The wait is finally over. Universal has revealed when and where Oppenheimer will be landing on streaming.
While the hit film could have been shopped around for streaming rights, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that it will stream exclusively on Peacock, the streaming platform of NBCUniversal. The film will hit the streamer on Feb. 16, just in time to be easily watchable by anyone voting for the Oscars.
One might wonder why it took six whole months to land on streaming, an incredibly long window in the modern age and even longer for a struggling streamer like Peacock who’s looking for any and all footholds it can get in the market. Barbie, which famously opened on the same day as Oppenheimer to form Barbenheimer, debuted on Max weeks ago.
Well, part of the reason is probably that the film just had legs in theaters, becoming the third-highest-grossing movie of 2023. However, there’s also the Christopher Nolan factor. Like all Nolan movies, Oppenheimer is something you should have seen on the biggest screen possible, which is why the film had great legs in premium (IMAX) theaters.
Nolan is also one of the least streaming-friendly directors in all of cinema, and one could easily see him enforcing a lengthy window before the film hit streaming to try to get as many people in theaters as possible. Hell, the entire reason Oppenheimer is a Universal film, and thus coming to Peacock, is because Nolan left Warner Bros. after their whole day and date streaming decision during the pandemic.
Whatever the reason for the long delay, everyone will finally be able to watch Oppenheimer on a screen it was not made for, with sound that won’t do it justice, over an Internet connection that can’t provide the kind of picture it needs on Feb. 16.
