Where can I watch HBO Max programs in Canada?

You may have heard about HBO Max, a new streaming service from WarnerMedia which launched on May 27, 2020, with streaming rights to the Studio Ghibli animated film catalogue, past hit series like Friends, and a slew of new programs on top of HBO's original series and current film lineup. This service is currently only available only in the United States.

Most of HBO Max's live-action "Max Originals" programs (technically branded "HBO Max Originals" outside the U.S.), including Love Life, An American Pickle, The Flight Attendant, and Raised by Wolves are or will be available in Canada on Crave, largely as a result of an expanded deal struck between Bell Media and WarnerMedia in late 2019. Crave was already the home of most HBO programming in Canada.

However, there are exceptions. WarnerMedia is only selling broadcast rights to HBO Max programs it produces directly or otherwise controls worldwide rights to, and even then some programs are excluded:

• Corus (owner of Treehouse, Teletoon, and Adult Swim Canada) has an existing relationship with WarnerMedia for Canadian rights to Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, and certain other animated program. It also retains the Canadian rights to Sesame Street and related programs.
• A handful of series that HBO Max controls the Canadian rights to, including Valley of Tears and Equal, have been been picked up by Hollywood Suite instead.

Finally, HBO Max is also ordering programs from other studios. While Crave has been able to secure Canadian rights to HBO Max-commissioned scripted programming from studios like Universal and Lionsgate, some programs like It's a Sin, Made for Love and House of Ho have instead ended up on other services like Prime Video and Super Channel.

Further details

• What is HBO Max? How is it different from HBO?
• What's the relationship between HBO Max and Crave?
• What HBO Max series will be available on Crave?
• How about HBO Max / Warner Max original films and specials (and that Justice League recut?)
• What HBO Max original programs are not airing on Crave?
• What about shows like Friends, South Park, Rick and Morty, and Doctor Who?
• What about the Studio Ghibli film library?
• Is there any possibility that Canada will get the "real" HBO Max anytime soon?

What is HBO Max? How is it different from HBO?

The streaming service later named HBO Max was first announced by WarnerMedia in late 2018, soon after the former Time Warner was taken over by American telecom company AT&T.

From the beginning, the plan has been for the service to include all of the existing HBO pay TV channel's content in the U.S. (both first-run movies and original series and specials), augmented with more programming from other divisions of WarnerMedia (like Warner Bros. Pictures, Cartoon Network, TBS and TNT) and targeting different audiences from those HBO has attracted traditionally (which have been mostly older, and mostly men), in order to make it a stronger competitor to other streaming services like Netflix.

To that end, HBO Max has announced a large number of new, original series, movies and specials, many based on other WarnerMedia properties, and most targeting younger generations as well as women.

HBO Max has also acquired U.S. streaming rights to a number of existing series produced by WarnerMedia, including Friends, The Big Bang Theory, and The West Wing, as well as past episodes of externally-produced series such as South Park and Doctor Who.

While HBO Max shares the "HBO" name – which makes sense from a marketing perspective – the "Max" programming lineup was originally handled by a separate programming team, reporting to the executive in charge of basic cable channels TBS and TNT. (As of August 2020, those responsibilities have been merged into a single team.)

HBO Max will not be available outside the United States initially, but previously announced plans to expand to Latin America and parts of Europe by 2021, in areas where HBO already operates its own local HBO-branded service, and has accelerated plans to expand more widely.

In other countries where HBO already has a deal with another broadcaster, WarnerMedia has so far chosen to extend those relationships – as in Canada, where HBO Max has a partnership with Crave.

What's the relationship between HBO Max and Crave?

Bell Media, which owns Crave among other Canadian TV networks like CTV, has a long-term output agreement for "new scripted series primarily produced by the divisions of the Warner Bros. Television Group for HBO Max". This was evidently expanded further to include some, but not all, unscripted series, and certain original specials and films.

