• Time Warner -- through its Warner Brothers and DC Comics subsidiaries are profiting most directly.
• Comcast Corporation (NYSE: CMCSA) partnered with Warner Bros. to offer "behind-the-scenes footage, trailers, and mini movies on demand"
• Verizon Communications, Inc. (NYSE: VZ) and Nokia Corporation (NYSE: NOK) collaborated in creating the Nokia6205 The Dark Knight Edition. Seeking Alpha reports that "This batphone targets superfans, with bat wallpaper, voice tones, screensavers, and the film's trailer pre-loaded."

Continue reading How to profit from the Dark Knight Industrial Complex

How to profit from the Dark Knight Industrial Complex originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 21 Jul 2008 18:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

'Fool's Gold' takes number-one spot at the box office originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 11 Feb 2008 21:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Spoiler alert - if you have not yet read the conclusion to the Harry Potter saga, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, you may want to skip this post, in which the ending is discussed.

For companies such as publisher Scholastic Corp. (NASDAQ:SCHL), the US publisher of the books, Time Warner (NYSE:TWX), whose Warner Brothers Studios produces the hugely profitable Harry Potter movies, and General Electric's (NYSE:GE) Universal Studios, which will open a Harry Potter theme park in 2009, the seventh and final Harry Potter book must have come as a great relief.

Despite rumors to the contrary, the title character did not die, and thereby cast a pall on the series and its offshoots. Rather, as I expected, Harry prevailed, and in general the core cast lived happily ever after. Even Snape, as I predicted, achieved redemption, but at a mortal cost.

In the coda to the novel, Harry Potter and his wife, the former Ginny Weasley, watch their children depart for Hogwarts. Also placing their children on the Hogworts train are Harry's best friends, the married couple Ron Weasley and Hermoine Granger.

This final scene, nineteen years after the climax of the book, will no doubt inspire a great deal of conversation, as it keeps open a couple of possibilities for future novels in the Potter universe. Harry is still young enough to have more adventures, perhaps as he takes on the role of the era's greatest wizard, much as Albus Dumbledore was in Potter's youth. Rowling could also, should she decide to continue the series, reboot the series with the next generation of Hogwarts students.

I don't expect her to return to the Potter storyline for a long time, if ever, but the lure will always be there; a huge, thirsty audience ready to demonstrate their devotion with their pocketbooks.

Gallery: Everybody loves Harry Potter

Rowling safeguards Potter empire originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 23 Jul 2007 09:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

With a $44.8 million day, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix set a new record for Wednesday premieres. Twelve million copies of Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows are flying off the presses of Scholastic Corp.'s (NASDAQ:SCHL) Scholastic Press in preparation for its release at midnight on July 21.

On Bloggingstocks, we usually talk about companies first, products second, but J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series has flipped that upside down like Malfoy on the receiving end of a Hermione spell. The books and movies have a huge impact on the bottom line of companies such as Time Warner Inc. (NYSE:TWX), Scholastic Press, Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) and even eBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY), and this summer's buzz is going to certainly help the year-end totals.

The question most of them will struggle with is, what next?

Gallery: Everybody loves Harry Potter

The Harry Potter magic turns film into gold originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 13 Jul 2007 15:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling is scheduled to be published by Scholastic Press (NASDAQ: SCHL) on July 21, and some fans are speculating that Harry will die. I am quite confident in telling you that he won't, for several reasons.

1. The artistic.
Experienced authors will tell you that a satisfying ending is one that, after it happens, readers will see as inevitable, even if they didn't see it coming. For example, the ending of Sixth Sense, while a shocker to many (including me), worked because it neatly tied up loose threads we'd momentarily lost sight of. The ending completed the Bruce Willis' character arc.

Rowling has not established the need for someone to sacrifice his life so that Voldemort might die. In fact, she has already given Harry's parents and Dumbledore to the cause. Harry's death would be gratuitous, and, most importantly, inconsistent with the rest of the saga. Harry is the viewpoint character, and it is our vicarious enjoyment of his overcoming obstacles that gives the series such impact. It's hard to enjoy the denouement of a dead character.

Most importantly, though, Harry is not a flawed character seeking redemption through sacrifice. He is an innocent predestined to conquer the wicked AND LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER.

2. The practical.
If Rowling were to kill off her hero in the final book, it would not only diminish sales of this volume, but horribly impact the future sales of the series. Knowing that Harry was to die, (and who on Earth would not know of this plot twist?), would change the reader's experience, robbing each bit of conflict of its gravitas. Plus, fans would revolt. Arthur Conan Doyle learned this lesson when he tried to kill off Sherlock Holmes -- some plot reversals fans will simply not accept.

3. The financial.
With two more films on the planning board (including Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, due for release July 11th by Warner Brothers, a division of Time Warner, NYSE:TWX) and a theme park in development, I can't believe these companies would invest so much in a closed-end storyline. And while Rowling may have all the money she needs, keeping the tale open-ended is a much shrewder business decision.

So I'm not worried about Harry. My prediction -- he'll defeat Voldemort with Snape's help, assume Dumbledore's position as head of Hogworts, marry Jenny Ginny and stand as best man at Ron and Hermione's wedding.

Harry Potter can't die. Trust me.

