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In-Theater Poster

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In-Theater Poster (trope)

Movie posters featuring the movie's characters watching a movie in a movie theater. Presumably the movie they themselves are in/advertising.

To keep the whole thing dynamic, the characters will often interact with one another, theater snacks flying everywhere (popcorn, sodas, candy, or some setting-appropriate equivalent), characters interacting with each other in ways typical to them, and the flare of the projector at the top. If the film comes in 3D, expect the poster to feature the characters wearing Anaglyph 3D or Digital 3D glasses to help sell the gimmick.

This style of poster can sometimes be part of a movie's release back into theaters, the first theatrical film adaption of a franchise (which may overlap with Big Damn Movie), and/or a movie that itself has movies (often in the form of a Film Within a Film) as a plot point in some way.

May overlap with "Let's Watch Our Show" Plot.


Examples:

Fanworks

Films — Animation

  • The Care Bears Movie: While not a poster, the spirit of the trope is shown in a TV commercial for the movie, which features the Care Bears gathering in a theater to watch their own movie.
  • Chicken Little: Chicken Little is shown watching alone in a theater, with a bucket of popcorn in his lap and black Digital-3D lenses in green-frames.
  • Elemental: The main characters are all featured wearing 3D glasses. The water elementals are eating ice-cubes, fire elementals hot coals, and earth elementals wood-chips as though they're popcorn.
  • Happy Heroes: The Stones: One of the film's pre-release posters depicts the Supermen, Doctor H., and Miss Peach in a movie theater, most of them looking at the viewer while Big M. and Little M. are in a row behind them, peeking out from under the chairs. An updated version of the poster with the film's new release datenote  has the same visuals, except without Big M. and Little M., for unknown reasons.
  • Lightyear: One special edition poster features Andy and his toys sitting in a theater, playing on the idea that Lightyear is the movie that made him want a Buzz Lightyear toy.
  • The Nightmare Before Christmas: For the theatrical re-release, the denizens of Halloween Town are all crowded in a theater, with all of them wearing digital 3D glasses, Sally reaching across Jack to get at the Mayor's bug-infested popcorn.
  • PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie: The title characters are all in the theater, with Ryder and Chase being the only ones with popcorn, while the Junior Patrollers are all crowded in one seat.
  • One poster for The Peanuts Movie features the whole Peanuts cast in a movie theater, including the Little Redheaded Girl, whose face is obscured by a popcorn bucket.
  • The Simpsons Movie: To promote the movie, Entertainment Weekly released four "special edition" covers that, when placed together, formed an image of the Simpsons at a movie theater. Homer is holding a remote to change the "channel", Marge is trying to keep her Beehive Hairdo from blocking the people behind her, Bart is blowing spitballs at the screen, and Lisa has to sit on some books just to see above her seat.
  • South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut: The cover of the 4K Ultra HD release for the movie's 25th anniversary shows many of the characters in a movie theater, referencing how a major plot point in the film is the kids sneaking into the R-rated Film Within a Film Terrance and Philip: Asses of Fire.
  • Teen Titans Go! To the Movies: Set in a fairly small theater, with the Titans, the Justice League and Slade (who's illegally recording the film with his camera).

Films — Live-Action

Music

  • Lil Yachty: In a non movie example, the cover of his album Teenage Emotions shows him decked out in a theater sitting with random people.

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