Now we are seeing some serious momentum from Warner Bros. as it plans its upcoming split from Discovery Global, it seems they are back to eyeing box office prominence. With a new pledge for consistent theatrical releases to build on a very successful Q2 at the box office, there is much excitement ahead. We have our entertainment attorney from Blake & Wang P.A., Brandon Blake, to share the news. 

Brandon Blake

New Commitments

Warner. Bros is targeting 12-14 theatrical releases a year going forward, drawn from across DC Studios, Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Animation, and New Line Cinema. According to the shareholder letter that announced the target, they are aiming for 1-2 Warner Bros. Pictures tentpoles, 1-2 DC films, 3-4 releases from New Line Cinema, and 1-2 Warner Bros. Animation titles, with the rest to be filled out by moderate budget originals.

There’s little wonder that they’re keen to keep the box office momentum going, after all. It has been an immensely successful year for them in theaters, with several record-breaking releases. All told, they have seen over $3B from global box office takings, with $2B of that shared across Q2 releases, A Minecraft Movie, Sinners, Final Destination: Bloodlines, and F1, which was released in partnership with Apple.

Rising Success

Warner Bros. Studios has also distributed 5 films in a row that have taken higher than $45M domestically. At the moment, they are behind only Disney in the 2025 box office rankings, a remarkable jump from the relative mediocrity of recent years. It’s likely this sudden impetus is part of the strategy transformation they have been talking about recently, which includes a more systemic approach to releases and the use of real-time data for windowing decisions. 

Will this be the secret to a new, improved Warner Bros.? It certainly seems like a move in the right direction for them.

Cinemark has seen an upswing on Wall Street on the back of a positive and popular box office throughout 2025. Our expert from Blake & Wang P.A., best entertainment attorney Los Angeles Brandon Blake, dives deeper into the results for us.

Brandon Blake

A Strong Box Office

We have seen some amazing performances at the box office since the start of 2025, with A Minecraft Movie offering a wonderful start to the year and that key factor we have been missing- a constant pipeline of quality content- returning to the box office.

Unsurprisingly, this rise in momentum, especially for summer movie going, has had a positive impact on the balance sheets of the theatrical chains now reporting their quarterly earnings- and for Cinemark, it has definitely paid off. The domestic box office at the moment is tracking at the $2.7B mark, a 35% increase year-on-year. We have also seen some great family film releases, which are ideal for Cinemark’s typical audience.

Positive Results

Cinemark saw its year-to-date tracking shift from a 12% deficit to a 14% gain to finish this quarter. In the back of this news, shares were 2.3% up, despite the overall down market. Revenue rose by almost 30% to $940M, with net income (more than) doubling on the year before, at $93.5M. 

Admission revenue rose by 28%, reaching $467M, while concessions ticked up by 29% to bring in $378M, the first time it has crossed the $300M mark. Attendance also improved, reaching 57.9M off the back of a 15.8% increase. They also saw a 12% increase in subscriptions to their loyalty program, reaching 1.45M members and accounting for almost 30% of domestic box office takings. 

Overall, it’s been a great quarter for Cinemark and the wider theatrical industry, and with some strong titles in the upcoming pipeline, we should see further solid performance at the box office throughout the end of the year. Welcome news, indeed. 

There could be new hope for the California film industry. As we ourselves recently reported, feature films have been notable only in their absence in recent rounds of film funding in the state. However, it seems that more features are reconsidering the Golden State, and that’s great news. To share more, we have our industry insider, entertainment lawyer from Blake & Wang P.A., Brandon Blake.

Brandon Blake

Stemming the Exodus

As a filming location, California has seen big-budget films flee the state for several years now. There’s no one factor to cause it, but rather a combination of a difficult and bureaucratically hampered permitting environment, high labor costs, a lackluster tax credit offering, and plenty of other alternatives rising. 

While the state has taken considerable steps to address some of these concerns, a look at the latest list of applicants through FilmLA’s shows that, despite plenty of indie projects, feature films are only noticeable by their absence.

