Max Announces 'Barbie' Streamhouse Date
It’s just Ken’s eleven days from arriving on streaming
Just like any Christmas, Barbie’s coming home. Max has announced that the year’s biggest hit movie will arrive on the streamer on December 15. This announcement comes after continuous “Coming Soon”, “Coming This Fall” and finally “Coming in December” teases that went until mere days before the specifics finally came in.
For those counting, the Margot Robbie-starring, Greta Gerwig-directed film based on the Mattel toyline will have gone 158 days from its July 21 theatrical release before hitting streaming. And that was very intentional, with Warner Bros. keeping it in theaters for a substantial amount of time as the film racked up $1.4 billion at the global box office, a $636.2 million United States and Canada/$805.6 million international split. The studio allegedly called it a “Barbillion” after hitting the milestone. It is not only the highest-grossing film of the year, but the fourteenth-highest of all time, and Warner Bros.’s highest grossing film ever in its 100-year history. It took long enough that Blue Beetle, released in theaters three weeks after, arrived to the streamer four weeks prior by the time Barbie does.
Facing an existential crisis channeled into her by America Ferrera’s Mattel employee Gloria’s own mid-life crisis, Robbie’s Stereotypical Barbie ventures off to the real world, with the Beach Ken played by Ryan Gosling that pines for her. Introduced to the real world’s realities of what it means to be a woman or a man, it creates quite the conflict for their mojos when they get home. The film also features Helen Mirren as narrator, and stars a pack of Barbie variants including Issa Rae as President Barbie and Kate McKinnon as Weird Barbie, Ken variants including Simu Liu as Tourist Ken Ncuti Gatwa as Artist Ken, as well as Will Ferrell as Mattel CEO and Ariana Greenblatt as Gloria’s daughter Sasha.
Barbie has also boasted a standout soundtrack that has garnered 11 Grammy nominations for songs like Song and Record of the Year for Billie Eilish’s “What Was I Made For?” and Song of the Year for Dua Lipa’s “Dance the Night” as well, Nicki Minaj & Ice Spice’s “Barbie World” which features Aqua’s “Barbie Girl”, is nominated for Best Rap Song, and of course there’s Ryan Gosling’s anthem “I’m Just Ken”. All four songs will go at it for for Best Song Written for Visual Media (against Rihanna’s “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, because Grammy eligibility windows are weird). The former three are also gunning for Academy Award recognition.
An American Sign Language version will also be made available featuring ASL performer Leila Hanaumi. It was apparently produced for Max, and came together from research and feedback from the Deaf community and consultation and counsel from community leaders. It will be listed as its own title instead of as a special feature. So it’s more akin to Coco in Spanish on Disney+ than to Star Wars: A New Hope in Navajo. It will be identifiable by key art that will have the sign language symbol. Unfortunately, unlike Disney+’s unique date reveal trailers, Max uploaded the theatrical trailer with a Max end card that has the date. Kind of disappointing. On the more positive side, McKinnon will be returning to Saturday Night Live for the first time to host on December 16, with Eilish as her musical guest.
Sources: Variety, Deadline, Box Office Mojo