Marvel’s ‘Black Widow’ gets delayed once again, by another 2 months. The previous release date of May 7th has been shifted to a July release with one major change – the Marvel superhero film will release in theaters and on Disney+ simultaneously (In India, it will be streaming on Disney+ Hotstar). Black Widow will be the first film in the Phase 4 part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). With this sudden shift of focus to their OTT platform, Disney seems to be gearing up for an (possibly) inevitable change.
The film which was previously expected to kick start MCU’s Phase 4 (not anymore, WandaVision did that) will not be available on the streaming platform as just another movie premiering on the streaming platform. Similar to the platform’s previous plan with ‘Mulan’s’ release, ‘Black Widow’ will be available for streaming for an early access fee of USD 30. But with ‘Black Widow’ being the movie where Scarlet Johansson will make her (likely) last appearance as the titular character, since the character was killed off in ‘Avengers: Endgame’, this feature film was expected to be a major tent pole movie. This decision will likely strain Disney’s already strained relationship with theater owners around the globe.
Since Star Wars: The Force Awakens released back in 2015, Disney has been putting various theaters under pressure by demanding certain stipulations for featuring their movies such as maximum percentage fee of 40% to be taken as displaying fees, running Disney’s film for a minimum of 60 days, allowing no other production company’s films to run in the theaters when their flagship movies are being displayed, etc. Needless to say, many theater owners and unions banded together to get Disney to curb on their demands.
But now, because of the pandemic, Disney has sensed a golden opportunity. They can now allow viewers early access to their movies at a price set by them as they do not have to go through any middlemen (distributors, theater owners, etc.) and even if their relationship with theater owners will sour, many small cinemas owners will have no choice but to cave to Disney’s demands. Because given the choice, most viewers would prefer to watch at home; not just because of ease-of-access but because of safety reasons as well (from the ongoing Covid issue).
With this delay, multiplexes are going to get hit even harder, as many were expecting this movie to help them get out of the heavy debts they have incurred, thanks to the pandemic – and this delay with ‘Black Widow’ means Marvel’s ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings’ will also lose it July release date and it will drop on in September 2021. This domino effect is going to have an adverse effect for distributors and theater owners in the long run, and many theaters will follow Regal cinemas in closing up shop til the foreseeable future, putting many people out of work.
This might be a smart business “power play” by Disney, at the expense of theater owners, so we will have to wait and see if there will be any retaliation for the theater owners side. With Disney being a global conglomerate, there is a very good chance that the company can just pull the film’s theatrical release entirely if they want to, just to spite anyone who opposes them. Which will not be a wise move, if theaters will reopen to full capacity around the globe within a year or two.
Marvel’s ‘Black Widow’ will release in theaters and on Disney+ Hotstar on July 9th 2021.
Marvel’s ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings’ will now be released on September 3rd 2021.
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