‘X-Men: Apocalypse’: Snapchat Ads Offer Movie-Ticket Purchasing for First Time
(From left) Jennifer Lawrence, Rose Byrne, James McAvoy, Lucas Till, and Nicholas Hoult in ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’ (Photo: Alan Markfield/20th Century Fox via AP)
By Todd Spangler, Variety
Twentieth Century Fox has bought the first takeover of Snapchat’s Lenses for X-Men: Apocalypse— and in another first, fans can purchase advance tickets directly from the studio’s video ads for the movie on Snapchat.
Related: ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’ Launches With Massive $103.3 Million Internationally
For 24 hours on May 23, Snapchat users in the U.S. will be able to transform themselves into nine different characters from the Fox sci-fi pic via Snapchat Lenses, and then send photos or videos to friends or post them to their Story timelines in the app. The movie hits theaters on Friday, May 27, at the start of the Memorial Day weekend.
#XMenApocalypse has taken over @Snapchat. Choose your power with the exclusive #XMen lenses!https://t.co/WOafeght5A
— X-Men Movies (@XMenMovies) May 23, 2016
In addition, Fox and Snapchat have teamed for the first movie-ticketing ad unit on the service, in a campaign running from May 13 through May 26 in the U.S. Snapchat users who see the X-Men: Apocalpyse video ad can swipe up to purchase tickets from either Fandango or MovieTickets.com. The ads are running across multiple channels in the Snapchat Discover section, including People, BuzzFeed, Food Network, Vox, Vice, and the Wall Street Journal.
Related: Bryan Singer on Deadpool in the ‘X-Men’ Universe, and Competing With Marvel and DC
The “X-Men” ticket-purchase ad is an example of interactive versions of Snapchat’s full-screen vertical video ads the company has been testing. Last month, Lancome and Target ran a similar campaign for shopping-enabled ads in Cosmopolitan’s Discover channel.
Join the #XMen with the new #XMenApocalypse lenses on @Snapchat! Follow ‘XMenMovies’ today.https://t.co/7USBl9Bf0p
— X-Men Movies (@XMenMovies) May 23, 2016
The nine character-based “X-Men” Lenses available on Snapchat are: Apocalypse, Cyclops, Mystique, Storm, Nightcrawler, Magneto, Quicksilver, Professor X, and Beast.
Related: Josh Boone Teases Possible Characters in ‘X-Men: The New Mutants’
X-Men: Apocalypse is directed by Bryan Singer, following his 2014 box-office hit X-Men: Days of Future Past. The film stars James McAvoy (as Professor X), Michael Fassbender (as Magneto), Jennifer Lawrence (as Raven/Mystique), Nicholas Hoult (as Hank McCoy), and Rose Byrne (as CIA agent Moira MacTaggert).
‘X-Men: Apocalypse’: Watch a featurette about the Four Horsemen:
