‘The Matrix Resurrections’ HBO Max Viewership Ranks Below ‘Godzilla Vs. Kong’, Piracy A Major Factor

One of the things that sucks about streaming services is we can’t judge how they performed the way we can box office numbers. Most companies don’t reveal their true viewership stats unless they’re really good, keeping the other numbers, that maybe aren’t so great, secret.

In the case of The Matrix Resurrections, the viewership stats seem to be middling at best. Keep in mind these aren’t official by any means, but Samba TV (via Deadline) says it was watched by 2.8M smart TV households over its first five days of streaming release on HBO Max. Along with the ho-hum $22.5M box office debut, this suggests people weren’t exactly flocking to jump back into the Matrix.

For comparison’s sake, 2.8M is way below the 3.6M viewers for Godzilla vs. Kong earlier this year. That sequel also did double the box office business, $48.1M, on the way to $100M in the U.S. and $467M worldwide. The Matrix Resurrections isn’t going to come close to those figures, even though it shares the same hybrid release.

Hurting The Matrix is the fact it was the most pirated movie for the week according to MUSO. This is another factor Warner Bros. didn’t deal with appropriately when planning this theatrical/streaming model. It’s easy for the torrent sites to obtain a clean digital copy once the film is available online for streaming.

Travis Hopson
Travis Hopson has been reviewing movies before he even knew there was such a thing. Having grown up on a combination of bad '80s movies, pro wrestling, comic books, and hip-hop, Travis is uniquely positioned to geek out on just about everything under the sun. A vampire who walks during the day and refuses to sleep, Travis is the co-creator and lead writer for Punch Drunk Critics. He is also a contributor to Good Morning Washington, WBAL Morning News, and WETA Around Town. In the five minutes a day he's not working, Travis is also a voice actor, podcaster, and Twitch gamer. Travis is a voting member of the Critics Choice Association (CCA), Washington DC Area Film Critics Association (WAFCA), and Late Night programmer for the Lakefront Film Festival.