“ A film minecraft ” was a success at the box office and on the internet: NPR

The film industry has found trembling bases after a tumultuous decade of banners, strikes and closings induced by the pandemic, causing identity attacks of several years for studios trying to restore attendance.

So it’s a bit of a surprise when A Minecraft film, Warner Bros. ‘Contribution to the tendency of children’s IP adaptation, exceeded box office expectations after opening last weekend.

According to Variety, The film won $ 163 million at the national level and $ 313 million worldwide, making it the biggest beginning of 2025. It is the biggest opening of video game adaptation in the history of the box office, exceeding the record previously held by 2023 The film Super Mario Bros.

A lukewarm critical response did not flow the commercial success of the film – the own PCHH PODCAST of NPR called this “ridiculous”, but not necessarily in the wrong direction.

Listen HAPPY HOUR OF POP CULTURE on how A minecraft film Transforms a best -selling game into a film festival.

The popularity of the film as a subject of online speeches is also multifaceted. Before the release of the film, the clips of the film’s watershed moments were already becoming viral on Tiktok.

Then, after the release of the film on Friday, this momentum resulted in Real Life, where users began to film and share videos of their own theaters filled with noisy participation of the public.

Which raises the question: does the public go to the film for a Rocky horror kind of experience or do they take the same? Jennifer Grygiel, associate professor of communications at the University of Syracuse and expert in social media, spoke with NPR in 2022 when Minions: the rise of Gru has collected a similar show of enthusiasm (and disturbed certain moviegoers).

“They exposed themselves because they all see Tiktok and they are therefore aware of it,” said Grygiel in 2022. “I think this leads to this type of participation. You know, sometimes social media ends up working as a big water cooler.”

Some things haven’t changed since then. Children always participate in online social trends and get their signs on the internet.

“It seems a little different in the sense that it attracted someone who is more a fan of this platform, which is interested in the Minecraft community,” Grygiel told NPR in an interview this week.

“Even by seeing the answers, it seems that (public members) were somehow sucked at certain points.”

One of the most heavily Memed scenes is a character in the game called the Jockey chicken entered just before a battle with the protagonists.

“In this combat scene,” said Grygiel, “it was almost as if they participated as they would be in Minecraft together, engaging in this hybrid space, in a way a crossing of the virtual at the IRL.”

Grygiel added that despite their most online generation reputation, Gen-Z is looking for more opportunities to get involved with their offline peers.

“Perhaps some of them are simply enough that bring them together in the real world. They want to be analog. They want to find pleasure. They want entertainment in terrestrial space.”

Grygiel suggests that if this desire exists, communities – and not only cinemas – could intensify to achieve it.

“There is a lot of potential to develop and invest in the construction of the community in spaces for this youth, but perhaps also their parents, in the physical world.”