A tech glitch on the HBO website accidentally revealed the HBO Max and pay cable network’s premiere dates for the studio’s current blockbuster hit The Batman, which is set to bank a half-billion dollars worldwide by this weekend at the global box office.
The listing, which you can see below, has since been scrubbed, but we hear the dates of Tuesday, April 19 on HBO Max and Saturday, April 23 on HBO linear are legit. By the way, all of this makes sense: WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar has continually mentioned that for 2022 and until further notice, all Warner Bros theatrical releases will hit HBO Max 45 days after their debut in cinemas.
In the case of The Batman, it’s 46 days after its March 4 U.S.-Canada theatrical release.
Last year, Warner Bros implemented a controversial day-and-date plan for its theatrical movies on HBO Max; this as a means to spike subscribers for its frosh OTT service, while preventing event titles from going to seed during the pandemic. The Batman reps Warner Bros’ return to a theatrical window, and, man, has it been successful.
Stateside, The Batman had a fantastic hold in its second weekend, -50% with $66.5 million (-41% if you back out the first weekend’s previews of $21.6M from its $134M start). That second-weekend hold was ahead of that of a Disney Marvel movie, which averages -63% in their second weekends, and ahead of previous DC movies’ second-weekend declines such as Batman v. Superman (-69%), and Dark Knight Rises (-61%), Justice League (-56%) and The Dark Knight (-53%).
Through Tuesday, The Batman stateside counts $252.5M. Industry estimates have Batman‘s final domestic tally at $400M. The movie doesn’t face another major studio wide release until March 25, with Paramount’s The Lost City starring Sandra Bullock, Channing Tatum, Daniel Radcliffe and Brad Pitt.
Deadline reported last week that HBO Max has given a straight-to-series order to the pic’s spinoff series The Penguin, which will see Colin Farrell reprise his villainous role from the pic as one of Gotham’s legendary kingpins.
The Batman director Matt Reeves told Deadline’s Hero Nation podcast that The Penguin picks up where the movie left off in regards to the villain. He said the original Batman spinoff series he conceived centered around a corrupt cop caught up in events preceding the movie is no longer moving forward at HBO Max. The Penguin is being executive produced by Reeves, Dylan Clark, Farrell and Lauren LeFranc, who writes and serves as showrunner.
When reached, HBO Max had no comment on The Batman HBO dates or the glitch on the website.