In what could only be described as a surprising and revolutionary move, Warner Bros. has partnered with Wal-Mart to sell tickets to an early screening of Zack Snyder’s ‘Man of Steel.’
The retail chain will be the first to offer advanced tickets to a major motion picture, but these won’t be just any regular tickets. The price will also include a code where you can either pre-order the Blu-ray combo pack or use it to pre-order the HD digital download of the film. Both will contain exclusive content that is not included in the theatrical release. You will also get a free original digital comic book written by David Goyer, the scribe of the ‘Man of Steel’ screenplay!
So how will this work? Simple! Just be one of the lucky people to buy the tickets when it goes on sale at 8 am on May 18th. This is 3 days before tickets will be available to the general public. Wal-Mart will be selling nearly 1 million tickets in 3,700 of its stores and they even have a microsite that will let you know which stores and what theaters will be selling the tickets and showing the film on June 13th (the film officially hits theaters on June 14). You even get to choose wither you want to see the film in 2D or 3D. Unfortunately, you can only buy up to 4 tickets at a time, so if you have a large party wanting to go, you may need to ask some friends to stand in line with you.
There’s a lot riding on this deal between Warner Bros. and Wal-Mart. For Warner Bros., this promotion will help launch ‘Man of Steel’ and hopefully erase the stigma within the Superman franchise known as ‘Superman Returns.’ If ‘Man of Steel’ does as well at the box office, this will ensure that the door is open for other DC character films which will hopefully lead into a ‘Justice League’ film.
For Wal-Mart, it will bring a lot more business into their stores which they intend to take advantage of with exclusive ‘Man of Steel’ merchandise that will be on shelves April 28th. Other retailers are looking at the result of this partnership as this could also mean that places like Target, Best Buy, and even Amazon could get their own exclusive deals in the future.
This seems to be a win-win for movie goers! Unfortunately, there has been no announcement of the price of these tickets but once we find out, we’ll let you know.
So will there be lines in front of Wal-Mart stores that rival the ones on the eve of Black Friday? Not sure but from the excitement of fanboys and fangirls about this film, don’t be surprised if you see a lot of Superman cosplay in front of Wal-Mart stores before the tickets go on sale on May 18th. For more information, you can check out the Wal-Mart ‘Man of Steel’ page and the microsite for a Wal-Mart near you that will be selling the tickets.
Will you be in line?
Source: Variety
