Paramount Skydance CEO David Ellison speaks during the Bloomberg Screentime conference in Los Angeles on October 9, 2025.
Patricio T. Fallon | afp | fake images
Hollywood could soon have a new king of the box office.
With supreme skydance ready to take charge Warner Bros. Discoverycombined film studios could dominate the theatrical slate.
Paramount CEO David Ellison has repeatedly vowed not to pull production from either studio, aiming to make 30 films a year: 15 from Paramount and 15 from Warner Bros. The pending transaction, with an enterprise value of $111 billion, must still win regulatory approval in both the United States and Europe.
As the current slate stands for 2027, combining WBD and Paramount would result in 26 theatrical releases. However, additions to that schedule could come as soon as April at the annual CinemaCon conference in Las Vegas.
This roster juggernaut is dominated by Warner Bros. titles, and those films likely account for the majority of ticket sales.
The studio will release films from major franchises, including Godzilla-Kong, Superman, Batman, Minecraft, The Conjuring Universe, Gremlins and Lord of the Rings.
Meanwhile, Paramount will have new entries for Sonic the Hedgehog, Paranormal Activity, A Quiet Place and its Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated franchises.
Still from Paramount's “Sonic the Hedgehog 2.”
Supreme
While Paramount's franchises are popular and have generated strong box office ticket sales, their major releases in 2027 are lower-budget features. In fact, no film from any of those four franchises has generated more than $350 million worldwide, according to Comscore data. But with smaller budgets, they don't have to do this to be profitable.
Warner Bros.' Some programming, on the other hand, has bigger-budget features that have generated greater box office returns in the past. The most recent Godzilla-Kong movie generated $572 million worldwide, 2025's “The Conjuring: Last Rites” grossed nearly $500 million, “The Batman” grossed $772 million and “A Minecraft Movie” nearly hit $1 billion.
“When you look at the movies on the horizon for the PAR/WBD combo, it's most impressive,” Paul Dergarabedian, head of market trends at Comscore, told CNBC. “And it may not be a stretch to say that that slate could have the potential to generate the biggest box office for a studio in 2027.”
The Warner Bros. movie studio is a big part of why Ellison was so committed to winning over WBD's board of directors and its shareholders in a bidding war against Comcast and netflix. Last year, Warner Bros. was the second highest-grossing studio domestically and worldwide. Paramount came in fifth.
Disney has long held the box office heavyweight title, although Universal briefly toppled it in 2023. Warner and Universal have jockeyed for second and third position, with Sony, Lionsgate and Paramount behind them.
A complicated feat
“Doubling two major slates increases the potential for a very strong 2027, but nothing is ever certain when it comes to assuming a potential annual box office winner among studios,” said Shawn Robbins, director of analytics at Fandango and founder of Box Office Theory. “That's especially true when companies like Disney and Universal will each introduce their own heavyweights next year.”
Disney, in particular, has franchises such as Ice Age, Star Wars, Frozen and Avengers on the agenda for 2027.
Of course, franchises aren't always guaranteed to be successful at the box office, but the combined efforts of Paramount and Warner Bros. are a compelling offering for an industry that has shrunk dramatically over the past decade.
“The notion of two big studios under one big umbrella in 2027 is an intriguing prospect and at the same time raises some speculation,” Robbins said. “We've seen the decline in theatrical production in the years following Disney's acquisition of Fox, although caveats like the pandemic and the explosion of streaming distort that comparison a bit.”
A combined proposal from Paramount and Warner Bros. also faces some logistical problems. There are only 52 weekends on the calendar, and with 30 movies, the studio would need to strategically place its releases so as not to cannibalize its own ticket sales.
David Corenswet stars as Superman at Warner Bros.' “Superman.”
Warner Bros. Discovery
Robbins noted that rival studios typically only face each other on the same weekend or on consecutive weekends if they are sure there is no significant overlap in audience demographics. That's why there's often a horror movie that's released at the same time as a family-friendly animated movie, for example.
By contrast, Robbins noted, Paramount is scheduled to release “Sonic the Hedgehog 4” just a week before Warner Bros.' “Godzilla X Kong: Supernova.”
“It wouldn't be a surprise to see one of them change sooner or later on the schedule, as the parent studio will want to minimize risk and do what's best for the financial bottom line while remaining competitive,” he said.
And while Ellison has touted a slate of 30 films in the years after 2027, it's unclear if that future is feasible.
Traditionally, when two major studios merge, the number of films released declines and there is a large wave of layoffs as consolidation eliminates layoffs. Not to mention, the marketing costs for big-budget movies can be prohibitive.
“What will truly become normal for the newly unified house of Paramount and Warner remains to be seen,” Robbins said. “The longevity of such a list in the years after 2027 will be challenging to produce, but never say never.”
Disclosure: Versant is the parent company of CNBC and Fandango.
