on Paramount+
HBO Max with ads will offer an alternative to those balking at the $15/month price for the standard HBO Max plan, but there’s a catch: day-and-date movies from Warner Bros., such as the just-released
Those Who Wish Me Dead and the upcoming
The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It, In the Heights, and
The Matrix 4 won’t be included.
That said, HBO Max will only be offering Warner Bros.’s 2021 slate of movies on the same day they arrive in theaters; after that, all bets are off.
The arrival of HBO Max with ads hasn’t been a secret. AT&T, the wireless conglomerate that—for now, at least—owns WarnerMedia, had announced as early a 2019 that an ad-supported video-on-demand (AVOD) version of HBO Max was on the way.