Paramount Goes All-In: 15 Warner Bros. Movies Hitting Theaters Every Year

David Ellison is not easing into the new era. After all the merger theatrics that pulled Netflix into the conversation and ended with Skydance-Paramount walking away with Warner Bros. property, he jumped on a call and sketched out the game plan. Short version: one big streaming platform, and a lot more movies in theaters.

The streaming swing

Ellison says HBO Max and Paramount+ are getting folded into a single service. On paper, that combo brings the direct-to-consumer headcount to just over 200 million and, in his words, puts the company in a place to actually trade punches with the biggest streamers. At Paramount, the internal cleanup finishes by mid-year, with three services consolidated under one tech stack; expect that same playbook for the new, combined platform.

• HBO Max and Paramount+ will merge into one streamer with a little over 200 million direct-to-consumer subscribers
• Paramount wraps its own three-service consolidation under a single tech stack by mid-year; that approach carries over to the unified platform
• A 45-day exclusive theatrical window becomes standard
• Annual target: 15 Warner Bros. movies in theaters and 15 Paramount movies in theaters (at least 30 total)

The theatrical promise

Alongside the streaming consolidation, Ellison committed to a 45-day exclusive window for theatrical releases and a bigger slate for the big screen: 15 Warner Bros. titles a year and 15 from Paramount. That is a swing.

'We really believe that movies should be seen in theaters.'

He pointed to Paramount already cranking up output: 15 films heading to theaters this year, which he framed as an increase from the eight films slated in 2025. Yes, that date reads a little odd, but the takeaway is volume up. On the Warner Bros. side, the studio put 11 movies in theaters last year; the goal now is to raise that number. Credit where it’s due: he called Warners a 'powerhouse slate,' singling out Superman and Minecraft as the drivers that helped push the company to $4 billion at the box office.

Why he is staking it on theaters

On a Monday conference call, Ellison laid out the philosophy: big brands and heavy IP should debut on the big screen. He says he learned it the loud way in 2022, when Top Gun: Maverick turned into a cultural freight train and flew to $1.5 billion globally. The same year, The Adam Project launched on Netflix, set records there at the time and tested great, but it clearly didn’t echo in the culture the same way.

'Large franchises and big pieces of intellectual property are launched in theaters, period.'

'We weren't going to be in the business of making movies directly for streaming.'

So the mission statement is pretty clear: go big in theaters, bring the streaming house under one roof, and try to match the top dogs in both lanes.