GTA to Marvel: How Holograms Could Bring the World's Biggest Entertainment Franchises to Life

Holographic entertainment concept inspired by gaming, superheroes, science fiction, fantasy and Minecraft-style digital worlds

What happens when the world's most valuable fictional characters are no longer confined to a screen?

Imagine walking through a shopping centre and seeing a character from Grand Theft Auto VI standing in front of you. Spider-Man appears inside a cinema foyer. Doctor Doom addresses visitors ahead of Avengers: Doomsday. A Star Wars character delivers a holographic message. A ghost from Hogwarts appears in a retail store. A Minecraft Creeper materialises beside a product display.

For decades, entertainment companies have become extraordinarily good at creating fictional worlds that audiences want to enter. Holographic display technology creates another possibility. Instead of taking audiences into those digital worlds, pieces of those worlds can begin to appear inside ours.

The economics behind that idea are substantial. The global games market generated $201.6 billion in 2025, up 9.1% year on year, according to Newzoo. At the same time, cinema has demonstrated that blockbuster characters still command extraordinary attention. In September 2026, the Associated Press reported that Spider-Man: Brand New Day had grossed $2.4 billion worldwide and helped drive the strongest North American summer box office in years.

These numbers point in the same direction. Audiences have not lost interest in characters, games, cinema or fictional worlds. The opportunity is to make those worlds feel more tangible.

GTA VI: What If Vice City Escaped the Screen?

Few game releases arrive with the cultural weight of Grand Theft Auto. Rockstar Games has confirmed that Grand Theft Auto VI will launch on 19 November 2026, returning players to modern-day Vice City and the state of Leonida.

That makes GTA VI more than a software release. It is a global entertainment event arriving in a games market that has already crossed the $200 billion annual revenue threshold. Newzoo reports that in 2025, mobile games generated $113.3 billion, consoles generated $44.7 billion and PC generated $43.6 billion. The scale of those numbers explains why the launch of a major game can now resemble a movie premiere, product launch and cultural moment at the same time.

Imagine entering a shopping centre in the weeks before launch and encountering a life-size holographic character from the world of GTA. A vehicle could appear to rotate within a display. A character could introduce a trailer. A fictional resident of Vice City could deliver promotional messages. With conversational AI added to the experience, a digital character could even answer questions, direct customers to a retailer or guide visitors through a launch activation.

The goal would not be to reproduce an entire game in physical space. The power comes from taking one instantly recognisable element of a digital universe and making it appear unexpectedly present in the real world.

Marvel: From Spider-Man to Avengers: Doomsday

If there is any doubt about the power of major entertainment characters, Spider-Man provides a fairly decisive answer.

By early September 2026, Spider-Man: Brand New Day had reached $2.408 billion worldwide, including more than $923 million domestically. The Associated Press reported that the film had held the number one position at the box office for six consecutive weeks and that the 2026 summer season had reached approximately $4.6 billion through 31 August, up 26.1% from 2025.

That is not simply evidence of a successful film. It demonstrates the extraordinary economic value attached to a globally recognisable character.

Marvel's next major theatrical event is already approaching. Marvel Studios confirms that Avengers: Doomsday will be released on 18 December 2026, directed by Joe and Anthony Russo, with Robert Downey Jr. among the announced cast.

Now consider how these characters are traditionally promoted: posters, trailers, billboards, digital screens, social media and cinema standees. All remain valuable, but they share one limitation. The audience knows it is looking at an image.

Holographic technology changes that visual relationship. Imagine Spider-Man apparently appearing inside a shopping centre. Doctor Doom standing inside a cinema foyer ahead of Avengers: Doomsday. Iron Man introducing a technology product. The Fantastic Four appearing as part of an immersive premiere. Or an AI-powered Marvel character responding to visitors rather than simply repeating a prerecorded animation.

Superheroes are especially suited to this format because audiences already accept worlds in which the impossible happens. Flying characters, portals, advanced interfaces, holographic communications and artificial intelligence are already part of Marvel's visual language. A physical holographic experience therefore does not have to fight against the fiction. It can become part of it.

