IMAX CEO Talks Measuring Success of Marvel’s ‘Inhumans’

Marvel’s The Inhumans will finally hit IMAX screens on Friday with a special presentation of the first two episodes before the show makes its network premiere later next month. With The Inhmans being the very first television show to debut on IMAX screens determining how successful the venture is also brand new territory.

Measuring the success — or failure — of The Inhumans‘ IMAX partnership may come down to something as simple as how many viewers who come out to theaters tune into the show when it hits ABC, according to IMAX Entertainment CEO Greg Foster in an interview with Forbes.

“Ultimately the success of the property is if the television show works. Our goal is, see it first in IMAX, and have the audience that IMAX has spent many years building, the fanboy and fangirl audiences, to come on board and to have that audience,” Foster said. “The goal is for the television show, when it premieres here this fall on ABC, and all of the various broadcast platforms in the other countries around the world, to be able to bring incremental traffic to watching it on television, that might not have come, were it not for the fact that it was affiliated with IMAX. That’s how we ultimately are going to be judging the success ourselves.”

However, that incremental traffic may be impacted by just how long The Inhumans stays on the big screen. Marvel Television, the ABC Network, and IMAX initially stated that audiences would two weeks to see The Inhumans on exclusively in IMAX theaters, but reports surfaced that tickets for The Inhumans would not be sold past September 7. Marvel Television later clarified that IMAX theaters would decide on a case-by-case basis how long The Inhumans would screen.

The potentially reduced screen time could result in fewer viewers, but Foster, who appeared to indicate that The Inhumans would still have a two-week run, isn’t concerned because of IMAX’s good relationship with both Disney and Marvel.

“We’ve had an outstanding relationship with everything Disney, and everything Marvel for quite some time, and to do so in a way that again, fills in this conspicuous absence of big studio product. September, for the first couple weeks, just made it too good to pass up. So, we didn’t,” Foster said.

Marvel’s The Inhumans debuts in IMAX Theaters Friday, September 1st, followed by its premiere on ABC on Friday, September 29th.