Theatrical Future/PVOD Thread

[belloq87]

I really don't want to wait any longer for Bond, Halloween Kills, Dune or Spider-Man (maybe add Matrix to that once we get a damn trailer)

The Deadline article I posted earlier says NO TIME TO DIE is 100% opening on its current date (and apparently would have regardless of how SHANG-CHI performed this weekend). It's happening, and there's something kind of cathartic about the first big movie to delay last year finally being ready to open.

After what SHANG-CHI is doing, I'm extremely confident the rest of the big October movies will stay where they are, too (except maybe VENOM, because putting it head-to-head with HALLOWEEN KILLS was incredibly stupid and will hurt it more than it will hurt HALLOWEEN, but then Sony would need to find a spot for it), and assuming trends continue, I'm reasonably confident the holiday season films still on the calendar will stay put, too.

 

[rageofthegods]

The Deadline article I posted earlier says NO TIME TO DIE is 100% opening on its current date (and apparently would have regardless of how SHANG-CHI performed this weekend). It's happening, and there's something kind of cathartic about the first big movie to delay last year finally being ready to open.

After what SHANG-CHI is doing, I'm extremely confident the rest of the big October movies will stay where they are, too (except maybe VENOM, because putting it head-to-head with HALLOWEEN KILLS was incredibly stupid and will hurt it more than it will hurt HALLOWEEN, but then Sony would need to find a spot for it), and assuming trends continue, I'm reasonably confident the holiday season films still on the calendar will stay put, too.

Cases seem to have peaked in early August, at least here in LA. With that and the Paramount movies moved to next year, I think there's enough optimism and breathing room to keep the calendar from shifting too much.

 

[Nick]

Disney's in a bit of a catch 22 situation with this. Disney/Marvel obviously want Shang-Chi to do great, but with the ScarJo lawsuit still ongoing, if Shang-chi does *too good* and out-performs Black Widows Theatrical + Disney+ Premier Access box office worldwide, then this is case and point for her to bring up.

 

[Viator]

To update on Shang-Chi, it has earned a solid 90 million domestically now, making it the highest domestic opening of the pandemic.

 

[Nick]

To update on Shang-Chi, it has earned a solid 90 million domestically now, making it the highest domestic opening of the pandemic.

It's the highest 4-day open ($90M vs. BW's $87M). The 3-day weekend is still slightly behind Black Widow. I think Shang-Chi is going to have far less of a drop than BW's 70% drop though, so i'm expecting Shang-Chi to out-gross Black Widow domestically by a decent amount when all is said and done.

 

[ThemeParks4Life]

And with Shang-Chi's success, Sony has realized their mistake:

‘Venom: Let There Be Carnage’ Heads To First Weekend Of October After Super ‘Shang-Chi’ Labor Day Stretch

It was the worst kept secret in Hollywood that Sony was bound to vacate Venom: Let There Be Carnage from its Oct. 15 release date, but after the enormous $90M Labor Day weekend success of Disney/Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the Culver City lot has decided to go earlier...

deadline.com

It was the worst kept secret in Hollywood that Sony was bound to vacate Venom: Let There Be Carnage from its Oct. 15 release date, but after the enormous $90M Labor Day weekend success of Disney/Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the Culver City lot has decided to go earlier with their own Marvel sequel on Oct. 1.
Venom: Let There be Carnage will screen in 3D, PLF and take over all the Imax screens. Tickets go on sale Wednesday.

This returns Venom to its early October stomping ground, the first movie in 2018 setting an opening domestic record for the month with $80.2M before Warner Bros’ Joker pushed the Marvel pic to No. 2 for October a year later with $96.2M. I’ve heard that tracking among males is really hot for Venom 2, and Sony has every reason in the world to keep it in 2021 versus pushing the Andy Serkis-directed pic to January 22 (which was the rumor).

