How HBO Max could end after losing movies like Batgirl – 04/08/2022 – Photographer

This complicated situation that arose after the merger of the late Warner Media and Discovery Inc.which led to the emergence of Warner Bros. conglomerate. Discoverythreatens the survival of HBO Max, one of the world’s leading streaming services.

According to the American portal TheWrapThe industry expects CEO David Zaslav to soon announce plans to ditch two on-demand services currently operated by the company — HBO Max and Discovery+. The idea would be to create a new broadcast, still unnamed, but that would be brand new.

As a result, rumors suggest that about 70% of the staff responsible for HBO Max’s original content is expected to be laid off in the coming months, in an effort to cut costs and simplify the creation of scripted content. Practically speaking, the current team at HBO, the television station, will be responsible for these projects, and therefore, they should be released less frequently.

The future is still uncertain, but some indications that drastic changes are on the way have already reached users. The most important of which was abandoning the release of the film.”bat girl‘, with a budget of about US$90 million, or 475 million Brazilian reais, in flow. Fans of the heroine from DC Comics simply will not be able to see the film, which is almost finished.

The decision comes amid uproar that Warner Bros. Discovery will favor products designed for movie theaters as well as measures to cut tax spending. As a result, some already released movies are starting to disappear from HBO Max.

There are big projects like “The Witches Convention” starring Anne Hathaway and Octavia Spencer, to smaller but more prestigious titles such as “Charm City Kings”. The catalog is also missing from “Our Dreams From Mars”, “Superintelligence”, “American Option” and “Confinement”.

Because the titles bear the stamp of the original HBO Max productions, they are unlikely to appear on any competing broadcasts – which, in practice, means that no one else will be able to see them, unless the group changes strategy or is sent to buy-and-rent services from This type.

In Brazil, they all disappeared, too. The cut happens, in theory, because their performance on the platform is low – that is, there are few views for them – and simply getting rid of them costs less money than keeping them in the catalog, which means paying taxes. related to titles.

It’s just the first of a long list of movies and series leaving the service soon, and that way, it shouldn’t appear in Warner Bros.’ new broadcast. discovery plans, According to Variety.

CEO Zaslav has as one of his tasks at the helm of the conglomerate is to identify about $3 billion, or R$15.7 billion, that can be deducted from current expenses, by leveraging the synergy between employees of former WarnerMedia and Discovery, Inc.

Sources from Variety say that the need to tighten belts comes after a crisis caused by the epidemic and the previous administration that decided to release several films at once in cinemas and on HBO Max in 2021.

The decision increased the streaming platform’s subscriber base, but weakened the studio’s theatrical releases, resulting in spending that was deemed excessive – such as the huge bonuses given to producing Movies like “Matrix Resurrections”Next to Income Loss Claims by representatives.

New information about the company’s future should be released later this week, during an investor event.