Posted in: Movies, Warner Bros | Tagged: aquaman and the lost kingdom, barbie, blue beetle, cinemacon, CinemaCon 2023, dc studios, dune: part two, The Flash, Warner Bros, Wonka

CinemaCon 2023: State Of The Industry & Warner Bros. Liveblog

Time for the liveblog of the State of the Industry and Warner Bros. presentation at CinemaCon. They have a lot of big movies to promote; what will we learn?

Published Tue, 25 Apr 2023 10:23:14 -0500

by Kaitlyn Booth

Last updated Tue, 25 Apr 2023 10:39:04 -0500

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The movie industry has descended on Las Vegas for another CinemaCon this week. The annual event brings theater owners and studios to look toward the rest of this year and beyond on the big screen. Seeing the event evolve in a pre and post-pandemic world has been interesting. In 2019, no one at the event was even a little concerned about streaming or same-day streaming releases. By the time the event was able to return in August 2021, the tone had changed drastically, and things have only continued to change. The industry needs to evolve to keep up with the changing times, and it's always interesting to see who is embracing change and who is fighting against it. Almost all of the major studios showed up this year, though some players are missing. This presentation is massive, clocking in at four hours long as we settle in for the State of the Industry and Warner Bros.

The last two Warner Bros. presentations were mostly the studio promising theater owners that the whole day of release streaming thing was just a temporary thing that won't be happening again. It seems like they have been forgiven, and this year has some serious potential for them. While there has been a massive stumble with Shazam! Fury of the Gods flopping pretty hard; Warner is going to be out here trying to convince everyone that the rest of the year isn't going to be the same. All eyes will be on The Flash, but that screens later today, so maybe they'll screen the new trailer, but that will likely be in. The Blue Beetle costume is here, and the teaser poster is hanging around, so maybe we'll see more of that. They are also hoping that Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom will do as well as the last one, but that is a tall order.

We also have Dune: Part Two coming out this year, and if there was a movie that Warner Bros. would want to push to theaters, it's the one that won them technical Oscars. Wonka is the other big holiday release, and they want us to believe that musicals aren't dead. We'll see about that one. Barbie is all over the convention, and Warner Bros. will lean into how well people are responding to that movie if there is a single working brain cell at that studio.

The State of the Industry part of the panel will be at the beginning, and then we're settling in for four hours of insanity with Warner Bros. Join us below, and let us know down in the comment section about what you're hoping for from the WB presentation here this year.