“This is our time. This is our chance,” Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav said today in his livestream intro for the company’s unveiling of Max, its rebranded streaming service that goes live May 23. “This is our rendezvous with destiny.”
Max will be the streaming destination for Max and HBO originals, Warner Bros. films, the DC universe, the Wizarding World of Harry Potter and kids content, along with programming across food, home, reality, lifestyle and documentaries from leading brands including HGTV, Food Network, Discovery Channel, TLC, ID and more.
Calling WBD “the greatest storytelling company on Earth” and the biggest and most successful creator of content, Zaslav said Max is “home to shows that have a supersized effect on people an culture,” singling out The Last of Us, The White Lotus, Succession and Euphoria.
Billing Max as “the one to watch for every mood and every moment,” the service’s three-tier pricing also was announced: $9.99 a month/$99 a year for ad-supported tier Max Ad Light; $15.99/$149.99 for Max Ad Free, which offers two concurrent streams; and $19.99/$199.99 for Max Ultimate Ad Free, up to four concurrent streams.
“This new brand signals an important change from two narrower products — HBO Max and Discovery+ — to our broader content offering and consumer proposition,” JB Perrette, WBD’s President & CEO of Global Streaming & Games, said during the presentation. “While each product offered something for some people, Max will have a broad array of quality choices for everybody.”
Among the programming highlights discussed today:
• Max original Harry Potter series, a faithful adaptation of the beloved original book series by J.K. Rowling, who will serve as executive producer;
Max original comedy series derived from The Big Bang Theory;
• HBO original Game of Thrones prequel A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight;
Max original drama series based on The Conjuring films;
• Magnolia Network’s Fixer Upper: The Hotel;
Discovery Channel’s Survive the Raft;
Max original Peter & the Wolf short film from U2’s Bono;
• Adult Swim’s Rick and Morty: The Anime;
Investigation Discovery’s Lost Women of Highway 20;
• Cartoon Network’s Tiny Toons Looniversity; and
• TLC’s Love & Translation
Max also provided first looks today at upcoming titles including:
• The Penguin starring Colin Farrell
• HBO Original drama series The Sympathizer, an espionage thriller and cross-culture satire based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel;
• HBO Original limited series True Detective: Night Country, starring Jodie Foster and Kali Reis
• HBO Original limited series The Regime, starring Kate Winslet (retitled from The Palace);
• Max Original six-part docuseries SmartLess: On the Road, following Jason Bateman, Will Arnett, and Sean Hayes as they take viewers on an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the sold-out live tour of their podcast
• Max Original kids series Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai
• HGTV’s four-part Barbie Dreamhouse Challenge hosted by Ashley Graham.
Also making announcements during WBD’s streaming day were Casey Bloys, Chairman and CEO of HBO and Max Content, and HBO SVP Programming Kathleen McCaffrey.
“Our incredible team has been hard at work taking the best of both legacy technology platforms to deliver a product that works much better,” said Perrette. “We’re confident that all these enhancements will deliver a stronger experience for our customers, which will drive more engagement, help enhance retention, and improve customer satisfaction, which in turn will help us continue to scale.”
Here are some highlights of Max product features:
Premium Video Playback. A new video playback experience will deliver smooth and cinematic video to users, wherever and however they prefer to watch. Whether binging their favorites, watching offline on-the-go, or tuning in on Sunday nights for the latest episode of Succession, users can count on seamlessly diving into their preferred worlds.
Personalization. Max will expand personalization beyond just the home page, offering a differentiated and high-performing experience for every user across the whole service. By significantly increasing our investment in machine learning while maintaining an editorial voice, Max will deliver a unique human and machine approach that will help surface the best content for our users.
More Prominent Kids Experience. At launch, Max will introduce a default kids profile for new subscribers along with accompanying parental controls. Parents can choose to customize settings and select to limit content for the kids profile by ratings: little kids (tv-y), big kids (tv-y7, tvy7-fv), big kids plus (tv-g, g), preteens (tv-pg/pg), or teens (tv-14, pg-13). Parents will also have the ability to set individual profile PINs to lock access to their adult profiles, as well as a parent code to lock their children inside of the Max kids experience.
Simplified Navigation. Max works harder so viewers don’t have to. Streamlined categories, improved content details pages, shortcuts, dedicated brand hubs and thematic content rails, make exploring the app and discovering new interests easier. The updated design coupled with a better personalization engine will help consumers quickly find and discover the best of what they are looking for.
4K UHD. The Ultimate Ad-Free tier of Max will have an expanded catalog of content available in 4K UHD including key programming such as Game of Thrones, The Last of Us, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, The Dark Knight Trilogy and more. All Warner Bros. movies released this year and going forward will also be available in 4K UHD when they arrive on Max following their theatrical windows.
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