If you were hoping to catch the new Melissa McCarthy new comedy “Superintelligence,” about the world’s first true artificial intelligence, in theaters, you’re out of luck. The Ben Falcone-directed movie will forego its Christmas release, and instead will debut on HBO Max when the service launches in spring 2020.
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“We used the A.I. from Superintelligence to look at every single platform in the world, and then used its super knowledge and big artificial brain-like thing to determine that HBO Max was the right home for our film,” McCarthy and Falcone said in a press release.
According to an interview with Deadline, the decision came from Falcone, not Warner Bros., but that the studio backed the decision. “When the announcement came that HBO Max was really happening, Ben had this idea,” Said McCarthy. “And we thought, is this better? Different doesn’t mean worse, and how are we watching films ourselves?”
Bobby Cannavale, Brian Tyree Henry, and Jean Smart also co-star in the film which features late-night host James Corden as the voice of the A.I. The film has McCarthy playing a former corporate executive whose life is turned upside down when she is selected to be observed by the first true artificial intelligence, which may or may not want to take over the world.
As Deadline reports, the news of “Superintelligence” comes ahead of an HBO Max presentation where it is expected that the streaming service will announce its full launch slate, which now includes the Steven Soderbergh-directed Meryl Streep-starrer “Let Them All Talk”, the Greg Berlanti-produced “Unpregnant”, and at some point it will include the recently acquired “Bad Education” starring Hugh Jackman. Of course, the biggest draw for the streaming service is WarnerMedia’s library which includes “Friends,” “The Big Bang Theory,” and “Game of Thrones.”