Scoob! animated movie will skip theaters and go straight to digital

The animated movie Scoob! is the latest to skip a planned theatrical release; it'll be made available directly on digital next month, the same month it was originally scheduled to debut in cinemas. The digital release will take place in the US and Canada, making Scoob! one of the biggest movies to entirely skip a theatrical release.

Movie studios have been forced to change the way they deliver movies in light of the coronavirus outbreak. We first saw movies start to trickle to digital video soon after their theatrical release due to increasing numbers of movie theater closures. That trend picked up speed quickly, shuttling many movies to digital.

It didn't take long for a studio to decide to entirely skip a theatrical premiere and instead go to straight to digital — or, in the case of The Lovebirds, straight to Netflix. The biggest movie to skip the theaters and go straight to digital was Universal's Trolls World Tour, quickly catapulting itself to the top of the charts.

In light of that success, Variety reports that Warner Bros. is taking a similar step with its Scoob! animated Scooby-Doo movie. The flick will be available to rent (48hr) and purchase on digital video through major platforms starting on May 15 for $19.99 and $24.99, respectively.

Though Warner Bros. is skipping theaters for this particular movie, it doesn't have plans to do that for some of its other big titles. Last month, it was announced that the planned Wonder Woman 1984 movie, for example, has been bumped from a planned release in June to a later one in early August.