'Sharknado' Won't Die, Hits Theaters Aug. 2

The quest to turn "Sharknado" into a commercial success is still very much underway, as Regal Entertainment Group announces plans to show the Syfy original movie in its theaters on Aug. 2.

The first airing of the movie on Syfy on July 11 made headlines because of the large amount of traffic on Twitter referring to it, but its actual viewership was lackluster. An encore broadcast a week later pulled in a larger but still unspectacular number of viewers.

Regal's involvement is an attempt to turn the movie into a cult phenomenon, presumably in the vein of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show."

The one-night-only showings of "Sharknado" will happen Saturday night at midnight in about 200 Regal theaters. Tickets for the event will cost attendees $12.50.

The first broadcast of "Sharknado" on Syfy drew about 1.4 million viewers, significantly fewer than other Syfy originals such as "Mega Python vs. Gatoroid" and "Sharktopus," but the name of the movie showed up in several hundred thousand tweets over the course of a few hours, leading marketers to think "Sharknado" was a potential goldmine. The next week's repeat broadcast pulled in about 1.9 million viewers. That's a substantial increase, but it's still only a bit more than half the number of viewers who watched "Pawn Stars" the same night.

The disconnect between "Sharknado"'s media profile and its appeal to viewers makes Regal's plan seem unrealistically optimistic, but even if only two thirds of the people who watched the last airing of the movie head to the theater to see it on Saturdy night, "Sharknado" will generate about as much box office as "R.I.P.D." did on its opening weekend.