‘No Happy Ending for Movie Theatres’, Argues WSJ – No Matter Who Wins Warner Bros.

Regardless of who ends up owning Warners Bros., “the outlook for theatrical movies is dimming,” writes a Wall Street Journal tech columnist, noting that this year’s U.S. box office of $8.3 billion (as of December 25) “is a bit below last year’s and well below prepandemic levels of around $11 billion.”

Warner has historically been one of Hollywood’s largest producers of theatrical films, averaging about 22 releases annually in the pre-Covid years of 2015 to 2019,…