In the last couple of years, we've all had to get used to movies shifting to future release dates as the pandemic caused issues for studios and cinemas alike. One of the repeat offenders in the release date shuffling was Sony's Spider-adjacent horror thriller Morbius, starring Jared Leto. The film is on the move yet again as the Omicron surge has the studio concerned about its box office performance.
Leto stars as Michael Morbius, a biochemist who becomes a vampire after attempting to cure himself of a rare blood disease. With Daniel Espinosa in the director's chair, the cast also includes Matt Smith, Jared Harris and Tyrese Gibson. Last scheduled for 28 January, the film's now headed – in the States so far – to 1 April.
It's doubly ironic that a film about a medical researcher should be shifting to avoid a pandemic, and that this new shift comes from the studio enjoying the most successful release of recent times in Spider-Man: No Way Home, which has earned more than $600 million in the US and more than $1.3 billion worldwide. Still, perhaps the executive types are more nervous about a title that has a lower recognition factor behind it, and no backing from the behemoth that is the MCU.