Warner Bros. remains committed to releasing their 2022 slate of movies exclusively in theaters. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic's dramatic effect on the global box office, the studio made the decision to release their entire schedule of films for 2021 simultaneously, or day and date, on HBO Max and in theaters. The decision would turn out to be a controversial one, as filmmakers such as Denis Villeneuve and Christopher Nolan blasted the studio for making the decision without first clearing the release strategy with their filmmakers. When the news was announced last December, Villeneuve responded with an open letter to WB that read "There is absolutely no love for cinema, nor for the audience here. It is all about the survival of a telecom mammoth."
Warner Bros. has insisted since making the announcement that the 2021 release strategy was a "unique one-year plan," though some critics believed the change would become permanent if the films performed well on HBO Max. However, now that 2021 is coming to a close, it's apparent that WB's strategy was not as successful as the studio had hoped. Many of the studio's films have struggled at the box office this year. While the domestic box office still isn't nearly back to normal, WB's films performed particularly poorly when compared to other Hollywood studios. Though the studio is one of the biggest in the industry, not a single one of their films is in the top ten box office performers of the year in the US. For perspective, Sony has two films on the list, Disney has five, and MGM, Universal, and Paramount each have one. WB's highest-grossing film of the year domestically is currently Dune which came in just over the $100 million mark.
Warner Bros. CEO, Ann Sarnoff, has now once again stated that the studio will not be carrying its 2021 release strategy into 2022. According to THR, Sarnoff was speaking at a conference on Wednesday and stated that the studio had considered bringing the day-and-date HBO Max release method into 2022, but they ultimately decided against it. She added that the studio is optimistic that theatrical attendance will be closer to normal by the time The Batman hits theaters in March. Sarnoff's comment reads:
"Have we thought about going back to day and date? Sure we thought about it, but we have made our commitments to the theaters, to the agents, to the talent. Everyone was hoping we would be on the other side of the pandemic by now."
Sarnoff's comments come right as theaters across the US are preparing for what is expected to be the biggest film of the year, Spider-Man: No Way Home. The film's opening gross this weekend is expected to fall somewhere between $150M-$200M, potentially double the previous highest opening of the year, Venom: Let There Be Carnage's $90M. WB's The Matrix: Resurrections opens next week on Dec. 22, and it will be the studio's last film to receive a day-and-date release on HBO Max for the time being. The fourth entry in the Matrix series is expected to open between $35M-$50M, putting the film on par with many of the studio's other 2021 releases.
Most of the highest-grossing films domestically in 2021 were either comic-book movies or sequels to already established properties. With films such as The Batman, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, Black Adam, The Flash, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom opening next year, Warner Bros. is seemingly set to make a big comeback at the box office. However, the delta and omicron variants of COVID-19 threaten to keep the box office from returning to pre-pandemic levels. Only time will tell how willing audiences will be to return to theaters next year, but the massive anticipated success of Spider-Man: No Way Home is a very good sign for theaters that have been struggling for nearly two years now.
Source: THR