March 28, 2024

Bowie Knives and a Tick Head: Marketing Gets Elaborate at Comic-Con

HBO, for instance, is counting on the “Westworld” stunt to keep a pilot light on for that series, which concluded its first season in December and will not return for a second until next year.

To participate, fans register in the lobby of the Hilton San Diego Bayfront. Then they receive the secret headquarters location of Delos, the fictional company behind Westworld, a theme park where wealthy visitors live out Wild West fantasies amid robot “hosts.” (It’s in a hotel on the other side of downtown.) Once inside, participants seem to step inside the show, with hosts preparing them for a trip inside the park.

And it is disorienting. In one room that looked a bit like a futuristic doctor’s office, I sat alone with a host who did a “psychological assessment” by asking questions like, “What percentage of your dreams are nightmares?”

“About 30 percent,” I answered honestly. The woman shot me a startled look. (Later, I quizzed participants about their answers, which turned out to be much lower. And then I went home and had a bad dream about having too many bad dreams.) Ultimately, the host gave my personality this appraisal: “You are strong-willed but not unhinged.” (I clearly fooled her.)

The experience ended with a trip inside the show’s saloon, complete with player piano and bartender hosts pouring cocktails. Everyone leaves wearing a cowboy hat.

Here are some other stunts planned for Comic-Con’s 2017 run, which concludes on Sunday.

‘Blade Runner’

Perhaps the most elaborate Comic-Con stunt of them all. To generate interest in “Blade Runner 2049,” arriving in theaters in October, Alcon Entertainment and Warner Bros. teamed with Johnnie Walker to replicate the movie’s futuristic setting — complete with an Oculus virtual reality experience, a neon-lit Los Angeles street scene, more than 50 props and vehicles from the film, and a cast of 34 actors in costume. The 12,800-square-foot exhibit, near the convention center, took a production team of 40 people working a full week to install, Warner said.

‘The Gifted’

To introduce fans to this new superhero series about human mutants, Fox set up a “gene screening station” outside the Hilton Bayfront. Participants must submit to swabbing inside their mouths (yes, seriously) and will later learn about their personal genetic profiles.

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‘Bright’

Netflix built an elaborate complex across from the convention center to promote several of its offerings, including this coming science-fiction film starring Will Smith. There are “Bright” sets and a related augmented reality experience. The complex also includes a “Stranger Things” virtual reality encounter and “The Defenders” costumes and sets.

‘The Tick’

Not to be outdone, Amazon has built a nearby pavilion dedicated to “The Tick,” a superhero action comedy, complete with fully constructed buildings from the series and a 20-foot-tall animatronic Tick head. (It’s blue with little antennas.) Amazon will also dispatch actors in Tick costumes as “street teams” designed to generate photos on social media sites.

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Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/20/business/media/comic-con-marketing.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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