UPDATED, 11:07 AM: Dune: Half Two is just a bit bit nearer now. Warner Bros mentioned as we speak that Denis Villeneuve’s sequel starring Timothée Chalamet will open March 1, two weeks earlier that deliberate.

PREVIOUSLY, August 24: In what was to be anticipated, Legendary Leisure and Warner Bros’ anticipated sequel Dune: Half Two from Denis Villeneuve is transferring off its November 3 theatrical launch to March 15, 2024, because of the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike. The sequel primarily based on the Frank Herbert novel additionally will play Imax on its new date. Don’t be shocked if Dune: Half Two fires off both on the Berlin Movie Pageant or SXSW in late winter/early spring.

In the meantime, regardless of the rumors on the market about Warner Bros additional shaking up its December launch calendar because of the strike, the studio’s present vacation tentpoles of Wonka (December 15), DC’s Aquaman and the Misplaced Kingdom (December 20) and The Shade Purple (December 25) will keep on with their dates, even when the SAG-AFTRA strike nonetheless is lingering. Suspicions abounded when there wasn’t a trailer this summer time for James Wan’s Aquaman 2 tagged to the theatrical launch of Warner’s Barbie. Warners has heard from exhibition loud and clear that it wants these motion pictures like air after the 2020-21 Covid closure. Theater circuits be working aggressively with the Burbank lot on selling these pics on their social media channels, and to their loyalty membership members.

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Dune: Half Two is taking the date beforehand held by Legendary’s Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire, which now strikes to April 12. Scheduled on that date was New Line’s animated function, Lord of the Rings: The Warfare of Rohirrim, which has been pushed to December 13, 2024. Godzilla X Kong on its new date stays unopposed by any rival tentpoles. The one different film dated on December 13 subsequent 12 months is Sony’s reboot of The Karate Child. The Dune sequel additionally stays unopposed at present on its new March date.

It stands to cause that Dune: Half Two would get pushed. Whereas the primary Dune received six Oscars and was one of many highest-grossing motion pictures throughout Covid with $402M WW, the pic’s field workplace prospects largely have been truncated by a theatrical day-and-date launch on Warner streaming service HBO Max. It was a transfer that vastly pissed off Dune financier and producer Legendary and properly as its filmmaker. This time round, each Legendary and Warners are in lock-step on the discharge plans for Dune: Half Two.

The sequel has the potential to be one other Star Wars and to construct out a future franchise for each Legendary and Warners, and it wants the social media energy of its younger forged that features Zendaya, Timothée Chalamet, Florence Pugh and Austin Butler to try this. The 4 of them collectively rely north of 258M followers throughout Instagram, Fb and Twitter, with Zendaya repping 71% of these alone on IG. Her unavailability in the course of the actors strike was one of many prime causes MGM pulled her spicy R-rated tennis romance film, Challengers, directed by Luca Guadagnino, out of its Venice Movie Pageant premiere, and off its September launch date for a late-April 2024 launch.

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With the 2024 theatrical launch schedule stays in peril because of the ongoing strikes, Dune: Half Two and Godzilla X Kong present insurance coverage to exhibition that the moviegoing rebound spurred from Barbie and Oppenheimer in 2023 will proceed into the New 12 months.

Dune: Half Two lands on a main weekend throughout Spring Break prematurely of the Easter vacation body of March 29-31. Dune: Half Two explores the mythic journey of Paul Atreides (Chalamet) as he unites with Chani (Zendaya) and the Fremen whereas on a path of revenge in opposition to the conspirators who destroyed his household. Dealing with a alternative between the love of his life and the destiny of the recognized universe, he endeavors to stop a horrible future solely he can foresee. 

What occurs now that Dune: Half Two is out of 2023? Many have been anticipating a seismic shift in tentpoles out of 2023, however we hear that’s not the case. It’s doable that Disney/Marvel Studios’ sequel The Marvels, at present dated for Nov. 10 may transfer as much as Nov. 3 and benefit from the supply of Imax screens which are being left behind by Dune: Half Two. Shifting up Marvels would additionally give it an extended play time on massive format screens earlier than Lionsgate’s prequel The Starvation Video games: The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes arrives on Nov. 17. Sony’s Marvel franchise starter, Kraven the Hunter, moved off its first weekend in October because of the SAG-AFTRA strike and hiked to Labor Day weekend 2024. Filling that emptiness is a large break of Sony’s Gamestop meme comedy, Dumb Cash, on Oct. 6.

Insiders say The Marvels is sticking to its date.

One other plus for Godzilla X Kong on its new date: the pic is apt to profit from a launch in China at the moment with earlier Legendary Monsterverse motion pictures making plenty of inexperienced there, i.e. Godzilla ($77.6M in 2014), Kong: Cranium Island ($168.2M in 2017), Godzilla: King of the Monsters ($135.4M in 2019) and Godzilla vs. Kong ($188.7M in 2021).

In the meantime, regardless of Dune: Half Two shifting to 2024, Imax nonetheless has sufficient tentpoles to generate planety of financial institution from for the rest of 2023 together with The Equalizer 3, Killers of the Flower Moon, The Exorcist: Believer, The Marvels, The Starvation Video games: Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes, Wonka, Aquaman 2 plus extra Oppenheimer and Barbie bookings within the close to future.