TikTok star gets attention of Disney with special effects superhero video: 'The world's gonna know your name'
A college student has captured the attention of Disney executives and other big names in Hollywood after going viral with his superhero-themed TikTok.
On Thursday, Julian Bass, 20, a theatre major at Georgia State University, uploaded a TikTok he’d made of himself transforming into superheroes using his special effects skills on Twitter.
In the clip, set to Harry Styles’ song Watermelon Sugar, Bass first transforms into a Star Wars Jedi, complete with a lightsaber, before morphing into Cartoon Network’s Ben 10.
The 20-second video ends with Bass changing into Spiderman and shooting webs out of his palms.
“If y'all can retweet this enough times that Disney calls, that'd be greatly appreciated," Bass captioned the clip.
if y’all can retweet this enough times that Disney calls, that’d be greatly appreciated pic.twitter.com/GrKlIRxg3J
— Julian Bass (@thejulianbass)
As of Friday, the video has been viewed more than 14m times and liked more than 1m times on Twitter.
Bass also reached his goal, capturing the attention of executive chairman of The Walt Disney Company and former CEO Bob Iger, who responded: “The world’s gonna know your name!!!”
Iger was not the only big name to recognise Bass’s talents, as Oscar-winner Matthew Cherry, actor Josh Gad, Guardians of the Galaxy filmmaker James Gunn and Ben 10 voice actor Tara Strong were also among those praising the 20-year-old.
“Hire this man, Gunn!” Zach Braff tweeted at Gunn.
The official Twitter account for The Lonely Island shared its support as well, tweeting that it had “forwarded” the video to Disney and visual effects company Industrial Light & Magic.
👀🤯
— Sony (@Sony)
Regarding the incredible response he’s gotten, Bass told The Hollywood Reporter that “these are people who have always been on my radar and it means everything in the world to me that now they've inspired me to a point where I'm on theirs.”
“I jokingly asked for Disney and got the chairman himself," Bass said. "I absolutely had no idea it'd get this big. I mean, I've always put 100 per cent into the videos I make and they're usually well received by those around me but nothing of this calibre.”
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