Disney Makes Theater Stop Unofficial Viral Marketing For Tron Legacy

Dan Koelsch,

Well, you have to give them credit for trying. Yesterday we reported that a movie theater in Ohio (and possibly others) seemed to be part of Disney’s viral marketing campaign for Tron Legacy. However, it turns out that Marcus Crosswoods Cinema had taken it upon themselves to set up their Encom-branded website and the QR Code display that lead people to it. Since it is unofficial, Disney has asked them to take it down. Read the statement on the now defunct site after the break.

At the request of Disney, we have had to halt our online marketing for the Tron Legacy motion picture. We will continue to promote the feature in-house in exciting and unique ways. For more information about the Marcus Crosswoods Cinema, please visit www.marcustheatres.com.



Although misguided and not even accurate to the ARG, I’m impressed that the theater did this themselves. Management is obviously excited about the film and looking for new ways to draw customers. At a time in which ticket prices are sky high and theaters are getting hit hard by the recovering economy, these drastic measures are almost necessary. What do you think?


Thanks to CalebH2010 at Unfiction for the heads up.

Viral Marketing

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Comments (8)

  1. kudos to the theater for being that excited by the movie to start their own mini ARG. I thought/wished it was the start of the next phase of the ARG that would lead to sneak previews around the country.

  2. I agree, they deserve a little credit for being innovative. It’s too bad it is not part of the ARG to be honest.

  3. They should have, however, realized that they were using someone else’s property… did they they’d completely get away with that? … *shrug*

  4. They just didn’t think it through. I don’t think they realized it’d hit the web and people like us would pick up on it.

  6. They were excited to market something with the trendy idea of a transmedia/viral/ARG type promotion. Too excited, and thus made some huge mistakes – used someone else’s IP, failed to understand and follow the canon of a franchise, and stepped all over another promotion’s territory.

  8. Couldn’t Disney have been a little forward-thinking & maybe picked up the promo & run with it? Stupid Big Media, always afraid to jump onto something new until it’s too late.

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