Archive for January, 2014

Reblog: X-Men: Days Of Future Past Debuts Trailer Tease Ahead Of Big Reveal Next Week

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , , on January 23, 2014| Leave a Comment »

I’ll save my indepth thoughts on this till we see the whole thing, but here is a lot of interesting comments from CinemaBlend. Though, why are we seeing Iceman and Magneto together, I thought them rescuing Rogue together got cut?

Via CinemaBlend

Director Bryan Singer has revealed on Twitter that there are some very big promotional plans in store for the upcoming X-Men: Days of Future Past coming next week, and he has begun teasing those plans with the Instagram video you see above, featuring a surprising amount of new footage that wasn’t seen in the trailer that was unveiled a few months back.

The tease features quite a few interesting quick shots, so let’s take a much closer, in-depth look at them, shall we?

I can’t seem to embed the video so here it the link.

Quicksilver X-Men: Days of Future Past

The first shot that I picked up on is this one of Evan Peters as Quicksilver shattering some glass in super slow motion. He also seems to be disguised in a police officer’s uniform, which is just a tad strange.

Wolverine X-Men: Days of Future Past

Next up we have Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) wrapped up in some kind of metal and sinking to the bottom of a body of water. Looking at the way he is bound, I would guess that Magneto is somehow involved here, but I can’t be sure if it’s the older version played by Sir Ian McKellen or the young version played by Michael Fassbender.

Blink Warpath and Sunspot X-Men: Days of Future Past

This third screengrab shows off three mutants who will be making their first appearance in the X-Men franchise. Up front is Booboo Stewart as James Proudstar/Warpath, to the left is Fan Bingbing as Clarice Ferguson/Blink, and on the right is Adan Canto as Roberto da Costa/Sunspot.

Mystique and Magneto X-Men: Days of Future Past

Our fourth shot seems to be an intimate meeting between Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) and young Magneto (Michael Fassbender). At the end of Matthew Vaughn’s X-Men: First Class the two of them became very close and Mystique even left her closest friend, Charles Xavier (James McAvoy), to be with him. It will be interesting to see how their relationship has developed since, given that their timeline in Days of Future Pasttakes place 11 years after the events in that film.

Mystique X-Men: Days of Future Past

Here we have Mystique all by herself incognito in her “human” disguise. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen the character in her pretty sundress and hat, as we got this behind-the-scenes photo a few months ago, but we’re still curious what she’s up to.

Iceman and Magneto X-Men: Days of Future Past

Lastly we jump back to the “future” timeline where we see two of Singer’s original franchise players: Shawn Ashmore as Iceman and McKellen as Magneto. With the exception of a few scenes in X2: X-Men United, these two characters have classically been portrayed on opposing sides – X-men vs. the Brotherhood of Mutants – but it would seem that facing an apocalyptic future has convinced them to work together.

We’re not 100% sure what exactly this is a tease for, but be sure to check back on Monday January 27th for even more X-Men: Days of Future Past awesomness.

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Review: All-New X-Men #20

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , on January 21, 2014| Leave a Comment »

All-New X-Men #20Rule #1 of Comics: Never, ever, EVER, trust the cover.

As much as I’m glad X-23 doesn’t actually kiss Scott, I’m annoyed that she ‘doesn’t do hugs’. X-23 does do hugs, she just doesn’t hug people she’s only known five minutes who took her to a former Weapons X facility. I hope Bendis understands this distinction. X-23 is a great and complicated character who has a really sad backstory, not to mention what just happened in Avengers Arena, but knowing how much Bendis likes to ignore established backstory, I’m sure none of this will come into play.

But at least the whole issue isn’t one long bad teenage drama fest (Jean is jealous that Scott thinks X-23 is hot, hypocrite much? trope much? Bendis unimaginative much?) and we see that Stryker’s son is out for mutant blood. The scary part though is that what he says does make a lot of sense when taken from an angle. All you have to do is dehumanize mutants and he is perfectly legit. This applies to so much else in our world and it is truly the biggest danger the mutants will ever face. Nothing hurts deeper than ideology gone wrong.

