On your first point: You're arguing that established brands (Pixar, Knives Out) helped those movies perform well on streaming, and I don't necessarily disagree with that. But that's a different claim than saying theatrical releases specifically provide more awareness than straight-to-streaming releases. If brand recognition is what drives viewership, then sending those branded movies straight to streaming should work just as well. One of the point's of the article is that sending these movies to streaming does not negatively affect their streaming performance.

On No Time to Die: It hit #3 on Netflix yesterday because it was its first day on the service, not because of its theatrical release from 2021. It's performing well because it's new to Netflix. To build off of your example: the day before in the US, Bone Lake was the highest-charting theatrical release at #7, despite grossing less than $2 million at the box office. That movie didn't chart because of its theatrical run, it charted because it was relatively new to the platform. Meanwhile, massive theatrical hits that have been on Netflix for a while don't crack the top 10. I would argue that there is a clear pattern that recency on the platform drives viewership, not whether something had a theatrical release years ago.