Ranker Spotlight: Hocus Pocus

Originally released in July 1993, the Halloween movie Hocus Pocus at first didn’t seem like it would become a holiday classic. The studio’s decision to release the movie out of season, combined with negative reviews from critics, combined to hurt the kids’ comedy at the box office. Hocus Pocus made $44 million in theaters, a paltry sum compared with other, massively successful films Disney was releasing in the early 1990s. It wasn’t until Freeform began airing the movie annually during October that it really started accruing a cult following.

Now, 20 years later, that following has become so large that Disney has decided to produce a sequel. Bette Midler, Kathy Najimy, and Sarah Jessica Parker have all returned to reprise their roles as the Sanderson sisters, three witches who are inadvertently summoned back to modern-day Salem. With some fresh faces like Ted Lasso’s Hannah Waddingham, The Afterparty’s Sam Richardson, and Veep’s Tony Hale added to the brew, Hocus Pocus 2 hopes to unite new fans with returning nostalgists throughout October following its release on Disney+ at the end of last month. 

How can Disney+ draw viewers from both within and outside its current subscriber base all through Spooky Season? Ranker Insights can give the streaming service some ideas with a look at the original Hocus Pocus movie’s fan base.

How Hocus Pocus Ranks on Ranker

Hocus Pocus has been voted on over 40,000 times on Ranker lists over the years, with an impressive 68% of those votes indicating positive sentiment from our readers. Looking at the lists on which the movie is ranked highest can tell us what’s behind its high approval rating. 

The movie has an impressive #1 spot on our list of Wholesome Halloween Movies For The Whole Family (2K votes), a ranking that tells the story of the movie’s success. Though it took some time for us to figure it out, especially since 1993 audiences didn’t have the chance to see the movie in October, Hocus Pocus is an ideal movie for families because it’s spooky without being too terrifying, and features plenty of laughs that adults can enjoy alongside their kids. 

Similarly, Hocus Pocus is ranked high on lists like Great Movies That Take Place In Autumn (11K votes) and The Best Movies About Witches (6K votes), where it sits at #1, and The Best Halloween Movies For Kids (41K), where it’s ranked #2. All these rankings tell us that for every box Hocus Pocus ticks — family movie, seasonal movie, movie about witches — it’s risen to the top of viewers’ minds. Additionally, it’s ranked #12 on our list of Movies That Need Sequels (81K votes), and Ranker tells us that women are 3X more likely than men to have upvoted the movie on this list. Taken together, this information suggests Disney was absolutely right to take a bet on a new film, with pop culture fans clamoring for a follow-up to a movie they still hold in high regard, with female moviegoers particularly excited about the sequel.

What Do Hocus Pocus Fans Love?

Hundreds of thousands of votes have been cast for Hocus Pocus on some of Ranker’s most popular movie lists. What and who else do those fans vote for? Ranker Insights can tell us more about the likes and dislikes of the Sanderson sisters’ biggest fans.

Other Movies

Disney classics like Beauty and the Beast (1991) and Jumanji unsurprisingly tend to share plenty of fans with Hocus Pocus, but another Disney film has a less expected affinity with the cult classic. The 2003 movie The Haunted Mansion is 7X more likely to be beloved by Hocus Pocus fans. Besides being another kid-friendly horror movie from the House of Mouse, what does The Haunted Mansion have in common with our favorite witchy kids’ movie? They both had middling performances at the box office when released, only to pick up plenty of fans later when they were rerun during holiday movie marathons. 

Hocus Pocus fans are also 7X more likely to love Labyrinth, the 1986 David Bowie-fronted kids’ fantasy movie, and they’re 6X more likely to enjoy the villain origin story Maleficent.

TV

The fans of this 1993 movie favor more supernatural family fare from the 1990s and 2000s. They’re 4X more likely to love Supernatural, the long-running CW fantasy series that’s getting a reboot in the form of prequel series The Winchesters this month. They’re also 3X more likely to love the modern Grimms’ Fairy Tales update Once Upon a Time, supernatural ’90s sitcom Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and Joss Whedon classic Buffy the Vampire Slayer. This audience’s tastes go beyond the world of witches and magic, however: Hocus Pocus fans are 3X more likely to also love long-running police procedural Law & Order: Special Victims Unit than the average Ranker reader.

People

Surprisingly, the celebrities and public figures most likely to be beloved by Hocus Pocus fans aren’t stars of the movie. These fans are 2X more likely to love EGOT-winning actor and comedian Whoopi Goldberg, as well as Downton Abbey star Maggie Smith — though, given the fact that Hocus Pocus fans are 5X more likely to love the Harry Potter film franchise, she’s probably more beloved for her role as Professor Minerva McGonagall.

These stories are crafted using Ranker Insights, which takes over one billion votes cast on Ranker.com and converts them into actionable psychographics about pop culture fans across the world. To learn more about how our Ranker Insights can be customized to serve your business needs, visit insights.ranker.com, or email us at insights@ranker.com.

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