The HBO Max streaming service launched earlier this morning with all eight of the “Harry Potter” films based on J.K. Rowling’s popular fantasy book series.
The inclusion was a big surprise as it NBCUniversal closed a deal to the TV and digital rights to the franchise in 2016 and HBO Max chief content officer Kevin Reilly telling investors back in January that the films wouldn’t be on the service at launch.
The series ranks as the highest-grossing movie franchise in history with a worldwide haul of more than $7 billion and so now they’ve returned home – it’s not clear what deal Warners made to do this, but it was likely substantial.
Already the service has launched with the Studio Ghibli films, numerous Warner Bros. Pictures classics and plenty of titles from the Criterion Collection. HBO Max’s film lineup is expected to increase to around 2,000 movies in the first year with “The Matrix” and “Lethal Weapon” franchises to soon join the line-up along plenty of DC Comics-inspired titles as only a handful were included come launch time.
There’s also still some confusion as to how it will impact the other services and just what are differences. The service has put out an explainer video discussing the difference between HBO Go, HBO Now and HBO Max. Sadly what should be a helpful explainer seems more like a promotional promo.
Source: Variety
