'Top Gun: Maverick' postponed to December due to coronavirus lockdowns, new release dates set for 2020 films
As movie theaters remain shut in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the release dates for a few highly-anticipated films have been postponed. Paramount’s ‘Top Gun: Maverick’, a sequel to the 1986 Tom Cruise fighter plane classic, which was scheduled to debut June 24 will now release on December 23, 2020.
Deadline reported that this postponement would likely push the Chris Pratt science fiction action war film, ‘The Tomorrow War’, to a yet-to-be-decided date. The theatrical releases for several other films have had to be pushed back as well.
Per reports, Paramount has also moved ‘A Quiet Place Part II’ that was originally supposed to release on March 20 to September 4; ‘The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run’ that was originally slated to hit theaters on May 22 will now hit theaters on July 31.
CNBC reported that on Monday, almost Sony Pictures title due out in 2020 was pushed to 2021. The company announced it would debut 'Morbius', 'Ghostbusters: Afterlife', 'Uncharted' and 'Peter Rabbit 2' in 2021. Even Disney postponed ‘Black Widow’ and ‘Mulan’, while Warner Bros. pushed ‘Wonder Woman 1984’ and ‘In the Heights’.
NBCUniversal, Vox reported, announced on March 16 that it would make some movies available digitally the same day they are released in movie theaters that remain open. These films include titles like 'Trolls World Tour', which is set to hit theaters on April 10. Movies that are currently in theaters will also be available on-demand, said NBCU. These include 'The Hunt', 'The Invisible Man', and 'Emma'.
The coronavirus lockdown across the U.S. has put many film theaters in a precarious position. But Deadline reported that many of the titles that have now been postponed are flexible for all studios, and can always be pulled up to an earlier opening “should the nation’s marketplace improve greatly”. The report further added that most of these titles remain in post-production.
The 2020 box office reportedly is now expected to be down more than 24 percent to $8.6 billion. Last year, the North American movie theater industry took in $15 billion in revenue, a combination of around $11 billion in ticket sales and $4 billion in concessions.