Institutions and Audiences Question Christina MacCallum

An example of cross- media convergence and synergy in film we have studied is Avengers Assemble. There are many examples of synergy used in this particular film which help to excite and engage the audience. Synergy is the combination of two or more things and can range from examples like film franchises to production companies. Synergy in films consists of product placement companies, tie-ins or promotional partnerships, spin offs, pre-existing property, merchandise companies and vertical integration.

A blockbuster movie consists of a lot of elements. Blockbuster films will always have a big budget. Avengers Assemble is a prime example of this as its budget was $220,000,000. They will also feature a star cast, which Avengers Assemble most definitely does with Robert Downey Jr, Scarlet Johansson, Chris Evans and Mark Ruffalo to name a few. Avengers Assemble is made by Marvel and Paramount Pictures which are both huge studio production companies, which is expected from a blockbuster movie. Avengers Assemble also includes a vast amount of CGI and special effects, one of the main examples being the Hulk character played by Mark Ruffalo. Motion capture was used and is used in many other blockbuster films like King Kong and Lord Of The Rings. This would have involved Mark wearing a special suit and making Hulk like movements. These movements would have been filmed and then programmed into computers. There would then be editing involved to make him look like the huge green character that Hulk is. All of this cost millions of dollars, so this links back to blockbusters needing huge budgets because they involve all kinds of expensive technology like this to create.

Avengers Assemble features superhero characters from a range of separate films coming together to fight evil. There were films from these different characters released prior to this film as a result. Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk and Thor were all released before Avengers Assemble. Lead up and hype was created from these films as they included special teaser scenes at the end of the final credits. For example at the end of Captain America there is a short scene of conversation between him and a character called Nick Fury who is in charge of the Avengers. This was clever as it excited the target audience by teasing them into wanting more, wanting to find out what will happen, so this ultimately persuades them to go and watch Avengers Assemble when it is released. This links in to the films USP. The unique selling point of this film is that it appeals to fans of the particular superheroes, so for example fans of the Iron Man film would have gone to watch Avengers Assemble because he is a part of it. Having these characters put together as a group targets each individual fan of each superhero, which results in a huge audience and therefore more money.

As mentioned before, there are examples of different types of synergy used in Avengers Assemble. Firstly, pre-existing property is used because the superhero characters come from the original Marvel comic books. Tie-ins and promotional partnerships have been used, these include MacDonalds- there were Avengers themed happy meals, Dunkin Donuts, Baskin Robbins and Pepsi. These partnerships with these major companies give the film a

huge amount of advertisement, drawing in even more audience and money. Throughout the film, product placement is featured. Examples of this are Acura (the car company) and Sony. Furthermore there are also spin offs and merchandise. There is a spin off TV series on Channel 4 in the UK called Agents Of Shield and “Shield” is majorly associated with the Avengers. There was a vast amount of merchandise for this film which included Lego, mugs, clothing, school supplies and action figures which again bring in even more money for the film. Vertical integration was most definitely used. Avengers Assemble was made by Marvel which was bought by Disney. Disney struck a deal with Paramount of which is owned by a company called Viacom, so all of these companies are integrated into this film which means this film targets fans of films made by these production companies. Synergy and cross-media convergence is an extremely important part of a huge film like this in ensuring it is a success and so overall I agree that Avengers Assemble was most definitely successful in using these techniques to get the film across to its audience.