The 21 Best Things We Saw at CinemaCon 2024

It’s only here because it’s not actually from the movie, but out of all the in-theater displays at CinemaCon, none was as eye-catching as the Twisters tube. Watch a video above and read more here.

Universal went all out for its upcoming musical Wicked, giving all attendees blinking lights to wear that would illuminate the entire room. Stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande then came out to introduce an extended sequence from the film. The footage looked very lively and really showed the full scope of the story. Or, half of it. Wicked Part One is out November 27. Part Two is next year.

CinemaCon 2024 was light on actual news but some of the biggest came from Lionsgate. The company announced it was bringing back The Blair Witch Project with Blumhouse and adapting Monopoly with Margot Robbie’s company. When the latter is nominated for Best Picture, we’ll say we were there at the start. Read more here.

Comedian Aziz Ansari has a new film coming out called Good Fortune which he wrote, directed, and stars in. It’s about an angel (Keanu Reeves) who attempts to do a good deed by showing a poor man (Ansari) that the life of a rich man (Seth Rogen) isn’t that great. So he switches their lives. But, Ansari disagrees with the angel’s point and wants to stay rich. There’s no release date yet but it looks like a great blend of humor and drama. Read more here.

John Wick will be back next year in John Wick Presents Ballerina. Keanu Reeves cameos in the new film starring Ana de Armas and Lionsgate showed a killer reel at the event. Read about it here.

You’ve seen the trailer but Disney screened two brand new scenes at CinemaCon and they were brutal and awesome. Read more about them here.

It probably goes without saying that we’re all excited for Furiosa. But Warner Bros. screened footage that showed just how wide the scope of the film is, and now we’re even more excited. Read about it here.

I didn’t love the first Smile, but obviously it was a big hit. Smile 2 is now in production and it looks even wilder. The footage started and I thought Paramount was releasing a Lady Gaga concert film. Nope, it’s Naomi Scott (Aladdin) as a pop star who comes face to face with the demon. New spin, same Smile. It’s out October 18.

The trailers make it clear that Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is going to be beautiful. But 13 minutes of footage at CinemaCon really proved that point. We saw the apes looking for very important bird eggs before their village is attacked and the main ape vows revenge. Just incredible visual effects pushing huge emotions and we can’t wait. It’s out May 10.

M. Night Shyamalan took the stage at CinemaCon not just for his own movie, Trap, but in support of his daughter Ishana Night Shyamalan, who directed The Watchers. We saw footage from both, which looked scary as hell, but the surprise was that Night’s other daughter, Saleka Shyamalan, performed and is an actor in Trap. So much Shyamalan! Read about Trap here.

DC Films co-president Peter Safran took the CinemaCon stage to reveal the moving trailer for Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story, a documentary Warner Bros. bought and will release later this year. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.

You’ve already seen this one online but seeing it on the big screen was really exciting.

The first teaser for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice may have given us more questions than answers but at CinemaCon, not only did Warner Bros. show a second, longer version of the trailer with a bunch of new footage, but also a behind-the-scenes featurette that focused on the sets and practical effects. All of which looked way, way better than the teaser. Get excited.

Robert Eggers is one of our most fascinating filmmakers and that he’s releasing an (sure to be) R-rated, period vampire movie on Christmas this year is just the coolest thing ever. And the movie looks awesome. Read about the first footage here.

The new Ryan Gosling/Emily Blunt movie The Fall Guy screened in full at CinemaCon. It’s not technically a sci-fi movie, more just a straight action comedy, but since it’s set in the world of movies, and the movie they are making in the movie is sci-fi, I’m going to mention it here. I’m also going to mention it because it’s fun as hell. Definitely check it out when it’s released in May.

Twisters is one of my most anticipated films of the year and new footage screened at CinemaCon only increased that anticipation. The big reveal is that the story is about scientists trying to stop tornados as they are happening, though that obviously doesn’t go too well. Plus, the size of the tornadoes in this movie and the scope of their destruction is just way beyond the original.

Oh, we thought Lionsgate had big news? Well, Paramount took that to a whole new level announcing over a dozen brand new titles. Among the highlights:

• A Transformers/G.I. Joe live-action crossover movie.
• The Running Man directed by Edgar Wright starring Glen Powell
• New Avatar: The Last Airbender animated movies.
• A new Star Trek movie
• A new Trey Parker and Matt Stone musical with an assist from Kendrick Lamar

And that’s just some of it. News dumps like that are what make CinemaCon so exciting.

Director Shawn Levy and producer Kevin Feige revealed nine very R-rated minutes of the year’s only Marvel movie and they didn’t disappoint. Read all about it here.

It won’t be out until next year, but Warner Bros. debuted the first footage from Bong Joon-ho’s Mickey 17 starring Robert Pattinson and holy shit. It looks incredible. Funny, weird, exciting, all of the things. Read more about it here.

Disney and Pixar decided to show over 30 minutes of footage from Inside Out 2 at the event and while that sounded like a lot, it really showcased how this sequel could easily be as good as the original.

We saw the opening 35 minutes which reestablishes the world in Riley’s now 13-year-old mind, then introduces new characters/emotions that you’ve seen already, followed by some you haven’t.

After being locked away by the new emotions, the old emotions find themselves in Riley’s vault where they meet some of her deepest darkest secrets. One is Blueby, a hand-drawn animated character from an old show Riley is embarrassed to still like, but does. The other is Lance Slashblade, a Final Fantasy-esque rogue hero complete with long hair and longer sword (think Cloud from FF7) that Riley has a crush on. He looks like a 32-bit video game character. It’s delightfully jarring to see such different-looking characters in a Pixar movie, but also so, so funny.

Most film fans are probably skeptical when they hear the words “Gladiator II.” Do we really need a sequel to the Best Picture winner, Gladiator? Probably not, but after seeing the world debut of footage from the Ridley Scott film, maybe we don’t need it, but we still want it. Now.

The footage featured all manner of epic gladiatorial battles— man vs. man, group vs. group, man vs. rhino., group vs. sharks (yes, that’s real)—as well as the tease of some incredible stories involving Paul Mescal, Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn, and others. Truly, this one looks like a sequel worthy of the original and that’s saying something.

It was easily the most exciting thing we saw at CinemaCon 2024.