Star Wars: The Franchise That Made Holograms Famous

There may be no entertainment property with a more natural connection to holographic technology than Star Wars.

Princess Leia's message to Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars: A New Hope became one of cinema's defining images of futuristic communication. StarWars.com has described holograms as an important recurring storytelling device across the saga, used for messages, communications and dramatic reveals. The franchise helped teach generations of viewers what a hologram was supposed to look like.

The commercial scale of the audience is equally striking. Star Wars: The Force Awakens generated $2.071 billion worldwide, including more than $936 million domestically.

Now imagine Star Wars retail and fan experiences where characters no longer need to appear exclusively on televisions and LED screens. A droid could greet visitors. A character could deliver a holographic message inside a cinema. A spacecraft could seemingly float within a display. A digital character powered by AI could even respond to individual visitors.

There is something particularly satisfying about that idea. Star Wars helped popularise the fictional hologram. Real display technology is now beginning to explore how digital people and objects can create a stronger sense of physical presence.

Harry Potter: When Technology Looks Like Magic

Harry Potter offers almost the opposite creative opportunity.

Star Wars uses holograms to represent advanced technology. The Wizarding World could use them to represent magic.

Moving portraits, ghosts, floating objects, magical creatures, talking paintings and characters that appear and disappear are already part of Harry Potter's visual language. Holographic presentation does not need to invent a reason for these effects. The fictional world has already done that work.

The timing is particularly relevant because Harry Potter is entering another major period of attention. Warner Bros. Discovery confirmed that production of HBO's new Harry Potter television series began at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden, with the series due to debut in 2027.

That creates another generation of viewers about to discover Hogwarts. It also creates a fresh wave of opportunities around retail, attractions, exhibitions, fan experiences and branded environments.

Imagine entering a Harry Potter retail environment and finding what appears to be a Hogwarts ghost nearby. A magical creature could move inside a holographic installation. A portrait could speak to visitors. A Sorting Hat experience could ask questions and respond differently to each participant using conversational AI.

The distinction matters. A conventional display shows someone an animation. An interactive holographic character can make the visitor feel that the animation has noticed them.

Minecraft: Taking a Digital World Into the Physical One

Minecraft may be the most interesting example because its universe was born entirely inside a digital environment.

There is no attempt to make Minecraft look realistic. Its blocks, landscapes and characters are unmistakably virtual. Yet that deliberately digital world has developed an astonishing cultural footprint.

Mojang confirmed that Minecraft had crossed 300 million copies sold. Its reach expanded again with cinema. A Minecraft Movie generated $960.4 million worldwide, including approximately $424.1 million domestically and $536.3 million internationally.

Holographic technology could provide another bridge between Minecraft's digital origins and the physical world.

Imagine a Creeper apparently standing inside a display in a toy shop. Minecraft blocks seemingly floating in space. A structure building itself layer by layer. Steve introducing merchandise. An AI-powered character guiding children through an interactive activity.

In this case, the fact that the object looks digital is not a weakness. It is the point. Seeing something unmistakably virtual apparently occupying a physical space could be part of the spectacle.

Why Bring Digital Worlds Into Physical Spaces?

Consumers already have enormous televisions, games consoles, smartphones, cinemas and streaming platforms. Why take digital characters into shopping centres, airports, stores, attractions and public spaces?

Because attention has become harder to earn.

A trailer can be watched anywhere. A holographic character appearing unexpectedly in front of someone is a different proposition. A photograph can be scrolled past in less than a second. A physical experience gives someone a reason to stop, look, record and share.

That relationship between physical presence and digital reach is becoming increasingly important. A strong real-world activation can become social content. Social content can drive people towards the physical activation. Visitors then create more content of their own. The experience itself becomes part of the media campaign.

Out of Home Advertising Is Becoming More Digital

This shift is happening while the physical advertising environment itself becomes increasingly digital.

The World Out of Home Organization reported that global Out of Home advertising spend reached $54.2 billion in 2025, up 15% from 2024. Digital Out of Home accounted for $25.5 billion, or approximately 47% of total OOH revenue.