In many ways, this is a natural extension. Crave has long been the home of HBO programming in Canada (you can read more about this relationship here) as well as the first-run pay TV home of Warner Bros. theatrical films, while CTV and affiliated cable channels carry many (though not all) of WarnerMedia's other TV series. Indeed, this new agreement also extends Crave's rights to HBO series and Warner Bros. movies. And certainly there are many parallels between Crave's 2018 relaunch (when the CraveTV library was added automatically to all subscribers of the former TMN) and how HBO Max is being rolled out to existing HBO subscribers.

Canadian telecom industry website Cartt.ca has reported that Bell Media's most recent 2019 agreements with WarnerMedia run five years (i.e., they would expire in 2024 or 2025), and cost Bell at least $100 million per year. This seems to be in line with other agreements that WarnerMedia announced around the same time, including the most recent extension with Sky for HBO programming rights in that company's European territories.

What HBO Max series are (or will be) available on Crave?

The following HBO Max series (listed alphabetically, with "the" ignored) have been, or will be, released on Crave's "Movies + HBO" streaming tier, and in most cases will have or had airings on the Crave / HBO linear channels (see next section for original movies and specials):

• The Big Shot with Bethenny (business reality competition series hosted by Bethenny Frankel) – episodes released weekly starting Thursday, April 29, 2021; also airing on CTV Life Channel and E! Canada
• Craftopia (kids/teens crafting competition series hosted by Lauren "LaurDIY" Riihimaki) – all eight Season 1 episodes premiered Wednesday, May 27, 2020, with two Halloween specials available since October 22, and two Christmas specials released on November 26
• Ellen's Next Great Designer (interior design reality competition series hosted by Ellen DeGeneres and Scott Foley) – epsiodes released weekly starting Thursday, April 22, 2021; also airing on CTV Life Channel and E! Canada
• Expecting Amy (limited docuseries featuring Amy Schumer) – all episodes available since Thursday, July 9, 2020
• The Flight Attendant (drama starring Kaley Cuoco) – premiered Thursday, November 26, 2020; full season now available; also aired on CTV Drama Channel
• Generation (also stylized genera+ion) (coming-of-age drama with an ensemble cast including Justice Smith) – premiered Thursday, March 11, 2021; full first season now available
• Gossip Girl (reboot / sequel to the 2007-12 series) – to be released starting July 8, 2021
• Hacks (dark comedy starring Jean Smart and Hannah Einbender, produced by Universal Television) – released starting Thursday, May 13, 2021; full first season now available
• Legendary (competitive vogue reality series) – full first season now available (episodes were released weekly starting Wednesday, May 27, 2020); season 2 premieres May 6, 2021
• Love Life (romantic comedy series starring Anna Kendrick, produced by Lionsgate Television) – full first season now available (episodes were released weekly starting Wednesday, May 27, 2020); also aired on CTV Drama Channel
• Raised by Wolves (science-fiction drama series from executive producer Ridley Scott) – full first season now available (episodes were released weekly starting Thursday, September 3, 2020); also aired on CTV Sci-Fi Channel
• Search Party (dark comedy starring Alia Shawkat; first two seasons produced for TBS but never previously aired in Canada) – seasons 1–4 released on Thursday, February 4, 2021
• Selena + Chef (cooking show starring Selena Gomez) – released starting Thursday, August 13, 2020
• Starstruck (British comedy starring Rose Matafeo) – first season released on Thursday, June 10, 2021
• 12 Dates of Christmas (reality series) – released starting November 26, 2020
• That Damn Michael Che (sketch comedy series starring Michael Che of Saturday Night Live, produced by Universal Television) – full first season  released on Thursday, May 6, 2021
• Two Weeks to Live (British dark comedy starring Maisie Williams, produced by Kudos / Banijay; sometimes listed on Crave's website with other HBO Max originals but not branded as one) – episodes released weekly starting Thursday, January 7, 2021
• Veneno (Spanish series about transgender personality "La Veneno") – released in full on Thursday, July 24, 2021
• Wahl Street (reality series starring Mark Wahlberg) – full first season released on April 15, 2021; also airing on CTV Life Channel and E! Canada
• A World of Calm (calming scenery narrated by well-known actors, co-produced with the makers of the Calm mobile app) – full first season now available

