Film exec names Deadpool & Wolverine as point of no return for phones in movie theaters

People aren’t just going to theaters for magic anymore. “Something has happened post-pandemic where movie theater behavior has really changed,” an anonymous “top film executive” recently told Variety. They’re not just talking about fringe instances like people throwing up and fainting at the Terrifier films or doing… other things… at Love Lies Bleeding. Conduct that used to be completely unacceptable like loudly singing along to a musical or shamelessly filming (and then posting!) the screen has become normalized, and it seems like the studios are too busy to care. People posting the entire finale of Wicked or their friends’ enamored faces while Ariana Grande sings “Popular” is just free advertising, right? 

While the tidal wave of pirated Wicked footage currently taking over social media has brought this behavior into the spotlight, the anonymous exec is pointing to a different film as its tipping point: Deadpool & Wolverine. “Something really happened with that movie,” they said, pointing to the fact that both its star, Ryan Reynolds, and director, Shawn Levy, shared and positively interacted with bootleg footage on social media. (Neither Reynolds nor Levy provided a comment to the outlet.)

The shift from film to content can also be seen in that movie’s focus on buzzy “easter egg” cameos, perfectly engineered for a quick bite on social media. Many of the videos shared (that are still fully available) include the brief introductions of characters like Wesley Snipes’ Blade, Channing Tatum’s Gambit, and Jennifer Garner’s Elektra, which Reynolds and Jackman managed to spoil at Comic-Con before The A.V. Club staff writer William Hughes had even attended his (early!) screening of the film.

We bring this up because studios, actors, and executives seem to have turned a complete blind eye to this kind of leak. Other sources for Variety shared that studios’ anti-piracy teams are mostly concerned with snuffing out full-length torrent uploads, rather than playing “whack-a-mole” with hundreds of social media clips. For theater purists, it seems the battle may be lost—at least for now. Still, if there are no rules for the people who want to whip out their phones and ruin the experience for everyone else, there’s nothing stopping you from regarding them with unadulterated loathing.