New Hope

However, production tracking service ProdPro, which follows global filming trends, has a new hope to offer. While we may only have seen 15 movies with big budgets ($10M +) filming in the state so far this year, it suggests there are 95 titles that meet that benchmark in active development currently. More popular than the alternate destinations, New Mexico, Georgia, and New York, put together. This could be the result of some of those recent overhauls and an upswing of positivity around California as a filming destination. 

It’s also seen a 17% increase in TV productions filming in the state, the highest levels since Q1 last year. Dramas (9.5%) and reality TV (29.5%) saw the biggest increases. 

There’s still work ahead for LA if it wants to reclaim its iconic status as a filming location. However, there’s definitely room to be hopeful about the future, if current trends continue and larger productions continue to consider the state. 

It’s been a good year to date for Disney, and it looks set to continue. With Lilo & Stitch proving to be a rare live-action success for the studio, it’s also now officially the first MPA film to cross the billion-dollar line this year. To tell us more, we have an expert entertainment attorney at Blake & Wang P.A., Brandon Blake. 

Brandon Blake

First of the Year

Although Chinese animation Ne Zha 2 was the first film to make a full billion this year, eventually closing over $2B, no Hollywood title has yet crossed that mark. Lilo & Stitch is the first studio film to reach that milestone this year, with $416M domestic and an extra $584.8M globally- and it is still in theaters, in its 8th week. This is after a record-breaking $183M opening weekend domestically. This makes it the top MPA movie of the year (so far). It’s also the highest-grossing Disney live-action film in several markets, including Mexico, and Latin America has contributed just under $200M of the total takings. 

More to Come

This exceptional reception has also put a Lilo & Stitch sequel into the works, and could be a new invigoration of the franchise for Disney. The original animation has also seen immense traction on Disney’s streaming services, racking up over 640M hours over recent months.

It’s been a great year for Walt Disney Studios, for sure. Having released four billion-dollar films in the span of just 13 months (Moana 2, Inside Out 2, and Deadpool & Wolverine fill out the list), the studio is riding a high that must be very welcome after a spate of lackluster and under-performing releases in the post-pandemic period and the rise of superhero fatigue at the box office. Now, let’s see if the momentum continues into the end of the year. 

We have now officially seen the end of Warner Bros’ Max era- and many feel it’s best forgotten as quickly as it arrived. The last 2 years have not been all that kind to Warner Bros, and the constant shifts in its branding and focus have done little to offset that. To fill in the gaps as we see its flagship streamer return to the familiar HBO Max name, we have our expert entertainment attorney at Blake & Wang P.A., Brandon Blake

Brandon Blake

Back to the Future

Warner Bros. announced its plan to return to the HBO brand name in May. While officials were quick to talk about how the reversal would “amplify the uniqueness” of the streaming platform, especially as the overall streaming landscape becomes rather crowded, many in the industry have also taken this as a sign that their early attempts to freshen the brand have simply failed. 

The move was initially made as part of a plan to blend Discovery’s unscripted programing with their better-known HBO fare. However, this mingling of genres wasn’t a particular success, with the brand losing a lot of the immediate recognition the HBO branding brings to the table, especially with Discovery+ remaining a stand-alone offering. 

Continuing Success

If we are being fair, however, Max can’t be written off completely as a bad idea. The service still managed to pull in new subscribers and kept strong viewership numbers. However, the loss of overall cohesion in the brand certainly had an impact on Warner Bros. stock along the way. Now, of course, we’re also waiting for the split-off of Warner Bros. cable TV assets from its streaming and studios arm, and in the midst of an aggressive territorial expansion for HBO Max itself. 

Warner Bros will be reporting its Q2 earnings over the next few weeks. As of the last earnings call, they had 122.3M global subscribers. It will be interesting to see what impacts, if any, this swing back to the old familiar brings for the struggling streamer in the coming weeks. 

The LA Film Office has not been free from scrutiny as California battles against the flight of productions from its destinations, but it seems the institute is here to stay- at least for another 5 years. We have our expert entertainment lawyer from Blake & Wang P.A., Brandon Blake, to tell us more.

Brandon Blake 

Board of Public Works Renewal

FilmLA has now had its contract renewed to act as the region’s film office until 2030. However, some local public advocates are still calling for the nonprofit to overhaul its processes and make the Californian Film and TV Tax Credit program more appealing, hoping to restore the state’s former glory as the go-to shooting destination. 

