First Teaser Posters for Men in Black III, Plus Viral Campaign Launch
Posted 11.28.11 by BrentJS
Initially plagued by delays and the need for multiple re-writes — Etan Cohen (Tropic Thunder) wrote the initial script, with David Koepp (Jurassic Park), Jeff Nathanson (Rush Hour 3) and Michael Soccio (TV's The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) providing successive drafts — director Barry Sonnenfeld's Men in Black III (MIB3) managed to wrap principal photography only one month later than initially planned. However, it's now going on six months since the movie entered post-production and MIB3 has virtually dropped off of the entertainment news radar. In fact, until a set of teaser posters showed up in theaters over the weekend, we pretty much forgot that the movie was still in the pipeline.
The cryptic new posters have yet to be released online, but thankfully Collider managed to snap a picture of the poster featuring Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones), and FirstShowing shot the poster featuring Agent J (Will Smith) and posted them online. Since the photos of the posters were shot in theater lobbies, they suffer a bit in quality, but after scrutinizing them we have discovered that hidden amidst the "MIB3" logos that make up the images is the URL for a new viral marketing campaign for the movie.
Immediately excited by the prospect of an immersive viral campaign for MIB3 akin to the one that Disney ran for over a year for Tron: Legacy, we were a bit disappointed when we followed the hidden URL on the posters only to be redirected to a pretty ordinary Facebook page titled "The Men in Black Suits Are Real" (only 322 fans at the time of this writing) containing nothing more than a basic logo (below) and this promise of "proof" that Men in Black are real:
My handle is BugEyes126. I'm 14 and I live in a town in middle of nowhere (don't even try, you'll never find me). It can get kind of boring here, but we do have a skate park.
My favorite subject is computer science and I'm getting pretty good at writing code and cracking encryptions. Not that I'm bragging or anything.
I'm interested in extraterrestrials and have been following groups of men in black suits who seem to be involved in covering up alien activities.
A lot of people (like my GF) think aliens aren't real, but they'll come around soon enough.
I've got the proof. Or at least I will get it. Just wait. If you have info on these men in black suits you should contact me to help.
Whenever I get more details I'll post here because the men in black suits are real!
bugeyes - (@).(@)
The movie isn't due to hit theaters until May 25, 2012, so there's still hope that the campaign will evolve into a more elaborate viral conspiracy concerning the "real" Men in Black and the aliens they supposedly investigate and police in secret.
The plot of MIB3 is being kept under wraps for the time being, but it's believed that the story revolves around a time-tripping alien — some sources have the alien named "Yaz" and others "Boris" — played by Jemaine Clement who hopes to defeat the Men in Black by destroying the planet in the past, requiring Agent J (Smith) to travel back in time and team up with a young Agent K (Josh Brolin). The cast includes Alice Eve, Emma Thompson, Michael Stuhlbarg, Betty White and Nicole Scherzinger.