MoviePass to resurrect in late summer with tiered prices and a waitlist

The tale of MoviePass’ rise—and eventual deep, plummeting downfall—is one that left film lovers on a budget with broken hearts everywhere. For two short years, the experience of seeing an unlimited amount of movies for $10 a month was decadent…until the service’s parent company went bankrupt and shut down in 2019. After being bought back by co-founder Stacey Spikes in November 2021, the company has finally revealed its mighty return.

According to Variety, the new MoviePass service will launch in beta form starting on Labor Day. There’s a catch, though; you’ll have to join a waitlist in order to get access to all those movies. Beginning this Thursday at 9 AM ET, you can put your name down for MoviePass’ waitlist. The time period to apply lasts for five days, with those bestowed as the chosen ones being notified on September 5.

Additionally, the new pricing tier for the subscription may be more expensive based on where you live. According to Business Insider, the monthly prices can range from $10, $20, or $30 per month, likely offering higher prices for those in major cities like New York City or Los Angeles where individual tickets can get pretty expensive.

Another new feature is using credits to pay for your ticket, with each plan option having a different amount of credits given to the user towards movies to see each month. Gone are the days of unlimited movies per month, as theaters will now have the ability to determine how many credits each ticket will cost. This option seems to be based on whether you’re seeing a movie during a dead time (like a midweek showing) versus that of a Friday night premiere, which financially makes sense but does hurt if you remember the limitless access from the old MoviePass.

There are still plenty of questions surrounding the new launch, like the inclusion of first-run movies, and what theaters are going to be included in the service. According to Variety, MoviePass says that they’ve partnered with 25% of movie theaters in the country, but no explicit news as to whether this covers major chains like AMC Theaters or Cinemark.

Despite the hype, the new MoviePass will have a rough road ahead. With other theater chains now having their own versions of reward subscriptions, MoviePass 2.0 has to deal with the competition, along with maintaining a balance between making enough profit as a company and keeping their users content with the higher price plans.