 

[MrBlonde]

And with Shang-Chi's success, Sony has realized their mistake:

‘Venom: Let There Be Carnage’ Heads To First Weekend Of October After Super ‘Shang-Chi’ Labor Day Stretch

It was the worst kept secret in Hollywood that Sony was bound to vacate Venom: Let There Be Carnage from its Oct. 15 release date, but after the enormous $90M Labor Day weekend success of Disney/Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the Culver City lot has decided to go earlier...

deadline.com

The sooner they release it (assuming they can get a decent return at the box office) means they can also get the cash flowing for whatever streaming service bought the rights to it after it’s theatrical run. It’s crazy to see a major movie being pushed up for once.

 

[Nick]

The sooner they release it (assuming they can get a decent return at the box office) means they can also get the cash flowing for whatever streaming service bought the rights to it after it’s theatrical run. It’s crazy to see a major movie being pushed up for once.

It goes to Netflix for 18 months after theaters and then it will shift over to Hulu in the US and Disney+ internationally.

 

[Jamesh22]

I’m waiting. I haven’t seen a trailer for a single movie yet that’s made me say, “I’ll go to a theater for that.”

But, again, I have a 4K big-screen and quality surround sound.

A bit off topic i know but out of curiosity, what was the last trailer you saw that made you think “I’ll go to a theater for that"?

 

[Legacy]

A bit off topic i know but out of curiosity, what was the last trailer you saw that made you think “I’ll go to a theater for that"?

Endgame.

That was the last movie that I felt I *had* to see in theaters. The Batman is closest to my next “have to,” but there are too many caveats and variables that are a higher priority than the theater experience for it to really count.

 

[Jamesh22]

Endgame.

That was the last movie that I felt I *had* to see in theaters. The Batman is closest to my next “have to,” but there are too many caveats and variables that are a higher priority than the theater experience for it to really count.

Interesting. For me I just have to see Dune and Bond on a big screen.

 

[rageofthegods]

A bit off topic i know but out of curiosity, what was the last trailer you saw that made you think “I’ll go to a theater for that"?

Eyes of Tammy Faye. No one does it like Searchlight.

 

[Tobias]

Disney's in a bit of a catch 22 situation with this. Disney/Marvel obviously want Shang-Chi to do great, but with the ScarJo lawsuit still ongoing, if Shang-chi does *too good* and out-performs Black Widows Theatrical + Disney+ Premier Access box office worldwide, then this is case and point for her to bring up.

This is something that came to mind for me as well, since if Shang-Chi outgrosses Black Widow in a period where Covid cases are still pretty strong than when Black Widow came out, it also tosses one of Disney's counters out the window since they played that card.

 

[Nick]

This is something that came to mind for me as well, since if Shang-Chi outgrosses Black Widow in a period where Covid cases are still pretty strong than when Black Widow came out, it also tosses one of Disney's counters out the window since they played that card.

They’d be better off just paying her and ending this headache.

 

[Tobias]

They’d be better off just paying her and ending this headache.

Fully agreed, take the L and move on. This is the kind of situation that will snowball if they keep it going. But is current management willing to end this?

 

[Nick]

Fully agreed, take the L and move on. This is the kind of situation that will snowball if they keep it going. But is current management willing to end this?

The issue is, this lawsuit is a precedent setting lawsuit for day & date releases going forward in the industry, so tbh, just settling sets a bad standard in their eyes I think. That’s why they’re going to keep fighting it.

 

[Nick]

Looking further into the numbers, I actually think Disney can make the case that Premiere Access only helped to bring in more money for Black Widow, not less, especially because Shang-Chi didn't drive more people to the theaters. There's a subset of people that just aren't comfortable going back to a theater or plain don't want to and by not offering PA, they are simply losing out on a revenue stream based on the numbers below.

Shang-Chi (being theatrical exclusive) made less domestically over the 3-day (75.5 v 80) and WW 3-day (131.7 v. 159) in theaters alone WITHOUT the option of Premiere Access, so it's already behind the 8-ball there. Then, add on the $60M that Black Widow made in it's opening weekend on Disney+ and Shang-Chi is actually behind 146.2 vs 219 (and that's not a straight comparison either as BW's are 3-day numbers and Shang-Chi's are 4-day).

So while the box office for an unknown character in a pandemic is impressive, Disney could argue they left $60M on the table by not offering the film on Premier Access, so I wouldn't count PA as dead yet. I still think it's very possible Eternals is released with PA.

