I’m hearing that
Legendary Entertainment either has or will send legal letters to
Warner Bros as soon as today, challenging the decision to put the Denis Villenueve-directed
Dune into the HBO Max deal, and maybe
Godzilla vs Kong as well. On the latter, Legendary reportedly had Netflix ready to pull the film from Warner Bros for around $250 million, before WarnerMedia blocked it. Sources said Legendary had no advance notice before last week’s announcement that both
Dune and
Godzilla vs. Kong were part of the HBO Max plan.
Legendary certainly seems to have the right to challenge WarnerMedia on its decision: Legendary and its partners provided 75% of the $165 million or so net budget of
Dune, the adaptation of the Frank Herbert novel that was envisioned to be the first of multiple films exploiting the six-novel series. It put up a similar amount of the funding on the
Godzilla vs. Kingfilm. Will the long-term viability of the franchises be tarnished by starting out as an HBO Max offering? It’s the same question the industry is asking about
Wonder Woman. Legendary wouldn’t comment. I’m told there are three other films that have a right to believe movies they majority financed are being served up to provide a steroid shot to HBO Max’s paid subscriber base by undoing deals that were made for theatrical release and the traditional revenue waterfall.