(Just as a reminder: there is a distinction between "HBO Originals" and "HBO Max Originials", so the fact that the list above does not include programs like Succession and The Nevers – which were commissioned directly by HBO, not HBO Max – is not an oversight.)

Other specific future series that Bell Media has confirmed as eventually coming to Crave (some still in development, with no guarantee they'll ever see the light of day) as of May 2021 are:

• And Just Like That... (sequel limited series to Sex and the City)
• College Girls (working title)
• Crime Farm
• DC Super Hero High
• DMZ
• Dune: The Sisterhood
• Untitled Green Lantern-based series
• Love and Death (limited series starring Elizabeth Olsen, produced by Lionsgate Television)
• Red Bird Lane
• Rules of Magic
• Strange Adventures
• The Shelley Society
• Tooned Out

(Some rough details about most of these series and others are in this 2019 WarnerMedia press release.)

Note that not all HBO Max series that Bell Media has rights to will necessarily be exclusive to Crave, or even debut there. Besides the aforementioned Doom Patrol, Bell Media management has indicated that the upcoming Gossip Girl reboot could debut on one of its cable channels like CTV Life before eventually streaming on Crave.

What about series that are moving to HBO Max?

For series that started on another American outlet and later moved to HBO Max for subsequent seasons, the situation is slightly more complex. Basically what it boils down to is, if one outlet had previously bought the Canadian rights, that rightsholder has first right of refusal to air subsequent seasons, regardless of what happens in the originating country. (That's why, for example, new episodes of The Mindy Project continued to first on Citytv in Canada, even after it moved from Fox to Hulu in the U.S.)

Thus, Bell Media already has the Canadian rights to Doom Patrol, a series which originated on the U.S.-only DC Universe service, but going forward will be considered an HBO Max original. This series remains available on both CTV Sci-Fi (formerly Space) and Crave's base streaming tier. (Season 2 began on June 25, 2020.)

Similarly, we expect that Bell will continue to hold Canadian rights to Comedy Central Studios' South Side and The Other Two, despite Max Original programs produced by Paramount, another ViacomCBS subsidiary, going to Prime Video in Canada as discussed below. Both series originated on Comedy Central, aired in Canada on CTV Comedy and Much, and currently have their first seasons streaming on Crave. (HBO Max and Comedy Central announced in August 2020 that these programs would become Max Originals starting with their respective second seasons.)

Conversely, shows like Harley Quinn and Titans, which were previously sold to other rightholders in Canada (Adult Swim Canada and Netflix respectively), are likely to remain on those outlets, despite HBO Max commissioning new "Max Originals" seasons of these Warner Bros.-produced series.

How about HBO Max / Warner Max original films and specials?

In addition to the main HBO service's lineup of theatrical and original films, HBO Max will also carry a range of service-exclusive films. Some of these are Warner Bros. films that are being moved to a streaming-only release such as Superintelligence, while others are being acquired or developed for the service, initially falling under the Warner Max film label.

In a June 2020 feature story in The Globe and Mail about the availability of streaming service programming in Canada, a Bell Media executive is quoted as saying that at that point, their "licensing agreement [did] not include HBO Max original feature films", but that negotiations were ongoing.