 

[belloq87]

I'm skeptical of the idea that SHANG-CHI would have done as well as BLACK WIDOW -- both in theaters and on Disney+ -- under any conditions (i.e. set aside the fairly different audience comfort levels re: the pandemic when each movie opened). They're really not comparable in terms of audience awareness of the characters (BW has been in the MCU for 11 years, and is played by an A-list actress), and one had a prime mid-summer opening while the other opened on what is usually a dead zone dumping ground weekend (in normal times!).

We'll see what the subsequent weekends for SHANG-CHI look like, because if the holds are good, the countercase would be that Disney left more of BLACK WIDOW's box office on the table because there were fewer repeat visits since $60m-worth of people could watch it as many times as they wanted with no additional cost. And how many of those individual purchases were actually families/groups of friends who otherwise would have had to purchase separate tickets?

The victory of SHANG-CHI is in demonstrating to the industry that big movies can still open even when the pandemic is perceived (I say perceived, because the trend of the numbers sure makes it look like things are beginning to peak, but "things are getting better" takes longer to set-in with people than "things are getting worse") to be in a sub-optimal place.

 

[Nick]

I'm skeptical of the idea that SHANG-CHI would have done as well as BLACK WIDOW -- both in theaters and on Disney+ -- under any conditions (i.e. set aside the fairly different audience comfort levels re: the pandemic when each movie opened). They're really not comparable in terms of audience awareness of the characters (BW has been in the MCU for 11 years, and is played by an A-list actress), and one had a prime mid-summer opening while the other opened on what is usually a dead zone dumping ground weekend (in normal times!).

We'll see what the subsequent weekends for SHANG-CHI look like, because if the holds are good, the countercase would be that Disney left more of BLACK WIDOW's box office on the table because there were fewer repeat visits since $60m-worth of people could watch it as many times as they wanted with no additional cost. And how many of those individual purchases were actually families/groups of friends who otherwise would have had to purchase separate tickets?

The victory of SHANG-CHI is in demonstrating to the industry that big movies can still open even when the pandemic is perceived (I say perceived, because the trend of the numbers sure makes it look like things are beginning to peak, but "things are getting better" takes longer to set-in with people than "things are getting worse") to be in a sub-optimal place.

I'm skeptical of the idea that SHANG-CHI would have done as well as BLACK WIDOW -- both in theaters and on Disney+ -- under any conditions (i.e. set aside the fairly different audience comfort levels re: the pandemic when each movie opened). They're really not comparable in terms of audience awareness of the characters (BW has been in the MCU for 11 years, and is played by an A-list actress), and one had a prime mid-summer opening while the other opened on what is usually a dead zone dumping ground weekend (in normal times!).

We'll see what the subsequent weekends for SHANG-CHI look like, because if the holds are good, the countercase would be that Disney left more of BLACK WIDOW's box office on the table because there were fewer repeat visits since $60m-worth of people could watch it as many times as they wanted with no additional cost. And how many of those individual purchases were actually families/groups of friends who otherwise would have had to purchase separate tickets?

The victory of SHANG-CHI is in demonstrating to the industry that big movies can still open even when the pandemic is perceived (I say perceived, because the trend of the numbers sure makes it look like things are beginning to peak, but "things are getting better" takes longer to set-in with people than "things are getting worse") to be in a sub-optimal place.

im not saying Shang-Chi should’ve been expected to beat Black Widow. What I’m talking about is when Disney is dealing with Scarlett’s lawsuit, for the sake of the suit only, they’ll be able to point here and say being theatrical exclusive didn’t help Shang-Chi do better + they’ll be able to point to all the PA money the film made on top of theatrical box office, especially if the two finish close to each other domestically like I’m expecting.

 

[belloq87]

they’ll be able to point here and say being theatrical exclusive didn’t help Shang-Chi do better

That's completely unknowable and unprovable, though, and I don't think trying to extrapolate hypotheticals will play well in front of a layperson jury (hence why I'm baffled Disney apparently wants this to get in front of a jury instead of just cutting Johansson another very large check).