Glen Powell's Dark Comedy How to Make a Killing Lands on Max June 19 — But Does It Deserve Your Time?
TL;DR: Glen Powell's How to Make a Killing hits Max on June 19, 2026, following a quiet theatrical run that grossed just under $21 million worldwide. Runtime: 108 minutes. Rated R. Directed by John Patton Ford (who made Emily the Criminal). Critical reception was mixed (44% on Rotten Tomatoes). For Indian viewers, check Movie OTT for regional availability updates, as an HBO Max India window hasn't been confirmed.
Glen Powell had momentum. Top Gun: Maverick made him a household name. Anyone But You proved he could carry a film without backup. Twisters showed he could anchor a franchise reboot. Then came How to Make a Killing in February 2026, and something didn't land.
The numbers tell the story: $21 million worldwide. That's not catastrophic for a mid-budget A24 release in a soft release window — but it's a stumble for an actor of Powell's current profile. The critical response didn't help either. A 44% Rotten Tomatoes score put the film in unfamiliar territory for a major studio release with this level of star power.
Now it gets a streaming second chance. Whether that actually matters is the real question.
What How to Make a Killing Is (and Who's In It)
Genre: Dark comedy-thriller. Think class warfare wrapped in dry humor and moral ambiguity.
Cast:
- Glen Powell as Becket Redfellow — a working-class man plotting against a wealthy family
- Margaret Qualley (The Substance, Drive-Away Dolls) as Julia
- Ed Harris as the patriarch/antagonist
- Jessica Henwick (Glass Onion, The Matrix Resurrections)
Director: John Patton Ford, whose 2022 debut Emily the Criminal was genuinely sharp — a tightly wound crime thriller that launched Aubrey Plaza into new territory as an actress. Ford can clearly direct. Whether this script gave him enough to work with is the debate.
Rating: R
Runtime: 108 minutes
Where to watch (US): Max starting Friday, June 19, 2026. HBO linear airs it June 20 at 8:00 PM EST.
Where to watch (everywhere else): Uncertain. The A24–Warner Bros. Discovery output deal doesn't automatically trigger international releases simultaneously. Indian audiences especially should monitor Movie OTT's streaming tracker for JioCinema or BookMyShow Stream windows — those are your most likely paths if a deal materializes. No dubbed versions have been announced, but subtitles should be standard.
Why the Theatrical Release Didn't Work
Here's what's strange: this had the pieces. A24 doesn't greenlight projects carelessly. Ford had proven himself on his first feature. Powell was riding genuine momentum. Margaret Qualley has built one of the most interesting careers in her generation by refusing safe choices.
Yet it came and went.
ScreenRant's Gregory Nussen called it "a lukewarm black comedy" in a 4-out-of-10 review — and honestly, that phrase is doing a lot of heavy lifting. Lukewarm doesn't generate conversation. Bad films get people talking. Forgotten ones disappear quietly, which is apparently what happened in February 2026.
Most coverage frames this as a misfire from an otherwise hot actor, but the more uncomfortable question is whether the "eat the rich" dark comedy has simply exhausted its audience. The Menu worked in 2022. Glass Onion worked that same year. Saltburn got people arguing in 2023. By 2026, the formula of attractive people behaving badly in expensive houses while the film winks at class resentment has calcified into a subgenre with diminishing returns, and How to Make a Killing arrived at the tail end of that curve looking like the fifth variation on a theme audiences had already processed.
In interviews before the theatrical release, Ford described the film as "about the violence of inheritance — not just money, but identity." He framed it as a class-war fable dressed in dark comedy clothing. Powell, in a separate conversation, said the role was a deliberate pivot from his heroic screen persona: "Becket is not a good person trying to do good things. He's a person trying to survive a system that was never built for him."
That's a genuinely interesting premise. There's a dinner confrontation with Ed Harris in the second act where you can see exactly what Ford was aiming for. The execution just didn't always match the intention — and that gap is probably why critics couldn't agree on what they were watching, and audiences decided not to show up.
The A24 Distribution Pattern (and What It Means for Streaming)
A24 signed an output deal with Warner Bros. Discovery years ago. Here's how it works: A24 films get a theatrical window, then home video, then they migrate to Max. That deal was renewed in early 2026, which means How to Make a Killing isn't a one-off. More A24 releases are coming to the platform this year.
The streaming release is essentially a third window — not a redemption arc, but a distribution pathway. Streaming algorithms will give the film promotional placement for maybe two to three weeks after June 19. If it cracks Max's weekly top-ten lists (which the platform occasionally shares publicly), that's a signal Powell's fanbase showed up. If it doesn't, the conversation ends quickly.
I keep coming back to the comparison with Emily the Criminal, which grossed only $16 million theatrically but became one of the most-watched titles on Netflix during its first streaming window in early 2023, spending three consecutive weeks in the platform's global top ten for English-language films. Ford's debut actually found its real audience on streaming, not in cinemas. That's the precedent Max is banking on here (whether consciously or not), and it's the strongest argument that How to Make a Killing could follow a similar second-life trajectory.
Hard to say if this one finds its audience. The ingredients are there — the star power, the director's track record, the studio's brand. We'll know soon enough.
What to Watch If You're Curious
Here's the honest take: if you liked the moral ambiguity of Emily the Criminal — that tightly wound sense of someone justifiably angry at systems that exploit them — you might find something here worth watching. Powell's comedic timing in Anyone But You proved he can handle lighter material, and this is definitely darker than that rom-com, but there's probably overlap in what his fanbase responds to.
Streaming data from Movie OTT has consistently shown that star-driven library titles outperform expectations when audiences are browsing casually rather than seeking something specific. A Powell film landing in someone's "recommended" queue might actually play differently than a film they had to decide whether to buy a ticket for.
That said, don't go in expecting a hidden gem. Go in expecting a film with genuine ambitions that didn't quite land its execution. Fair assessment? Watch the first 30 minutes. If the tone clicks, you'll probably stick with it.
The Bigger Picture: Where Glen Powell Goes From Here
Powell's got projects lined up. There's J.J. Abrams' sci-fi film The Great Beyond and a new season of Hulu's Chad Powers. He's not disappearing. But How to Make a Killing is a useful reminder that even momentum can stall — and that a film doesn't need to be bad to fail at the box office. Sometimes it just needs to be the wrong thing at the wrong moment.
For Indian audiences specifically: the streaming situation is still unresolved. Max's footprint in India is limited, and the A24–WBD deal doesn't automatically create regional parity. Your best bet is monitoring JioCinema (which carries Warner Bros. Discovery content under partnership with HBO) or checking Movie OTT for BookMyShow Stream or Apple TV+ rental windows as they're announced. The film's class-war premise — a working-class man reclaiming what a wealthy family stole from him — isn't uniquely American. It translates. Whether Indian distributors treat it as a priority is a different matter.
June 19: The Streaming Premiere
How to Make a Killing arrives on Max on June 19, 2026. It'll get an algorithmic push. Early viewership metrics in that first week will tell us whether Powell's fanbase actually showed up, or whether the theatrical box office already said everything that needed saying.
Watch for it to crack Max's top-ten list. That's the signal that matters.
For current streaming availability across regions — especially India — Movie OTT tracks where-to-watch updates as regional deals are confirmed. Worth bookmarking if you don't want to miss the window when it materializes.
We'll see if streaming gives this one a second life. Sometimes it does. Often, it doesn't.
