Last night, the Syfy Original Movie Sharknado became their most social telecast ever, reaching 5,000 tweets per minute, according to Trendrr. With 387K social mentions (97% driven by Twitter with the top hashtags #sharknado and #syfy), Sharknado bested competitive cable/broadcast programming including CBS’ Big Brother/The Big Bang Theory and was within 2,500 tweets of the Game of Thrones’ #RedWedding episode. Danny Sullivan at MarketingLand.com notes that the campy disaster movie had about 25% of the online buzz that the Super Bowl had, but "for a strange TV movie on a cable channel, I’ll count that as pretty impressive."
It seemed like everyone on Twitter took part in the Sharknado fun. NBC News’ Chuck Todd tweeted:
I follow about a thousand folks. Every one of them tweeting about SharkNado
— Chuck Todd (@chucktodd) July 12, 2013
He wasn’t alone. Lost co-creator and showrunner Damon Lindelof also got in on the action.
I am going to write the Sharknado sequel and I am going to do it before Shaknado is over.
— Damon Lindelof (@DamonLindelof) July 12, 2013
Critics were spellbound. Hitfix.com’s Alan Sepinwall wrote that Syfy’s Sharknado "hits the schlocky motherload," writing, "Some movies are just designed as communal experiences: "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." "The Sound of Music." "Sharknado.""
Time’s James Poniewozik had a similar reaction:
I'm on vacation and it's my birthday, but I will be goddamned if I am not going to review SHARKNADO. http://t.co/zuGSRJJhR4
— James Poniewozik (@poniewozik) July 12, 2013
Given the enormous popular demand, Syfy will present a special encore presentation of Sharknado on Thursday, July 18 at 7PM (ET/PT).