The team is taken out, well except for Angel, and considering the rhetoric that was spilled his way in the last issue with him being, well, an Angel, I have a feeling we might actually pull away from the Jean/Scott drama for a bit and focus on one of the other characters for awhile…

One can hope…

 

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Reblog: Mark Ruffalo Dishes On Avengers: Age Of Ultron Script, Confirms Darkness, Laughs

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , , on January 20, 2014| Leave a Comment »

via CinemaBlend

Mark Ruffalo Dishes On Avengers: Age Of Ultron Script, Confirms Darkness, Laughs image
If there’s any one script that the entire industry would give their right arm to get their hands on (good luck turning pages, stubby!), it’s got to be The Avengers: Age Of Ultron. The first picture was a billion dollar success, but the story actually left several unanswered questions. How can S.H.I.E.L.D. be trusted after the chain-of-command scuffle that almost destroyed New York? Who is Thanos? And what’s going on with that barely-contained sexual tension between Tony Stark and Bruce Banner?

Earlier, Scarlett Johansson claimed to know these answers, as she dished some minor sentiments regarding the script, calling it “dark” (not a huge reveal there). Now, Mark Ruffalo has also revealed that he’s read the script, and MTV was there to derail conversation about his Sundance film Infinitely Polar Bear to ask about it.

“I would say that it’s better, it’s cooler, it’s more awesomer,” he said, proving that he’s fairly adept at speaking Comic Con-ese. “It’s a little bit darker, but also really had Joss Whedon’s incredibly witty and sly sense of humor.” He also confirms there’s plenty in the script for Bruce Banner to do, but, well, he’d better if Ruffalo’s agent has anything to say about it.

Nerd Speculation Time! Ruffalo seems to be confirming the mandatory “darker sequel” angle, but by talking up the humor he suggests the drama will come from unlikely sources this time around. In other words, the Avengers won’t be “Disassembled” or any such event. Facing off against Baron Von Strucker and Ultron in this installment seems fairly comic book-y, and there’s a very good chance that lingering, deadly-serious Thanos continues waiting in the wings. Or maybe Ruffalo and Johansson simply read different chunks of the same script: again, this thing is in-demand, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if they both read approved chunks of the script in a heavy-security safe house in Brazil once and were forced to leave without it. Maybe Ruffalo got the funny stuff, while Black Widow ended up dealing with some heavy stuff in the aftermath of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

You can pull off “darker” with “more laughs,” and that’s really the best sort of balance with these comic movies: with sequels announced until the end of time, you really need to find new ways to build suspense as much as possible. Fortunately, Whedon and his collaborators never forget that these are comic books originally made for audiences of children. They should be funny, a little ridiculous, and ultimately light on their feet if they want to honor the source material.

Expanding beyond that and using, say, Batman as a template for a serious message or a relevant contemporary theme could prove fruitful, but that’s not the sort of approach that’s all that easy to pull off. Nevermind the struggle in being allowed to use what are essentially costumed corporate mascots for the sake of complex adult storytelling: you can really only pull that off in cult comics and slashfic. Dirty, dirty slashfic.

Avengers: Age Of Ultron opens May 1st, 2015.

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Review: Uncanny X-Men #15

Posted in Reviews, tagged , , on January 18, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Uncanny X-Men #15There is such thing as trying too hard not to be sexist.

People have to go shopping, especially when they literally have nothing but the clothes on their back to their name. Toiletries, underwear, I mean, I know comic book character never seem to change their clothes but realistically they need these things. There is also another thing called cabin fever, something that is especially troublesome in cold, desolate, areas. You don’t need a whole page of “don’t judge us, we are strong, independent women, but we need to go shopping” when both the need of basic items and cabin fever affect both genders and could easily be explained away as such in a quarter of the space. Writing that whole ‘don’t judge us excuse’ is basically Bendis not wanting to be called sexist for sending the girls shopping because, apparently, he thought it was an inherently sexist thing they were doing.

