Riots at “Creed 3” performances: Popcorn, nachos and probably fists fly – police evacuate the cinema room

Anyone who has attended a screening of the new boxing drama “Creed III: Rocky’s Legacy” in Essen, Bremen or Hamburg in recent days may not have been able to see the film to the end – because there were such riots in several cinemas that the film screenings had to be stopped. In some cinemas, spectators climbed over the seats, threw snacks – in some cases there were even alleged violent attacks, in Hamburg there were reportedly even mass brawls with police action, e.g. reported.

In Essen, on the other hand, the police even had to evacuate a cinema. Noisy about 40 young people did not leave the room voluntarily after employees had stopped the film screening due to disturbances. A police operation was necessary to enforce the house rules.

The police suspect a similar phenomenon to that of “Minions 2”: in the summer of 2022, visitors – especially young people – of the animated film massively disrupted the screenings and then posted videos of their behavior on the social media platform TikTok, hoping that it will go viral to go. There could be another similar TikTok trend right now. This also includes disrupting a film screening in such a way that it was stopped – and thus enjoy a brief moment of attention as a “social media star”.

Why “Creed 3” after “Minions 2”?

But why on screenings of “Creed 3”? In the case of “Minions 2”, it was especially this film that attracted the TikTokers – because under the hashtag #gentleminions it was important to ideally go to the cinema in a very chic suit. “Creed 3” may not be specifically about the movie at all, but simply about getting the utmost attention. After all, the spin-off ‘Rocky’ by and with Michael B. Jordan started with no less than 410,000 viewers in the opening weekend.

There should have been a similar uproar at the beginning of “Creed 3”, but also in France. There was, among other things, a brawl in the city of Saint-Étienne, which not only led to a police operation, but even to 20 arrests. Here it refers according to a report by the AFP news agency. From where to where the trend could have spilled over is currently not clear.