The Board of Public Works, however, was quick to note that it doesn’t have the authority to make specific contractual changes. Instead, they proposed that concerned stakeholders share concrete suggestions with the state for future overhauls. They also established a need for quarterly reporting, and seem willing to request for proposals from both FilmLA and other relevant entities to bid on the contract. 

No Blank Check

FilmLA, too, seems open to having contractual structure changes over the next five years, so there’s plenty of reason to hope we will still see some reform within the organization geared toward helping productions better navigate local regulations and procedures. Many believe that slicing through some of this red tape is the key to improving California’s appeal as a filming destination. Whether it’s truly FilmLA’s work to do, or if the city departments need to better address this, is the real question. 

There’s certainly an argument to be made that consistency and a familiar face also have a role to play in restoring California’s appeal, so let’s choose to see this renewal, and the acknowledgement of the bureaucratic issues dogging permitting in LA, as a positive development for the Californian film landscape. 

We could be on the verge of some major shifts in the streaming advertising landscape, with news of a new deal between Amazon Ads and Roku. It’s suggested that this new deal will give media buyers access to four-fifths of domestic connected-TV households. We have Blake & Wang P.A. entertainment lawyer, Brandon Blake, with the details.

Brandon Blake

Reaching 80% of US Connected-TV Households

It is expected that the deal will launch from Q4 of this year. Amazon’s DSP (demand-side platform) will be used to place ads across top-viewed platforms, including both Prime Video and Roku Channel, as well as offering other services for the Fire TV and Roku operating systems. 

This system has already been trialed, with pretty interesting results reported by both companies. They are suggesting that 40% more unique viewers are reached, without extra cost to the buyer’s account. It also lowered the frequency of ads shown to a specific user (by roughly 30%), allowing for tighter targeting of ads and less repetition to users unwilling to bite. Taken together, this pretty much triples the value per ad spend compared with other options. 

Partners and Rivals

It’s an interesting bit of teamwork, certainly, especially given that Amazon and Roku are rivals in several aspects of their business. However, given that Amazon actively sells Roku-connected devices and Prime Video is now available among Roku’s offerings, they are also partners with overlapping interests. Both also have a strong customer focus and rely heavily on their marketing portfolios for new opportunities. 

Advertisers will, no doubt, be happy for expanded access to a broad consumer base, especially paired with the (claimed) savings on ad inventory spending. 

As we know from tech circles, once a new technology is brought to market, we typically see competitors eager to get their own slice of the action. Does this mean we will see a widespread change in how advertising is delivered for other streaming platforms? It’s too early to tell, but there are certainly some interesting changes coming in the streaming advertising landscape.

Jurassic World: Rebirth is set to be a reboot for the franchise, but can it spread some of that magic to the box office, too? As we hope to see the momentum kicked off on Memorial Day continue through the end of the year for cinema screens, the time is ripe for a $100M opener, and the famous dino franchise may be set to deliver. Entertainment attorney Brandon Blake, at Blake & Wang P.A., has all the news. 

Brandon Blake

Fourth of July Opener

The film is set to hit theatrical screens over the long weekend for the Fourth of July celebrations. This should set it up for box office traction. Long weekends are typically the best for increased traffic from families looking for entertainment. 

Based on current tracking, the film is actually expected to open north of $120M, but tracking can, and notoriously has, gone wrong. However, a $90- $100M start should definitely be on the cards. 

Franchise Staying Power

In 2015, we saw Jurassic World, the first of the modern Jurassic Park installments, take off for a series-best $206.6M domestically (not adjusted for inflation). While the following 2 films didn’t quite meet that high, they did manage openings in the $140M range, which is hopeful. 

However, the reboot is using a new ensemble cast, although there are some hot names among them that should have pulling power. The reboot is also using a new core idea to expand a little beyond the classic dino-narrative. This time, only limited dinosaurs remain, confined to specialized biospheres, and they could hold the key to a needed life-saving drug. 

Will a new story and cast, paired with the same action on screen the franchise has become known for, be enough to pull off that coveted $100M start? We’ll find out soon.