So it’s less of a ‘i’m not sexist’ and more ‘i’m sexist and don’t want to get called out’ kind of moment.

As for the story, this is a tie-in to the new Inhumanity arc going on right now. Inhumans are getting the spotlight because Marvel still owns the movie rights to them and likely will try to use them to make up for the lack of mutants in the MCU. So we’re treated to the discovery of a new Inhuman with some incredibly powerful abilities. He takes out all the X-girls and then gets carted off by people’s unknown (though maybe they are known, I haven’t been reading the Inhumanity arc).

Will this have any impact on the future of our team? Probably not, but as filler issues go, it’s decent once you get past the first part.

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Review: A+X #15

Posted in Reviews, tagged , , , , , , on January 18, 2014| Leave a Comment »

A+X #15One has Blue Fur and the other is wearing Horrible Pajamas.

That’s literally all I took away from this first team up in A+X #15 which pits Science vs Magic with Beast and Dr Strange. While the story is fun and there are a few good one-liners, this is a pairing I would have loved to have seen across a whole issue rather than just half. This seems to be the biggest issue with A+X (beyond constant reuse of characters rather than always going for something new), with only half an issue to tell a story you often get something short and sweet. For some of these stories that works just fine, but for others, it really does make the story feel empty. Like they really could have done more with it.

Also, does this cover image make Dr Strange look like Wil Wheaton? Just a little…

Then we have the continuing adventures of Cap and Cyclops. Now, the only reason these two are working together is because the Skrull guy could confirm that those two are not Skrulls. Then, with their Skrull captured (cause the guy was smart enough to move his heart), they head off looking for a Skrull safe house… and call in backup. Why does this feel like it’s negating the whole reason these two enemies are working together? How can Cap or Cyclops trust that Emma, the Cuckoo’s, and Ant-Man are not Skrulls? I know they needed Emma to to conveniently use her telepathy to save the day… and I suppose you could argue that it’s the fact that they are using the powersets of said individuals are a good reason to trust they are who they are… but still, it defeats the purpose of the teamup. If all Cap needs “proof of powerset” then he could cuff Cyclops and be done with it.

Ah yes… plot holes..

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Reblog: SUPERMAN/BATMAN Bumped to 2016, Showdown with MARVEL Looming

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , , on January 17, 2014| Leave a Comment »

via Newsarama

 The unexpected move sets up a game of chicken with Marvel Studios, who previously staked out that date for unannounced film. Marvel has traditionally released films the first weekend in May, including this past year’s Iron Man 3 and 2012’s The Avengers.

Sony and Fox have also released Marvel-adapted films on that weekend, and Sony will release next year’s Amazing Spider-Man 2 (May 2 2014) on that weekend. Of course comic book reader also know the first weekend in May as the traditional weekend Free Comic Book Day is held.

Warner  Bros. pushing production on director Zack Snyder’s untitled Man of Steel follow-up that will also star Ben Affleck as Batman and Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman to second quarter 2014, after initially being scheduled to begin shooting this winter.

“We are happy to take advantage of these coveted summer dates, which are perfect for two of our biggest tentpole releases,” Warner Bros. president of domestic distributionDan Fellman said in a press release. “We share the fans’ excitement to see DC Comics’ most popular figures, Superman and Batman, together on the big screen for the first time, which will now be arriving in theatres in May 2016.  Peter Pan has delighted people of every generation for more than a century, so we are thrilled to bring him back to the screen next summer for today’s moviegoers.”

“We know that there is already great anticipation building for the next super hero film from Zack Snyder, and we are equally eager to see what he has in store for Superman and Batman as they share the big screen for the first time ever,” Warner Bros. president of international distribution Veronika Kwan Vandenberg added in the press release.

