Walt Disney Studios and Marvel Entertainment set out to announce the cast of its biggest film yet – in a manner that would leave fans on the edge of their seats, drawing all eyes to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
With little more to work off of than a list of 27 names (no new plot details, no movie visuals, etc.) , we set off to build out a start of production/ cast announce that was visually interesting and engaging in a way that could command the cultural conversation for hours on end, setting up Avengers: Doomsday as one of the most anticipated movies in the near future. Most importantly, this activation had to be tailored to how fans are consuming content online with consideration for the different platforms, thereby maximizing the impact, reach, and excitement for this announce infinitely moreso than what we might have seen with a more traditional press release/ social post.
By placing chairs with the names of each actor approximately every 12 minutes, viewers had a reason to return to the screen and try to predict who was coming next via the live chat. Reactions were shared in real-time, with enthusiasm building with each new name, culminating in the on-screen appearance of star Robert Downey, Jr. The 5 hour, 27 min, and 52 second livestream received 5.7M total views, with 246,050 chat messages during the stream. Social and media sentiment was positive across the board, with fun-hearted parodies and posts soon following, highlighting the stunt’s overall pop culture impact. Using YouTube enabled our campaign to kickoff with a bang as only a real-time announcement could do, declaring to the world that Doomsday was on its way.