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Photo Illustration: Vulture and HBO Max
We will probably never know for sure how many people see Zack Snyder’s Justice League now that it has landed on HBO Max. Likewise, although I wouldn’t be surprised to see a press release next week talking about some aspect of his performance, “the biggest movie on the platform yet!” for Max simply because of the superhero epic, unless the WarnerMedia-owned streamer is suddenly hit with a wave of transparency hitherto unseen in the digital television universe. So how do you determine if League of Justice 2.0 ends up being a worthwhile investment for HBO Max? That’s easy: it already is.
To be sure, traditional ways of measuring success or failure have not suddenly become irrelevant to this film. From a short-term results perspective, data and finance managers at AT&T, parent of WarnerMedia, have the new League of Justice moving the needle appreciably. If not and the numbers are meh, this will definitely influence how Max executives spend their money in the future. But like so many programming works in the streaming age, the #ReleaseTheSnyderCut decision was never purely transactional. And in this case, the benefits of giving in to the online army of fans clamoring for the remixed version of League of Justice they have gone far beyond simply appeasing the hardliners.
➽ You’ve given Max months of (mostly) positive publicity. I don’t think it was a coincidence that, after months of rumors, the official announcement that Snyder’s work would be heading to broadcast came on May 20, 2020, exactly one week before HBO Max’s debut. Despite the film not being available for nearly a year, the rookie streamer generated a tsunami of coverage simply by confirming that it was in the works. Of course, most people will not subscribe based on the promise of content in months to come. But even if a small percentage decided to take advantage of those discounted one-year subscriptions Max sold last spring, that’s a win. Similarly, the whirlwind of speculation surrounding every little detail in the film served as a low-key reminder to audiences that this great pop culture event was coming and would be available only on HBO Max. Having such a high-profile hum magnet on hand is always helpful, but particularly since the COVID closures slowed down Max’s flow of originals during his first year. And while not all critics are enthusiastic about the movie, many seem to like it very much, so audiences, especially those who already have Max, are more likely to see it. I did not see 2017 League of Justice, and I was even forced to see a screening of the film. (Well, the first hour, anyway).
➽ The arrival of League of Justice serves as a gigantic signal (Bat) to the public: HBO Max takes everything DC seriously. In the same way that Disney + has presented itself to consumers as the home of all things Marvel (among other things), Max wants to be known as the new center of the DC Universe. WarnerMedia even shut down its DC-branded niche streamer last year to make sure Superman et al. Superfans knew they’d have to sign up for Max to get their fix. Also, while Snyder’s movie is technically somewhat standalone, as of now, no plans have been announced to use it to launch new projects, people who sign up to watch it will find hundreds of more hours of DCU movies and TV shows. . The message that Max is now DC HQ has been around for a while – last December’s debut of Wonder Woman 1984 It certainly underscored the importance of the franchise to the platform. But WW84 it was in Max for only a month and was shown in theaters too. WarnerMedia maintains League of Justice a broadcast-only event here in the US; You can’t buy a digital copy or watch it in a movie theater. Sure, you are sacrificing some short-term spike in income, but if the bottom line is more records for Max, it will be worth it.
➽ It fits perfectly with WarnerMedia’s strategy of breaking through the unique theater window. The deal to bring Snyder’s cut to airing was finalized a year ago, long before Warner decided that his movies would air on Max the same day they hit theaters. And yet, even if it isn’t planned, that Snyder-cut investment fits the new theatrical strategy. Zack Snyder’s Justice League It is a box office success in every way, apart from not being shown in theaters. Sandwiched between WW84 Y Godzilla vs. Kong, it is less atypical than it might have been otherwise. Audiences who flock to Max for Snyder’s epic may stick around longer because they know there are more new movies with a similar scope and scale just around the corner. Similarly, anyone who has signed up to see WW84 in December or January they could have chosen not to cancel immediately afterwards, partly because they knew League of Justice it was coming soon.
Whether consumers will continue to pay for HBO Max after seeing Snyder’s movie is obviously one of the big unknowns here. Slowing down the rate at which people cancel, what industry types call “churn,” is a big deal for streamers as they mature. And while a big event like this is designed to fight dropout, League of Justice It will still attract some viewers who do not intend to remain subscribers to Max for more than a month, in the same way that millions of people who tuned in to CBS earlier this month to see Oprah interview Meghan and Harry did not meet. nowhere a week later when the Grammys aired in the same time slot. That’s one of the reasons Max and other streamers have been pushing so hard for annual discounted plans – they lock down viewership for longer and lower the churn rate.
But once again, I think HBO Max is still winning here even if the data doesn’t show a huge increase in new subscribers. If you assume the price of $ 70 million widely disclosed by Justice League is correct, although, for the record, Max officials have never confirmed, the cost per hour of the movie is not that outrageous by 2021 TV broadcast standards. Many of the major scripted broadcast series these days cost more than $ 15 million per hour, so $ 17.5 million for each of the four hours of League of Justice it’s not ridiculously out of place. In return, Max has earned a year of “free” advertising, has been better able to promote the prominence of DC properties on its platform, and strengthened its value proposition among existing subscribers, who are gaining access to one of the most talked about. : about film projects in years. Oh, and there’s another bonus for Max executives: They no longer have to worry about responding to Snyder’s legion of passionate fans.
We have known since last month that the last season of TV Land’s Younger I’d broadcast first on Paramount + rather than cable. But it turns out there is a twist: On the same day the episodes drop on Paramount +, they will also show on competing streamer Hulu. TV Land and Paramount + did not mention this, neither last month nor Wednesday, when the show’s comeback date was announced on April 15. But a few hours after yesterday’s announcement, Hulu sent its own statement saying that it would also be releasing new episodes of Younger weekly
Hulu has been the exclusive home of SVOD’s Younger for years, but usually does not have access to new episodes until months after they are broadcast on TV Land. So why the change this year? Well, with ViacomCBS executives deciding to put the final season of Younger On Paramount +, it made sense that all episodes of the series were also available to stream there. However, to do that, the company had to go to Hulu and ask it to reopen the existing deal and establish a new clause allowing Paramount + to share streaming rights to past seasons of Younger. Disney-owned Hulu agreed, but on one condition, according to a source familiar with the situation: It wanted same-day access to episodes of the seventh season. ViacomCBS agreed, and the upshot is that Hulu subscribers won’t have to wait months, or sign up for Paramount +, to watch. Youngerfinal act. However, cable-only houses are out of luck: The final season of the original TV Land series won’t be seen on mainstream television until “later this year,” according to a press release from producer MTV Entertainment.
Last week, The Information reported that Netflix may be looking to license some of its content to linear networks. If it happens, and it is not a fact, it will be a kind of deviation for the streamer, who until now has preferred to keep all his originals exclusive to his platform. But it would not have precedent either: BoJack Horseman The reruns were sold to Comedy Central in 2018 (that deal came about because the show got the green light in Netflix’s early days, when the company didn’t require near-perpetual exclusivity from outside studios). converting, I think it’s a no-brainer for the company to license some of its lower-profile projects, particularly movies, to linear platforms. Not a single human being is going to cancel their Netflix subscription because they run into a sample of The ridiculous 6 on TBS. Also, any money that is made from such sales could go back to making more originals. I have to love that virtuous cycle!