Bell has since confirmed (in an update to that article, and subsequent posts or schedule releases) that Crave will carry the following HBO Max original films and specials:

• An American Pickle (Warner Max-acquired comedy film starring Seth Rogan) – released August 6, 2020
• Class Action Park (documentary about an infamous New Jersey water park) – released August 27, 2020
• Charm City Kings (Warner Max-acquired drama starring Jahi Di'Allo Winston and Meek Mill) – released October 8, 2020
• Chelsea Handler: Evolution (comedy special) – released October 22, 2020
• The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air Reunion – released November 19, 2020
• Let Them All Talk (comedy film starring Meryl Streep, Candice Bergen, and Gemma Chan, and directed by Stephen Soderbergh) – released December 10, 2020
• Locked Down (heist film starring Anne Hathaway and Chiwetel Ejiofo) – released January 14, 2021
• My Gift: A Christmas Special from Carrie Underwood (music/variety special) – released December 3, 2020
• No Sudden Move (heist film directed by Stephen Soderbergh, starring Don Cheadle and Jon Hamm) – released July 1, 2021
• On the Record (documentary about allegations of sexual abuse against Russell Simmons) – released on Crave on September 19, 2020
• Superintelligence (comedy starring Melissa McCarthy) – released November 26, 2020
• Unpregnant (road movie starring Haley Lu Richardson and Barbie Ferreira) – released September 10, 2020
• A West Wing Special to Benefit When We All Vote (theatrical re-staging of a 2002 episode of the political drama) – released on Crave on October 30, 2020
• Zack Snyder's Justice League (the director's cut of the 2017 DC superhero film) – released Thursday, March 18, 2021

We believe it is highly likely that, based on their existing relationship with WarnerMedia, Crave will have effective first right of refusal on the majority of HBO Max-exclusive films and specials. However, the Globe piece seems to make clear that Crave may still make decisions on a case-by-case basis.

What HBO Max original programs are not airing on Crave?

While Crave will have a broad selection of HBO Max programs, there are still a number of exclusions. Although Crave's current partnership for HBO's mainline programming has covered most acquisitions from third-party producers, as well as co-productions like the British miniseries Years and Years or Chernobyl, to date, similar HBO Max acquisitions have not been covered in the same way.

In late 2020, Warner Bros. moved two of its planned major theatrical releases for the rest of the year – The Witches and Wonder Woman 1984 – to simultaneous or exclusive release on HBO Max in the United States, later announcing it would do the same for all of its 2021 films. It's now clear that these sorts of day-and-date releases are not covered by Crave's deals with WarnerMedia either, with Warner Bros. ultimately releasing The Witches and WW84 both theatrically and on premium VOD in Canada, though they will still be available on Crave later in 2021 (further explanation is available at the provided links).

There are several other HBO Max original programs (or U.S. debuts) that we know for sure will have Canadian broadcasters other than Bell Media / Crave, a few of which are listed in the table below:

Other examples of programs that will air on HBO Max in the U.S. but are not yet confirmed to be available on Crave (or any other service) include:

• series commissioned or acquired from some outside studios;
   
• co-productions with CNN, such as Heaven's Gate: The Cult of Cults, Generation Hustle, and LFG – it's possible that WarnerMedia may be holding back the Canadian rights in advance of a future linear premiere on CNN's North American feed (as seems to have been the case with 2020 documentary On the Trail);
   
• other fully animated programs, like the revival of The Boondocks (from Sony), or even those produced by WarnerMedia – as with the ones listed above like Looney Tunes, it is very likely (but not necessarily confirmed) that many of these will air on Corus channels like Teletoon (see below); and
   
• certain other reality shows and docuseries like Haute Dog.

To be clear, it's very possible that much of the programming above could still end up on Crave. The announcements to date simply suggest that they are not part of the current deal and would require further negotiations, either with WarnerMedia or with the other production companies involved. In some cases, it's also possible Bell Media has already taken a look and decided based on price, content, or other factors, that those programs are not worthwhile acquisitions for Crave.

WarnerMedia has an existing relationship with Corus Entertainment for animated programming, including broadcasts on YTV and Teletoon, and licensed Canadian versions of Cartoon Network and Adult Swim, so it would stand to reason that the majority of animated programs will end up on Corus' channels.

