HBO Max not canceling Harley Quinn, Our Flag Means Death (yet)
Why all of the fears? HBO Max did an earnings call today and in it, there was a huge amount of fear that they were going to come on an announce the shutdown of the streaming service’s scripted division — this does not include HBO scripted entities like Westworld or Euphoria, but rather HBO Max originals that don’t air on the linear network. We know already that the streaming service has axed Batwoman, and things aren’t looking great for some of their other movies set to hit the streaming service.
Yet, it seems like some of the aforementioned shows will live to survive another day … at least for now. We don’t want to sit here and guarantee that they won’t get canceled tomorrow or next week, but nothing was said about them being shut down as of now. Instead, the earnings call went into plans to merge HBO Max and Discovery+ into a singular service by the summer of next year. They emphasized the need to prioritize DC content, and claimed that they would continue to spend more than ever to make sure that they have a great roster of shows.
Personally, we came out of the call feeling as though some HBO Max shows should be safe. We didn’t get the sense that they were cutting all of their originals. However, we do think that they will scale back eventually and prioritize only the most profitable. The shows we are probably the most concerned about moving forward are Doom Patrol and Harley Quinn just because DC could eventually go more the way of Marvel and offer up a singular canon for all of their characters. This would of course stink, since these are ironically two of the best shows that they have.
We should note that yesterday, James Gunn confirmed that Peacemaker is safe for now, so don’t expect any transition to a “new” HBO Max to be immediate.
Are you still worried about just about every HBO Max show?
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Photo: HBO Max