If you didn’t know any better, you’d think that movie distributors are still a little nervous about this whole pandemic thing not being over yet. Sure, Godzilla Vs. Kong did okay for the pandemic era, but everyone loves a monster movie. A seventh iteration Mission Impossible and a Top Gun sequel? That’s a little more… eh.
So Paramount is once again pushing back the release of Top Gun 2 and Mission Impossible 7.
Top Gun: Maverick was originally supposed to release in July 2019, but was delayed to June 2020 to get some more interesting flight footage. Little did Paramount realize that we'd all be stuck indoors thanks to a deadly virus, so they delayed Top Gun again to De 2020. Then to July 2021, and now they're delaying it to November 19, 2021, in the hopes that we'll all be vaccinated by then.
A big if, but hope springs eternal.
Meanwhile, Mission Impossible 7 was originally going to arrive in theatres in July but has now been pushed to May 27, 2022, which is Memorial Day weekend. Mission Impossible 8 (yes, they're already filming Mission Impossible 8) has been pushed to July 7, 2023, from November 2022.
And they're hardly alone. Lots of movies have announced delays as a panicked Hollywood struggles to convince anyone to risk getting a deadly virus just to watch Tom Cruise fly around in an antiquated fighter jet. Delays range from one week to Venom: Let There Be Carnage to two months for the next Resident Evil Movie. Disney recently announced a slew of delays for everything from Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings to Ryan Reynolds’ Free Guy.
Sony is the only smart one of the bunch. They recently signed a deal with Netflix to have their future movies stream on Netflix when they release in theatres so there's no need to take any risks or pay outrageous prices for movie popcorn. Although now I have a giant popcorn kettle in my living room and my whole apartment smells like butter.
Source: Deadline