March 19, 2021; Ghostbusters: Afterlife has been delayed from July 10 to March 5, 2021; and Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway has been delayed from August 7 to January 15, 2021.
This release date shuffle on Sony's part is even having an impact beyond 2020, because along with their summer slate being pushed to 2021, movies releasing next year are also being moved. An Untitled Sony/Marvel movie has been delayed from October 8, 2021 to an unannounced future date. Tom Holland's Uncharted, a production that has been struggling to get off the ground and was recently halted indefinitely because of the coronavirus pandemic is now also delayed. Having finally settled on a March 5, 2021 release date, Uncharted is now delayed to October 8. Ghostbusters: Afterlife is taking Uncharted's spot, while the long-awaited video game adaptation takes the date previously held by that Untitled Sony/Marvel project.
It's hard to say what the entertainment landscape will look like once the planet has seen this pandemic through as this is an unprecedented event in modern history. For the time being, it's largely been feature films that have had the most significant delays, but as the widespread shutdowns continue having a toll on filming for movies and TV, then more upcoming shows will wind up delayed as well. Still, while the constant delays may be frustrating, they're the results of necessary measures for keeping people safe during the coronavirus pandemic.
Source: Sony