How can I start a franchise? 15 movies listed in the catalog, Disney IP Have they actually been calling themselves indie films for decades? There’s no rule that says a movie about dogs playing basketball can’t be an independent movie.
In fact, Air Bud Returns will be the 15th installment in the series, which will be 30 years old when released. But Air Bad Returns is now an independent film, 12 of which were released straight to video, but it’s also aiming for a theatrical release and box office hit.
The original 1997 “Air Bud” was released by Disney and grossed $23.1 million at the box office, which comes to about $47.4 million when you factor in inflation. However, the second movie, “The Golden Receiver,” in which Buddy the dog switches from basketball to football, grossed only $10.2 million. Subsequent films, depicting Air Buds playing soccer, baseball, and volleyball, were eventually spun off into the Air Buddies series, a story about a golden retriever puppy who talks, has superpowers, goes to space, and saves Christmas twice, all released directly to video.
While reintroducing Air Buds to a new generation through streaming seems like the perfect opportunity for a reboot, Air Buds Returns will actually be released in theaters on January 22, 2027. And the filmmakers believe this is a theatrical film for the same reason that its predecessor was 30 years ago.
“The kids who watched the original ‘Air Bud’ were 10 years old and you’re now a parent. Now the kids and their parents are introducing ‘Air Bud’ to them,” director and Air Bud Entertainment CEO Robert Vince told IndieWire as part of the CinemaCon event held at Barco Cinema Space. “Someone took you and your parents to the theater. 1776905649 they are grandparents. The timing was perfect from a demographic perspective, and we knew it and were paying attention. ”
Vince has heard NBA players say they were inspired by Air Bud, there was an SNL sketch featuring Sidney Sweeney and Air Bud, and John Oliver spent so much time talking about the series that he originally wanted to be in the new movie. Oliver joked that between the time he began the worldwide search for Air Bud and the crowdfunding investment campaign to support the film, not only did Vince not have a dog, he also had no money. Sounds like an indie filmmaker to us.
“I knew the timing was right because the sound got so loud,” he said.
Although Vince has touted Air Bud Returns as a theatrical re-imagining of the series rather than another sequel, it falls into the category of a “sequel” that is essentially a remake of the original. The new movie exists in a world where not only the original Air Bud exists, but the movie about that dog’s life was made: the original “Air Bud.”
In the 12-minute footage of the film we saw at CinemaCon, the new Buddy walks past a statue of the original Buddy. When Buddy meets a boy in a wheelchair who also lost his parents, they watch an old VHS tape of the original movie together and decide to recruit Buddy to his school’s basketball team. It’s even the same Timberwolves team uniform that Buddy is wearing, and there’s another grumpy clown trying to get Buddy back, and yet another referee saying, “There you go.” still There is no rule that says dogs can’t play basketball. ”
Vince said the dog in Air Bud Returns is an incredibly well-trained “movie star” type dog, but teaching him how to play basketball “isn’t as easy as you think.” The original Air Bud was not trained by professionals, and Kevin DeCoico was the first to put the dog on David Letterman’s “Stupid Pet Tricks.” He was kind of a “party dog” who knew how to do these unique tricks seen in the first movie.
“He had real natural ability. He was one of a kind. He was a wise man,” Vince said. “You’ll never be able to replicate that ability in one dog.”
The reason this is all indie is that Air Bud Returns isn’t being released by Disney, but instead is a collaboration between Cineverse, best known for bringing us the Terrifier series of horror films. Air Bud Returns marks the company’s first foray into family films after cornering the niche horror market of killer clown movies (thankfully Air Bud Returns doesn’t feature clown art chasing Buddy in a car).
Cineverse is unique in that, rather than spending heavily on advertising and doing extensive marketing, it leveraged a network of other streaming services and podcast channels to turn Terrifier 2 and Terrifier 3 into hits with minimal P&L spending and highly focused marketing.
The difference here is that Air Bad Returns is a four-quadrant family film that needs to be distributed more widely, but Cineverse Chief Film Officer Yolanda Macias said Air Bad is representative of an IP with a built-in fanbase, and their goal is to identify other family IPs that scratch the same nostalgic itch. Their only goal is to make the theatrical release an event, and CinemaCon is the first step in that journey, which also includes Buddy’s trip to Cannes.
The journey for Cineverse’s Air Bud Returns began before production began, with the distributor leading the charge to find a dog to play Buddy in the film. The team submitted more than 5,000 videos of people with golden retrievers, and ultimately settled on two (the one they came across at CinemaCon was named Roscoe). For them, it’s enough of a vote of confidence that there’s an audience here who believes a movie like this can be as successful at the box office as they believe a dog can play ball.
“This is America’s desire to bring Air Bud home,” Macias said.
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