At this point, we think it's likely that, as with Made for Love (noted above), other programs produced by Paramount Television like Station Eleven are most likely to land on Prime Video in Canada.

It may well end up that other broadcasters have made or will make deals for the remaining HBO Max programs, but these may not be announced until Canadian broadcast dates are scheduled.

What about shows like Friends, South Park, Rick and Morty, and Doctor Who?

For the most part, the (new) streaming rights that HBO Max has secured for these and other shows are for the United States only. So for Canada, as of now, the upshot seems to be – no immediate change to the status quo.

Netflix initially retained the rights to stream Friends in Canada (and in many other countries outside the U.S.). However, on December 1, 2020, Crave announced it would be assuming those rights on December 31.

There are already Canadian versions of Cartoon Network and Adult Swim operated by Corus Entertainment, with rights to the American versions' original programming. Thus, Adult Swim Canada (available through cable as well as Prime Video streaming package StackTV) will retain rights to new episodes of Rick and Morty, and a rotating selection of past episodes, for the foreseeable future. (To be clear, we're not aware of any streaming service in Canada where all past seasons are currently available.)

Crave already has Canadian streaming rights to many of the other library series that HBO Max will be highlighting, like South Park, Doctor Who, and The Big Bang Theory.

However these are pre-existing deals, and just because Crave is now aligned with HBO Max does not guarantee that Crave will have the same terms or that these deals will remain in place in exactly the same way going forward. If, say, the BBC gets a better offer for Canadian streaming rights to Doctor Who when its current deal with Bell Media runs out, there's no guarantee that it'll stick with Crave just because of its U.S. deal with HBO Max.

For other WarnerMedia programs, unlike the U.S. where that company has long operated its own cable channels like TNT and TBS which it could use to air Warner movies, there's a patchwork of licensing deals in Canada covering individual programs and various sets of movies, so it cannot easily assign similar rights to a single Canadian partner. As another example (beyond Friends), rights to older Warner Bros. movies tend to get split among many different channels and services including Netflix, Bell Media channels like Starz, and Corus Entertainment channels like Showcase. There probably won't be any big shifts here.

Even for other library programming that HBO Max is promoting without a current streaming home in Canada, like the original Gossip Girl and The West Wing (both also Warner Bros. series), there has not yet been any indication that Crave will be acquiring those rights.

Does Crave carry the Studio Ghibli film library?

No. Studio Ghibli's North American distributor ultimately made a deal with Netflix to carry these films in Canada.

Speculation began after HBO Max announced that it would be the first U.S. streaming service to carry the catalogue of Studio Ghibli animated films like My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away, and Howl's Moving Castle. Netflix then followed up in early 2020, announcing it had secured global rights to these films outside the U.S., Canada and Japan.

This, of course, left two big holes: Japan (which is of course Studio Ghibli's home market, and where it might be constrained by existing domestic distribution contracts, or perhaps just seeking a more lucrative domestic streaming deal), and Canada.

Some media outlets erroneously suggested that HBO Max would have North American rights that would also cover Canada, but Crave management subsequently clarified that it is not receiving any rights to Studio Ghibli films through its dealings with HBO Max.

On June 22, 2020, Netflix finally announced it had made a deal covering Canada, making 20 Studio Ghibli films available on June 25, with one more (The Wind Rises) coming August 1.

The core of the issue was that Ghibli has two international distributors: GKIDS in the U.S. and Canada, and Wild Bunch everywhere else except Japan. Netflix purchased rights for all of Wild Bunch's territories, but they needed to make a separate deal with GKIDS in order to get Canadian rights – which evidently took a lot more time.

Où sont les émissions HBO Max en français? (Where are the French-language versions of these programs?)

