MoviePass Is Coming Back: Here's What You Need To Know
For all the industry-shaking promises made by MoviePass — the subscription service offering a film ticket each day for a flat $10 per month — the company eventually imploded in a spectacular fashion back in 2019. The platform became an industry lesson of stunningly ignorant mismanagement, but it appears that the idea of theater-as-a-subscription-service is not dying anytime soon.
Founder Stacy Spikes, who was sordidly fired via an email back in 2018, made a comeback at the Lincoln Center in February 2022 to announce that MoviePass 2.0 will be released in the Summer season. The MoviePass brand, whose assets were acquired by Spikes Shortly after the company filed for bankruptcy, has now revealed plans for a second coming on Labor Day.
As per a report from Business Insider, MoviePass has inked deals with 25% of theaters in the U.S., and this time around, the color of the movie credit card is going from red to black. For its revival, MoviePass is not raising the entry-level, too-good-to-be-true price of $10 for watching movies, but the benefits will be toned down and two more tiers have been added to the mix.
MoviePass will kick things off with a limited beta registration phase that will only last for five days, with limited slots available to onboard new subscribers. The resurrected avatar of MoviePass will "feature all major theaters" in the U.S. that accept major credit cards, but there's no word of AMC Theatres being in or out given the two brands' history.
How to join?
MoviePass will begin accepting registrations for the limited slots at 9:00 am ET on August 25, 2022, and will close the window at 11:59 pm on August 29, 2022. The company notes that the registration process has been implemented to put people on a waitlist, giving them priority access to the service in its beta phase on a first come first serve basis.
Registrations to join the waitlist are open to all and there's no fee involved. Those who register will also get 10 invites that can be used to onboard friends and family members. MoviePass says there will be three pricing tiers for the subscription service that will cost $10, $20, and $30, each with a different amount of credits added to the account.
MoviePass 2.0 will officially launch on September 5, but it won't be a nationwide release covering all theaters. The company webpage FAQ section makes it abundantly clear that the service will be rolled out in a phased manner in different markets. Plus, the rollout will be decided based on the audience interest in that region alongside the availability of partner theater chains.
Legacy MoviePass members that are returning to the service will get extra credits in their account. The company will notify users via email as the rollout expands to their respective regions. As of now, there is no word if the company will again venture into the movie-making business or if there are any additional perks for early adopters.