MGM has delayed Daniel Craig’s final 007 outing, “No Time to Die,” once again.
Originally set for April 2020, then pushed to November 2020, then April 2021, it has now been pushed back again to an October 8th 2021 release. That puts it out just one week after “Dune” hits cinemas and HBO Max.
It also means a gap of six years since the release of the previous film “Spectre” in late 2015 – closing in on the six-and-a-half-year gap between “License to Kill” and “Goldeneye” as the longest break between Bond films since the franchise’s launch.
That’s not the only major move today. Sony has pushed back five major features – the musical “Cinderella” moves to July 16th (from Feb 5th), the “Peter Rabbit” sequel is now headed to June 11th (from April 2nd), and Jason Reitman’s “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” will now hit November 11th (from June 11th).
The biggest changes though – the film adaptation of the “Uncharted” video game series is exiting 2021 altogether – going from July 16th to a February 11th 2022 slot. Also the Jared Leto-led Marvel film “Morbius” which, despite being delayed only a few weeks ago, has been moved further back and will arrive January 21st 2022.
Universal has also made some shifts. They’ve slotted in the Bob Odenkirk-led action film “Nobody” for the April 2nd Easter weekend, pushing it back a little over a month, and delayed the Tom Hanks-led sci-fi film “Bios” from April 16th to August 13th. Finally, their Focus Features division has pushed back Edgar Wright’s “Last Night in Soho” by six months – now opening it on October 22nd.
The move continues the exodus of major studio features from the first half of 2021, aside from a handful of titles already set up for simultaneous or exclusive streaming debuts on HBO Max, Amazon, Netflix, Disney+, Hulu or Apple TV+ with films like “Coming 2 America,” “Godzilla vs. Kong,” “Mortal Kombat,” “Raya and the Last Dragon,” “The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It,” “In the Heights,” “Cherry,” “Judas and the Black Messiah,” “The Little Things,” “The United States vs. Billie Holiday,” and “Tom and Jerry” likely to remain where they are.
Only a handful of major studio titles are still slated to go theatrical before July, most notably “Black Widow,” “F9: The Fast Saga,” “A Quiet Place II,” “Free Guy,” “The King’s Man,” “Chaos Walking,” “Cruella” and the “Venom” sequel. Today’s delays will likely see a good portion of these also get moved sooner rather than later.
