I was initially in no rush to see Kick-Ass, America’s current box-office superhero, but after a weekend of accolades from friends, and endless Facebook updates and tweets, I had to see it.
I found Kick-Ass to be a very fun and surprisingly gory experience, but it’s the marketing behind it that I found most intriguing, and which keeps the film experience alive long after the final credits have rolled. According to AdAge, Lionsgate has achieved a social-media milestone in promoting the movie, being the first to sync all of their branded digital networks in one seamless platform. By using a Distributed Engagement Channel (DEC) created by ThisMoment, the producers are able to manage all of the film’s social media pages, user-generated content, and other official multimedia-links, through one cohesive system.
No matter where you originally tune in for official information on the film – Twitter, Facebook, MySpace or YouTube – you are easily linked to and aware of all the others that exist. Each one of these pulls content from the others, displaying them in real-time threads. The official website becomes a social network in itself, offering entertaining, thematic web games (just try to spend less than five minutes on this site) and opportunities to show off your scores across a massive network – your own plus all those registered to the page.
Before you click to enter the site, you are offered a list of all show times at nearby theaters, and an easy system to buy tickets, as well as to join the Facebook fan page while you’re at it. Unlike anti-social move websites of the past, this site is completely interactive, engaging the user with every click. The Youtube page even prompts you to upload your own video-review of the film after you’ve seen it, making it incredibly simple to get involved while increasing content for the site. Even if you haven’t yet had the chance to see the movie, you can submit a video of your own kick-ass moves, which are then intertwined with content from the film, or you can submit your own superhero video for a chance to win a cameo in Kick Ass 2, the Comic. Or you can just choose to “tweet this now,” where you post from a list of prepackaged clever and profane movie-related tweets.
With all the seamlessly connected content out there for Kick-Ass, it’s no wonder that the movie already has 195,000 fans on Facebook and over 25,000 followers on Twitter. Yet theaters still won’t post the movie title on your ticket (it reads Kick A##)!