UPDATE: She picked. The judge set the trial for March 2 to March 19, 2027, five weeks from the states’ ask and four months from Paramount’s, with over $1 billion in ticking fees piling up first.
The merger war now has calendar proposals. They’re five months apart, and the gap is worth about a billion dollars.
Per a joint court filing Friday, Paramount asked Judge Araceli MartĂnez-OlguĂn for a 12-day trial starting November 4 in the lawsuits trying to block its $110 billion purchase of Warner Bros.
The 12 states and the writers’ union asked for April 5, 2027.
The two sides told the court that they had discussed it but could not agree. So the judge picks.
The trial happens in Oakland either way, and it will be decided largely by dueling economists.
Why Five Months Costs A Billion Dollars
Here’s the number that explains everything: starting September 30, Paramount owes Warner Bros. shareholders about $7 million a day until the deal closes.
Every day in court is $7 million.
Even Paramount’s own November date costs it hundreds of millions. An April trial costs it well over a billion.
And the cliff is still there. The deal’s drop-dead date is June 4, 2027.
An April trial means a verdict around May, leaving the judge almost no room to rule, and Paramount almost no room to appeal, before the whole thing expires and Warner Bros. faces the fire sale our insiders described.
The Arguments, Fast
Paramount’s case for November: the states already have plenty. Over two million documents from more than 80 employees, handed over months ago through the DOJ review. The AT&T-Time Warner case went to trial four months after the government sued. And Paramount caught Bonta moving the goalposts, noting he favored a January trial just last week before asking for April. Its spokesperson called the April request a “stonewalling tactic.”
The states’ case for April: not one deposition has happened yet, and Paramount’s document production largely cuts off before the merger agreement was even signed in February. They say the rushed schedule unfairly favors the side that holds all the information and doesn’t have to prove anything. Even their April date, they argue, gets this to trial faster than virtually any merger case in recent history.
Fun wrinkle: this is an AT&T-Time Warner rematch. Paramount legal chief Makan Delrahim ran the DOJ division that sued to block that deal. Daniel Petrocelli defended Time Warner then, and he’s defending Warner Bros. now. Same fight, same lawyers, new scoreboard.
The Part DC Fans Should Watch
Buried in the states’ filing is the request that matters most for our readers.
They want discovery of Paramount’s “integration plans” for the merged company. That’s the paperwork about who runs what after the deal closes.
In other words, the post-closing plans our insiders have been describing for weeks, the DC regime change, could get dragged into depositions and court filings.
We broke down exactly what that could mean for James Gunn’s fate, and when, right here.
The date also sets the DC timeline. A November trial means the dominoes could start falling by early 2027. April means James Gunn’s stay of execution runs deep into next summer.
Unless, of course, nobody ever gets to trial. Newsom is already pushing Bonta to settle, and a settlement rips up every calendar in this filing.
The judge decides the date. Whichever day she circles is the day the future of Warner Bros., and DC, gets argued by economists in an Oakland courtroom.
