Warner Bros. Discovery’s decision to merge HBO Max with Discovery Plus and rename it Max has got to be one of the most terrible branding decisions of all time, right up there with Meta, Qwikster, and Snoop Lion. HBO is a strong name with a decades-long reputation for quality movies and shows, but I have no idea what Max is. Even when Pizza Hut started going by The Hut, the correct association was stil🉐l there; it’s the only hut around. What is Max? It’s nothing, and it’s a terrible name.
The rebrand isn’t the only bad decision the company is making. Its slate of upcoming programs includes a new adaptation of the Harry Potter books, executive produced by transphobic author JK Rowling - which is 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:a terrible idea on pretty much eve🎃ry 🦹level. There’s also going to be a reorganization of theꦫ pricing model, which is a fancy way of saying a price increase with extra steps.
Technic⛎ally, Max is keeping the monthly subscription prices the same, and adding an additional tier on top. If you currently subscribe to HBO Max and you don’t do anything, your monthly fee of $9 or $16/month (depending on whether you have ads or not) will stay the same when Max launches May 23. However, both of the current ad-supported and ad-free plans will be losing access to 4K content when Max rolls out. To see 4K, you’ll need to upgrade to the new Max Ultimate Ad Free plan for $20/month of $200/year.
There are some other small differences in the new pricing scheme. The Ad-Lite and Ad Free options will support two concurrent streams while the current HBO Max plans support three. Tha🌄t increases to four with Ultimate Ad Free. You’ll also get 100 offline downloads with the Ultimate plan, while the Ad Free plan continues to offer 30. The loss of 4K support is the one thing that really stings here - or at least it would, if HBO Max’s 4K library didn’t totally suck.
For as many qu🐻ality films and shows as there are on HBO Max, that are surprisingly few that stream in 4K. Searching 4K in the app will only bring up Dune, The Matrix films, the DCEU movies, and a few others like Tenet, Watchmen, and The King’s Man. There’s no 4K category in the app, but 39 4K movies on HBO Max as of last December. I found a few more that h✅ave been added since, like Hugh Jackman’s Reminiscence, but out of the 2,000 or more movies available on HBO Max, less than two percent are in 4K.
TV is even worse. Game of Thrones didn’t get 4K support until last year, and while House of the Dragon and The Last of Us have it, they might be the only HBO shows that do. There’s nꦦo 4K for The White Lotus, Perry Mason, Succession, or Barry. Even the DC Universe shows, which 🌃had 4K when they first premiered, were downgraded to HD when they moved over to HBO Max.
It would be one thing if it was just a matter of resolution - though I’d argue that there are some Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon episodes that are practically unwatchable in HD - but these streaming platforms treat 4K like a premium package.🐠 A 4K movie also gets Dolby Vision for HDR and Dolby Atmos audio. These are cinema-standard features that come automatically with every TV sold in the last three years. If you’re not watching 4K, you’re missing a big part of the intended experience.
I’m not happy about it, but I’d be willing to fork over another $7/month if the Ultimate Plan actually has a large selection. Having an extra concurrent stream and 70 more downloads is meaningless to me - as I’m sure they’re meaningless to Warner Bros. Discovery - and if I’m going to pay for a premium tier, I better be getting a lot of premium content. There are entire streaming services that cost less than $7. It’s a significant price hike for the best tier, and if you’re going to charge Netflix prices, you better have a thousand 4K options, just like Netflix. Something tells me Warner Bros. Discovery isn’t going to suddenly add over 900 new 4K movies and shows in May, but then again, I don’t know wh♕at to expect from a platform called Max.