Gallery: Everybody loves Harry Potter

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Will Rowling kill off Harry? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 06 Jul 2007 11:41:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Blockbuster backs Blu-Ray originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 18 Jun 2007 08:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Beth Gaston Moon is an analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research.

Warner Brothers taking He-Man to the big screen originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 30 May 2007 16:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Continue reading 'Spiderman 3', everything '3': Preview of potential summer blockbusters

'Spiderman 3', everything '3': Preview of potential summer blockbusters originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 30 Apr 2007 21:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Warner Brothers' Studio's animated Happy Feet was clearly in a position to show a large profit within a couple of weeks of its debut. Through the weekend finishing December 17, the movie has brought in almost $150 million after only five weeks. According to Box Office Mojo, the film had a budget of about $100 million.

It is clear that Warner is not going to be so fortunate with Blood Diamond, a film starring "Titanic" glamor-boy Leonardo DiCaprio. The film also had a budget of about $100 million, but after two weeks it has grossed a little over $18 million.

Warner's weak results have not helped parent Time Warner Inc. (NYSE:TWX) much over the last two quarters. Cable and network operating profit have had to make up some of the poor performance from the studio. The company needs a decent performance from its movie arm to bring home fourth quarter numbers that will support Time Warner's rising stock price.

The studio needs a little Christmas gift. With sports drama We Are Marshall coming out in a few days, Warner may have one last chance in 2006.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.

Warner's big movies run opposite directions originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 18 Dec 2006 18:06:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Paramount Picture's recent decision to cut loose Tom Cruise may be just the opening salvo in an upcoming battle between Hollywood studios and high-priced, high maintenance celebs. While overall movie receipt totals for this summer were up, the increase was driven by higher ticket prices, not increased attendance. Moviegoers are increasingly likely to be videoviewers instead. More than 1 million viewers have downloaded the video clip of a young man mixing Diet Coke with a mint and spewing the resulting concoction out of his mouth. Even more odd, 400,000 viewers have downloaded a clip of rabbits munching on vegetation.

Memo to viewers: GET LIVES! Seeing this image on the wall, AOL's strategy to become a premier video viewing destination begins to make a great deal of sense.

Movie production costs continue to skyrocket, with no assurance that money spent on production will be recouped at the theatres. By contrast, the number of no or low-cost video and video clips grows exponentially every week. As well, hundreds of hours of TV programming and thousands of movie titles are added to an increasing number of video-on-demand channels. With its recent purchase of GameDaily, Userplane and Truevo, AOL Video is moving to capture audience eyeballs. AOL also concluded a deal to distribute movie titles from 20th Century Fox, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Universal Pictures and Warner Brothers Home Entertainment Group.

Currently, AOL's business model allows viewers to access some ad-supported TV programming on demand free of charge. AOL plans to charge $9.99-$19.99 per movie download. For this fee, howwver, viewers will NOT own the movie. Purchasers may not burn the movie onto a DVD, though the movie may be played repeatedly over a period of days on several different Windows-supported devices. It remains to be seen whether consumers wil pay this fee for short-term ownership only.

TWX: E-lebrities to Replace Celebrities originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 25 Aug 2006 13:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Warner Bros to create straight to DVD movies originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 08 Jun 2006 07:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Warner Bros., the television-and-movies subsidiary of Time Warner, is stepping up efforts to cash in on the big-money, low-budget industry of Reality -- reality television, that is. The company intends to launch a TV production unit, called Warner Horizon Television, to produce even lower budget reality television programs.

And how does Warner Horizon Television plan to lower the cost of the already pathetically cheap reality television shows?

Well, according to Peter Roth, President of Warner Bros. Television, the studio will limit taping days, shooting locations and "talent" pay. This new production model will reduce costs to about $500,000 less per episode than what a "traditional" (read: watchable) TV show costs per episode.

If you're interested, Warner Horizon, I have a couple of ideas for some very low-budget reality shows:

Continue reading Reality Bites Warner Bros.

Reality Bites Warner Bros. originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 27 Apr 2006 13:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Forget about taxi drivers, muggers, Christo installations, and/or Matt Lauer. There's a new reason to avoid New York: Broadway's newest vampire musical.

"Lestat" -- which has been uniformly savaged by the Washington Post, the New York Times and even the mighty Star-Ledger of Newark, New Jersey -- was supposed to be Warner Brothers' challenge to Disney's many successes in the Broadway musicals ("The Lion King," "Tarzan," "Aida" and others). 

Coming in on the heels of two other failed vampire musicals -- "Dance of the Vampires" (2002) and "Dracula, the Musical" (2004) -- "Lestat" is based on Anne Rice's vampire novels, and it boasts otherworldly powers that would make the undead blush: a reported bankroll of up to $12 million and songwriting by Elton John.

Unfortunately, neither deep pockets nor the powerhouse behind "Crocodile Rock" could help. Ben Brantley, in the New York Times, called it a "musical sleeping pill" ... and his review was charitable by comparison. 

"I vant to suck your blood" is a line for old-school vampires. "I vant to suck the life out of this production" is apparently how the new generation of vampires rolls.

Warner Brothers' vampire musical a bloody mess originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 26 Apr 2006 18:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.