Some HBO Max programs, such as Love Life (Destin amoureux), are available in French on Super Écran, the French-language equivalent of Crave's Movies + HBO tier. However, not every program is available, and those that are are being made available in French much more slowly than programs from the main HBO channel. For example, the French-language dub of An American Pickle will be released on November 27, almost four full months after its English-language release.

(Sommaire en mauvais français, parce que je suis un anglophone: Quelques des émissions de HBO Max, telles que Destin amoureux (Love Life), sont disponibles sur demande pour les abonnés de Super Écran. Mais plusieurs d'autres ne sont pas disponibles à ce moment, et ceux qui seront être disponibles sortiront plus lentement que les autres émissions de la chaîne principale de HBO.)

Is there any possibility that Canada will get the "real" HBO Max anytime soon?

Anything is possible, particularly following recent announcements elevating HBO Max's priority within WarnerMedia. But as noted above, it appears that Bell Media has locked up rights to HBO and most WarnerMedia-produced HBO Max programming until the mid-2020s. Regardless of any changes in WarnerMedia's management or strategy since the deals were signed, these deals are not likely to be undone without either a serious breach of contract, or some sort of cancellation buyout.

Even if HBO Max does eventually launch as a standalone service in Canada, as with other international services like Netflix, there is no guarantee that it would be able to get the same programming rights in Canada as it has in the U.S.

If anything, it's more likely that there'll be tighter integration between Crave and HBO Max, given the similarities in film and other programming rights between the two (and the overall similarities in strategies between Bell and AT&T). At least one Canadian market analyst has already predicted that Crave will rebrand as HBO Max within a couple of years, in order to maximize the marketing benefits of the relationship.

We here at WCIW are less certain about such a rebrand, but we do think there's a strong likelihood of the relationship staying close in the years to come.

(And if we may offer a suggestion to Bell – even if Crave remains as its own Canadian-operated brand – if WarnerMedia is as serious as they seem to be about making HBO Max a top-tier global service, perhaps it makes sense for Crave and HBO to start working together on their streaming architecture, or risk Crave falling further off the bandwagon in terms of next-generation features like 4K resolution.)

Significant revisions

• July 1, 2021 – updated some listings, and noted a couple of extra details that have been reported elsewhere about Bell's contract with WarnerMedia
• April 27–May 2, 2021: Additional programming updates (specifically for the shows starring Ellen, Bethenny, Michael Che, and Jean Smart [Hacks])
• March 14, 2021: Updates, including updating links to Crave throughout.
• February 12, 2021: Added a couple of animated programs we'd missed previously.
• January 30, 2021: Updated the situation re the "Snyder cut" of Justice League. We were previously under the impression that, because the original film had recently been in broadcast rotation in Canada on Showcase (Corus), Crave would not be able to air a recut version so soon. Crave has now stated they will be carrying the recut, so it appears there is no longer a conflict with Showcase, if there ever was.
• January 24, 2021: updates for Search Party and Full Bloom
• January 14, 2021: more programs added
• January 3, 2021: various updates, including a few programs that were missed in past updates
• December 1, 2020: Crave announced it will be assuming Canadian streaming rights to Friends on December 31.
• October 31, 2020: Further updates.
• September 8, 2020: Added a few more shows that have been confirmed for Crave (or other Canadian services).
• August 5 and August 10, 2020: Miscellaneous updates.
• June 28, 2020: Updates, mainly re HBO Max-exclusive films.
• June 23, 2020: Updates re Elmo, Looney Tunes and Studio Ghibli.
• June 3, 2020: Minor updates.
• May 26, 2020: Updates to Crave's premiere airdates of launch episodes.
• May 23, 2020: Noted HBO Max launch series that have shown up on Crave's schedule; added brief discussion of Zack Snyder's Justice League.
• April 22, 2020: Noting confirmed launch date, and noted launch-day original programming to discussion of shows not part of Bell Media's deal.
• April 20, 2020: Noted Canadian rightsholder to White House Farm.