Warner Bros. also announced they have moved their Peter Pan/Captain Hook origin storyPan, which will star frequent superhero himself Hugh Jackman as Blackbeard, to the July 17, 2015 date.

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Review: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. S01E12 “Seeds”

Posted in Reviews, tagged , , , , on January 16, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Agents-of-SHIELD-SeedsToo Cool For School? Bad puns just can’t help themselves…

AOS continues to be stronger this second half of the season. We get another non-Skye-centric episode that didn’t feel like it was trying to be a non-Skye episode. Our team heads back to the S.H.I.E.L.D. Science Academy to hunt down a prank gone wrong. It’s nice look into how S.H.I.E.L.D. works but at the same kinda odd. I mean, if you go by Thor 2 (the most recent MCU movie) S.H.I.E.L.D. still isn’t that well known across the world unlike the CIA or NSA which every British person has heard of even if they don’t understand their particulars. Yet, in this episode, SHIELD has not just one, but several independent Academies that seem about the size of a City College at least. Yeah, NSA, CIA, they may have specific training camps and stuff but nothing on that scale, they usually hire out of University rather than doing it all themselves… yet SHIELD is still “a secret” according to Darcy?

Considering what happened in NYC I’m sure Darcy is the odd one out here but I can’t help be a bit nitpicky.

Anyway, I had a point, didn’t I?

Ah, yes, this episode was well rounded in how it was laid out and presented the characters. Skye’s story finally moves forward, giving us some interesting information about the circumstances of her being orphaned. Because we actually have forward movement in her story rather than lateral, this episode avoids more ‘annoying Skye-time’ pitfalls that we saw throughout the first half of the season.

Also, the other characters are finally becoming part of the episodes rather than part of ‘character-theme’ episodes. Basically, everyone is really starting to mesh and work as a group, character wise.

Was the story itself all that thrilling? Not really… it lacked the umph of scenes like the spinning room, but it shows that this show knows how to be more cohesive. A great sign for things to come.

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Avengers 2 adds Baron Wolfgang von Strucker

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , , , on January 15, 2014| Leave a Comment »

Thomas-Kretschmann-in-Focus-Films-The-Pianist-2002-9THR is reporting that Thomas Kretschmann has been added as Baron Wolfgang von Strucker, a Hydra leader who has had his own share of run-ins with the Avengers.

Seeing as this movie is already full of A-List actors and characters, I predict that Strucker won’t have much of a role in this film beyond being the link to Hydra for the Maximoff Twins. I doubt he’ll do much more than issue orders, though it would be interesting to see if he’ll be used to greater effect in later films.

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Gotham goes to Series and Constantine gets Pilot order

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , , , , , on January 13, 2014| Leave a Comment »

GothamIn the original announcement, Fox‘s drama Gotham was described as the origin stories of Commissioner James Gordon and the villains who made Gotham City famous. Fox chairman Kevin Reilly today announced that the series will include all of the classic Batman villains as well as heroes, including young Bruce Wayne. “The show will track Bruce from a child (around 12 years old) until he puts on a cape (in the finale),” he said. Also on tap are the Riddler, Catwoman, the Penguin. “We will see how they get to become what they are as Gotham is teetering on the edge,” Reilly said. “It is an operatic soap with a larger than life quality.” Reilly also confirmed that Gotham, originally bought with a series commitment, has a greenlighted pilot (Danny Cannon is directing), and is setting up a writers room in mid-February with the full intention to go to series. The series hails from Warner Bros TV and The Mentalist creator Bruno Heller.

via Deadline

 

PREVIOConstantine NBC Pilot DC ComicsUS, 3:34 PM: It is a big day for Warner Bros TV and DC Comics. On the heels of Fox confirming its Batman drama Gotham is going to series this morning, NBC has greenlighted a pilot for Constantine, a drama based on the characters in DC Comics’ John Constantine stories. The project, which had a script commitment with penalty, is written/executive produced by The Mentalist executive producer Daniel Cerone and David S. Goyer, the go-to writer for Warner Bros’ feature DC adaptations. Constantine centers on John Constantine, an enigmatic and irreverent con man-turned-reluctant supernatural detective who is thrust into the role of defending us against dark forces from beyond.

