In an announcement made by Warner Bros. today, not only is Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince NOT coming out on November 21, 2008 like it was slated to, but it will in fact now come on July 17, 2009. That’s right, our precious Harry Potter, with only three more months to go, has now been pushed back EIGHT more months.
President and Chief Operating Officer of Warner Alan Horn basically said that the movie would be better off as a summer tentpole release, as proven with the last film, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which was released last July and went on to be the second-highest grossing installment in the film franchise.
Horn also explained that the writers’ strike had a part in the decision to move the sixth Harry Potter film to summer 2009.
Additionally, like every other studio, we are still feeling the repercussions of the writers’ strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films—changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of. We agreed the best strategy was to move Half-Blood Prince to July, where it perfectly fills the gap for a major tent pole release for mid-summer.
I just don’t know, folks, this sounds a lot like some Dark Knight envy if you ask me. Either that or director David Yates is having some issues. Most people seem to like the guy, but I felt that Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (also directed by Yates) was my least favorite of the lot and I’m very worried about the fact that he will compose these last four movies in the franchise. I didn’t hate the last one, but there was something lost and I really hope he can re-gain that from here on out.
In any case, to pick and settle into a firm release date like they always have and then suddenly and randomly throw a movie not one or two months back, but a whole eight months — there’s something very, very odd about that.
I feel so teased.
[Source: Trailer Addict]
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