In an odd twist of miscommunication, Entertainment Weekly goes to press this week with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on the cover of their Fall Preview Issue. This would be understandable with something like the HP preview on the front of Clone Wars, since the Lucasfilm production isn’t under Warners’ banner, but Entertainment Weekly is a Time Warner company.

They are just as puzzled as we are, according to EW’s Sean Smith:

In an irony sure to set blogger hearts beating giddily, the film graces the cover of EW’s new fall preview issue, which hits stands today. EW and Warner Bros. share a parent company, but they clearly do not share, you know, important friggin’ information.

We’re not sure our hearts are beating “giddily,” but it is an interesting view of just how surprising the Harry Potter move was to everyone in the industry.

New speculation continues to surface about Warners’ true intention behind moving the sixth-franchise film back to summer ’09. “They don’t need the money this year anymore,” says a rival studio exec. “When a movie overperforms the way Dark Knight has, you really don’t need Harry Potter in the fall.”

The shuffle has already begun with Disney moving their CGI kiddie flick Bolt up a week to November 21st, ready to fill the Potter gap left in millions of crying children’s hearts.

We’re also expecting Universal to move Land of the Lost clear of Potter, which decided to move into the same July weekend. Obviously, the Will Farrell film adaptation isn’t far enough along to test, but we’re guessing they will be pulling for some of the same audience. Expect Land Of The Lost to move either three weeks earlier in the summer (avoiding Emmerich’s 2012) or deeper into the July season to catch the Harry Potter runoff.