John Constantine, who first appeared in 1985 as a recurring character in the horror series The Saga Of The Swamp Thing, was created by Alan Moore, Steve Bissette and Jamie Delano. He was portrayed by Keanu Reeves in the 2005 feature Constantine and is rumored to be featured in the Justice League Darkfeature Warner Bros has in the works with Guillermo del Toro.

In addition to Gotham, Constantine joins Warner Bros TV/DC’s The Flash at the CW, a spinoff from hit Arrow exec produced by Berlanti, which is shooting a pilot. Goyer has co-written The Dark Knight, The Dark Knight Rises, Batman Begins, Man Of Steel and the upcoming Batman vs. Superman. On TV, he is the creator/executive producer of Starz’s Da Vinci’s Demons. Cerone is the creator/executive producer of Canadian drama Motive, which aired on ABC this summer.

via Deadline

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Reblog: Will Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man Have Two Hank Pyms?

Posted in News and Editorials, tagged , , , , , , , on January 13, 2014| Leave a Comment »

via CinemaBlend

Will Edgar Wright's Ant-Man Have Two Hank Pyms? image
It was exactly one week ago that director Edgar Wright teased us with the idea that his upcoming Marvel Studios film Ant-Man would actually feature more than one character taking on the titular hero’s moniker. Posting a still from the episode “To Steal An Ant-Man” from the animated series Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, the director seemed to hint that his movie would include portrayals of both Hank Pym and Scott Lang, the first two characters in the comics to become Ant-Man. Today that was confirmed with the casting of Michael Douglas, who will star opposite Paul Rudd.Exciting as that development is, however, there’s evidence that suggests that there is more to come. Looking at both recent revelations and old, it’s entirely possible that we will soon end up hearing about the casting of a third Ant-Man. No, I don’t mean Eric O’Grady – I’m talking about young Hank Pym.

When the news of Douglas’ casting was announced this afternoon, Wright directed fans through his Twitter account to an interview that he did with SuperHeroHype all the way back in 2006 (just three months after he landed the Ant-Man gig). Discussing his vision for the superhero story, the filmmaker described beginning the movie with a “prologue” set back in the 1960s, following Hank Pym’s early adventures as Ant-Man, and then flashing forward to the present to tell the story of Scott Lang and how “he crosses paths with Henry Pym, and then, in an interesting sort of Machiavellian way, teams up with him.” Douglas will clearly be playing the older version of Pym that ends up taking Rudd’s Lang under his wing, but that means the project still needs an actor to play the character when he was 50 years younger.

In this regard, having Douglas on-board gives them something to shoot for in the casting process. We can probably assume that Wright won’t be going the Tron Legacyroute and create a younger, digital version of the actor, so that means finding someone who could pass for a young Michael Douglas. The veteran star’s age and the director’s hints suggest that the production will be looking for an actor in his 20s who stands about 5’10″ and who has the uncanny ability to switch from affable to intimidating at the drop of a hat. It won’t be an easy search, but there are a lot of young, talented actors out there who could fit the bill.

In addition to giving a full, rich history to the character of Ant-Man, casting a semi-known actor as the young Hank Pym would also open up a very interesting avenue for Marvel Studios. Thanks to Captain America: The First Avenger we’ve seen the 1940s in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but the 1960s would be entirely new terrain to explore. Twenty some-odd years after both the creation and presumed death of Captain America, where do things stand? How is S.H.I.E.L.D. progressing? What other experiments are going on? It’s yet another way for the comic book studio to expand everything that they’re doing, and we already know how much they love doing that.

Ant-Man will be in theaters on July 31, 2015, which means that production will start up in the first half of this year. Hopefully we’ll hear even more casting news soon.

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