WOO forecasts that digital will account for 49% of global OOH spend in 2026, reaching around $28 billion. In other words, a medium historically associated with static posters is rapidly becoming digital.

The next question is what those digital experiences should look like.

More flat rectangles are one answer. Holographic displays provide another.

For entertainment brands in particular, the ability to create the perception of three-dimensional people, products or characters inside a physical location opens possibilities that conventional displays cannot reproduce in quite the same way. A cinema campaign can extend beyond the poster. A game launch can extend beyond the trailer. A retail activation can extend beyond the screen.

From Displaying Characters to Talking to Them

Holographic AI could push the idea even further.

A prerecorded character can attract attention. A character capable of responding to someone can potentially hold it.

Modern conversational AI makes it possible to create digital personalities that can understand questions, generate relevant answers, change languages and respond differently depending on the interaction. Connect that intelligence to a holographic visual representation and the display begins to behave less like a screen and more like a presence.

A superhero could answer questions about an upcoming film. A game character could guide someone through a launch event. A fictional character could recommend merchandise. A digital host could give directions inside an entertainment venue. An avatar could switch languages for international visitors.

The character stops being simply content. It begins to become part of the experience.

The Most Valuable Asset May Be the Character Itself

The biggest entertainment companies do not simply own films and games. They own characters and worlds that can travel between formats.

Spider-Man can exist across cinema, games, merchandise, attractions, toys and advertising. Harry Potter can move between books, television, retail, experiences and theme parks. Minecraft can move from games to film to toys. Star Wars has spent decades extending its universe across almost every entertainment category imaginable.

Holographic technology offers another environment in which those characters can exist.

Not on someone's phone. Not behind a television screen. Not printed onto a poster. Apparently present in the same physical space as the audience.

The Screen Does Not Need to Disappear

None of this means traditional screens are going away. Cinema screens are extraordinary. Televisions are extraordinary. Smartphones may be the most successful display technology ever created.

Holographic technology does not need to replace them. It offers a different experience.

Spider-Man swinging across a cinema screen is entertainment. Spider-Man apparently standing in the cinema foyer becomes an encounter.

Driving through Vice City on a console is gaming. Encountering a GTA VI character in a launch installation connects that virtual world with the physical one.

Watching Hogwarts on television is storytelling. Walking past something that appears to be one of its ghosts is theatre.

Seeing Princess Leia's holographic message on a screen is one of cinema's most famous science fiction moments. Seeing a digital human apparently standing in front of you brings part of that science fiction into reality.

Fiction Is Moving Into the Real World

There is a pattern running through GTA, Marvel, Star Wars, Harry Potter and Minecraft. Every one of them asks audiences to believe in a world that does not exist.

Vice City. Superheroes. Galactic empires. Wizarding schools. Entire universes made from blocks.

And audiences do more than believe in them. They spend billions of dollars entering them.

The games industry has crossed $200 billion in annual revenue. The latest Spider-Man film has crossed $2.4 billion worldwide. Minecraft has sold more than 300 million copies and produced a movie worth almost $1 billion at the global box office. A single Star Wars film has generated more than $2 billion worldwide. At the same time, global Digital Out of Home expenditure is forecast to reach $28 billion in 2026.

These are not disconnected trends.

Entertainment is becoming more valuable. Physical media is becoming more digital. Artificial intelligence is becoming more conversational. Display technology is becoming more immersive.

The interesting question is what happens when all four converge.

Companies such as Miirage are developing holographic display and holographic AI technologies designed to give digital people, products and content a greater sense of physical presence.

For entertainment companies, retailers, cinemas, attractions and advertisers, the opportunity is not simply to create another digital screen.

It is to make audiences momentarily forget that they are looking at one.

For more than a century, entertainment has tried to transport audiences into fictional worlds. The next chapter could reverse the journey. The fictional worlds may start coming to us.

This article discusses hypothetical uses of holographic and AI technology. Miirage is not affiliated with, endorsed by or associated with Rockstar Games, Marvel, Lucasfilm, Warner Bros., Mojang, Microsoft or the entertainment properties discussed in this article.