It seems many Fox franchises have fallen by the wayside since Disney merged with the studio, and it's beginning to look like the Kingsman series could be one of the most noteworthy casualties to date.
While filmmaker Matthew Vaughn has ambitious plans for the property (including spinoffs and TV shows), upcoming prequel movie The King's Man could be offloaded to a streaming service ahead of its planned March 12th release. After Morbius was delayed by Sony Pictures yesterday evening, it's now impossible to imagine anything being released over the next few months.
That might explain why Variety is reporting that, "There have been rumors that a major streaming service would like to take the film off Disney’s hands, but it’s unclear if the studio would ever sell the movie. Moreover, if it went that route, it could always debut “The King’s Man” on Hulu, which it owns."
Nothing is set in stone just yet then, but as the trade points out, if the marketing campaign doesn't pick up soon, chances are the movie will face another release date delay... at the very least.
There's a lot of uncertainty as we head into this year, because while a vaccine is rolling out, that's going to take a long time, and people won't immediately be willing to rush back into a busy theater even then. Studios are clearly going to have to embrace new ways of releasing movies, not to mention new ways of making them ($250 million blockbusters and streaming don't go hand in hand).
Time will tell, but we'll be sure to keep you updated when it comes to plans for The King's Man!