When Paramount hosted its first ever Star Trek fan event at the Paramount lot last month, they overbooked, leaving hundreds of fans out in the cold. As promised by Justin Lin, Paramount is now making it right by sending swag bags and tickets to the world premiere of Star Trek Beyond to the folks who missed out that night.
[UPDATE: We have a copy of the e-mail that Paramount sent to fans who were turned away at the event]
Paramount hosted its first ever Star Trek fan event at the Paramount lot in May where they hosted a Q&A session with director Justin Lin, JJ Abrams, and the stars of Star Trek Beyond, unveiled the long awaited second trailer, and more. It was an all out Trektastic party, and we were beyond thrilled to be there bringing the nights events to you all.
But, some fans who had been promised entry to the affair got snubbed. They arrived, waited in line, and were then told that the event was full and to go home.
Dear Paramount, thanks for nothing. Took time off of work to get here on time. Stood in line over two hours. Denied access. WTF #StarTekFan
— Ben Warren (@TrekGuy62) May 21, 2016
Beyond director Justin Lin tweeted his intentions to make it right for those fans the night of the event.
@TrekCore we’ll make it right for the fans that didn’t get let in. We’ll make sure they’ll be at the premiere. #StarTrekFan
— Justin Lin (@trailingjohnson) May 21, 2016
Now, Paramount has started making good on Lin’s promise. According to TrekCore, they’ve already started sending out swag bags to fans that didn’t get in (those that did get in already got those bags, pictured below).
Photo: Geek Culture
In those bags is the real prize: a “golden ticket” that gets its holder into the world premiere of Star Trek Beyond, which will be screened at a first of its kind outdoor IMAX experience at San Diego Comicon on July 20th.
For those of you who have their golden tickets and have reached out to Paramount for information on the premiere, sit tight. There has been no word back from Paramount yet on the details, but we hope to have them by the end of the month.
[UPDATE 6/8]: Paramount gets in touch with snubbed fans
We’ve obtained a copy of the letter sent to fans that didn’t get into Paramount’s Star Trek Beyond Fan Event last month:
In a second email to one of the unlucky fans, a publicity person at Paramount confirmed that they indeed overbooked the event and were cut off by the Fire Marshall.
“I’m sorry that you were turned away. It was my understanding that we tried to bring in as many people as we could (more than we were allowed) and the Fire Marshall cut us off. I wish there was a way to have had everyone come in.”
Nice gesture. I believe these guys really do care about the fans.
i went but didn’t get the 50 year t-shirt. Oh well
Also happy they let people who didn’t get in get the stuff the rest of us got. Also I was the last person they let in. So i know it was a issue since there was about 200 people they didn’t let in
Still Meh…
It is simple: seats = invites. You do not give out more invites than you have seats.
Yeah, that’s the same email I received a week ago. I also replied to the ‘thanks for coming’ email that went out the night of the event, and was told then they are working on it as well. At this point, I’ve not heard from, or received anything. Personally, it’s not that big of a deal….understanding that a premiere is also a studio promotional event, I’ll need to decide if going for the possibility of a chance for admission is worth the trip.
Phil,
You don’t think having it outdoors might be a successful Fire Marshal dodge? Although, I’m not sure I’d enjoy a packing of the crowd so that every viewing spot was literally SRO. Perhaps if I were younger….
I’m no expert, but probably not. A permitted outdoor event would have to disclose attendance to calculate needs for security, toileting, and public safety. There’s little info on the SDCC outdoor premiere night, so it’s hard to say if it’s an open event or not. Hopefully, it doesn’t rain – we actually got some in July last year.
Don’t recall TrekMovie making any mention of this issue previously? I had thought of flying out for it (from the Twin Cities). Glad that I didn’t!
It popped up in the discussion threads the day of, during the event.
Instructions were that the gates were opening at six, the event started at seven. Enough people reported that, if you weren’t actually in at six, you probably didn’t get in at all. Adding to the confusion were studio personnel who kept giving conflicting information to those waiting, until around eight thirty, when they just told everyone outside to go home. Lesson learned, but yeah, given how that went down, there’s no way I’d tell anyone to spend (airfare & hotel) money with one of these premiere passes in hand, knowing that all you have is probably a pass to stand in line for a couple of hours. If you are at CC, or have reason to be in San Diego, have fun.
Speaking of promotional expectations never materializing, wasn’t it a year ago that Prodigal Son claimed?:
“Since you have Star Trek in the title, Paramount can probably just “grab your site” anytime they want. You risking waking up one morning, going to your site, and seeing it gone and a new Paramount site in its place for the new movie.” — Prodigal Son, June 3, 2015 12:26 pm
“The minute it becomes official that the movie get’s titled Star Trek Beyond, a lawyer, from Paramount/CBS/Redstone (it will be worked out, trust me) will, within 24 hours, cement ownership of Michael’s StarTrekBeyond.com web site.
You can take that to the bank.” — Prodigal Son, June 3, 2015 3:47 pm
“Paramount will obviously grab that URL [startrekbeyond.com] now soon.” — Prodigal Son, June 18, 2015 12:54 pm
Well, a visit to http://startrekbeyond.com shows:
“404
Error – Page Not Found”
that it is NOT the official site for the new movie and never was. This is:
http://startrekmovie.com
Those predictions risk NEVER materialized.
And a check of its whois record shows:
http://whois.domaintools.com/startrekbeyond.com
Registrant Org: DNStination Inc.
Paramount NEVER took possession as is clearly shown in the OFFICIAL “Star Trek Beyond” site’s whois record:
Registrant Organization: Paramount Pictures”.
Wait … the world premiere is at ComicCon, not a proper theater?
Stuff arrived today. Thanks to all involved.