Honoring the Mastermind of the MCU, Stan Lee
Stan Lee, the man with an entire universe in his mind, has died at 95.
Lee revolutionized the comics industry by giving his superheroes flawed characteristics where they had previously been invincible and unflappable. Starting with the Fantastic Four, he developed an entire interconnected series of characters that developed into the wildly successful MCU. Working with the legendary Jack Kirby, Lee created the original Avengers Hulk, Thor and Iron Man as well as the X-Men and Black Panther...
New Game of Thrones Teaser Reveals Premiere Month
We’ve finally got some actual, concrete information regarding Game of Thrones premiere date thanks to a new teaser released by HBO. There might not be any new footage to parse over here, but it does give us a nifty half minute of all the blood, sweat, tears and wine that’s been poured since Ned Stark lost his head in season one. With winter finally here and all the pieces—and surviving characters—more or less set, Game of Thrones fans can expect the shortened 8th and final season to bring the epic series to its rightful,...
Key & Peele are in Back in Hilarious Toy Story 4 Teaser Reaction Video
One of the most joyous Key & Peele sketches was when Jordan Peele and Keegan-Michael Key played a pair of pop culture obsessed valets who had a particular fondness for action films and mispronouncing their favorite performer’s names (a favorite was how they pluralized Liam Neeson’s name into Liam Neesons.) In a mashup we never saw coming, Key and Peele are rebooting this classic skit, only in the form of stuffed animals named Ducky (Key) and Bunny (Peele) in Toy Story 4. ...
The Gang is Back in First Toy Story 4 Teaser Trailer
Disney has released the first Toy Story 4 teaser trailer, supplying you with a reminder of why this was the franchise that changed the game for animation. The film picks up after the events of Toy Story 3, which gave Woody (Tom Hanks), Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) and the gang a new life when Andy gave his beloved toys to his little sister Bonnie. In Toy Story 4, Woody and his friends are off on another adventure (this time in Bonnie’s room),...
Disney Reveals the Exact Year We Will Meet Captain Marvel
The Marvel films have definitely not been released in chronological order. You would need a handy guide like this one to truly watch them as they actually occurred. Even then, there are few spots that are hazy. What’s finally clear is exactly when Captain Marvel will take place. Sure, it’s the 1990s, but which year of that decade?
Ok, it’s clear if you can read Japanese. I cannot, but I am trusting Google translation...
A Rogue One Character Lands a Series on Disney Streaming Service
That “Disney streaming service” we have been musing about so frequently finally has a name. The home of all things Marvel, Star Wars, and live-action versions of animated classics will now be called Disney+. Pronounced “Disney Plus,” the future of the House of Mouse will also feature Disney, Pixar, and National Geographic. The moniker matches that of Disney’s sports property ESPN+.
While the Disney Channel has always been steered toward kid and teen programming,...
Avengers 4 Currently Longest Marvel Film Ever at 3 Hours
It’s going to take a long time to defeat Thanos and find a way to bring back T’Challa, Spider-Man and the Guardians of the Galaxy. How long? Possibly three hours. The epic final film in Marvel’s Phase 3 is currently Godfather-length, according to director Joe Russo. Russo sat down for an Instagram Live chat yesterday and shared the news that Avengers 4 is long, and, possibly could stay that long. (h/t THR...
Jeremy Irons’ Intriguing Role in HBO’s Watchmen Revealed
HBO’s Watchmen is one of the more interesting TV series currently in development. Based on Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons iconic graphic novel, Watchmen offers a ton of potential for the canny creator (including the brilliant conceit and all those wonderfully weird characters), but just as many pitfalls. For one, there are few other comic-book narratives that are called “masterpieces” as Watchmen credibly is. Second, Zack Snyder’s ambitious crack at it in his 2009 film proved how hard the material is to adapt (and that film had plenty of merits)...
New Trailer for Andy Serkis’ Mowgli Reveals Motion-Capture Marvel
A new look at Andy Serkis’ Mowgli has arrived, revealing the motion-capture master’s gorgeous take on the Rudyard Kipling classic “Jungle Book.” Yet there’s more good news to share here, courtesy of Netflix—the streaming service has given us a new Mowgli trailer and revealed they’ll be giving Serkis’ adaptation a theatrical release. The new film (now titled Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle) will be a departure from Jon Favreau’s The Jungle Book for Disney,...
Wild Web-Slingers Unite in new Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse Sneak-Peek
Everyone is excited for Miles Morales (voiced by The Get Down‘s Shameik Moore) to make his grand entrance on the big screen, yet the young Brooklyn native will be sharing the stage with a slew of wild web-slingers. Yes, Morales has a few things to learn about being Spider-Man (for example; he doesn’t wear a cape), but luckily for him, he’ll have plenty of opportunities to hone his skills in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse thanks to a mentor by the name of Peter Parker (voiced by Jake Johnson)...
Maria by Callas Writer/Director Tom Volf on Revealing the Person Behind the Legend
Maria by Callas writer/director Tom Volf discovered opera only 7 years ago, yet he very quickly found a passion for the fascinating artistic and personal life of Greek-American opera legend Maria Callas. Delving into copious research, he unearthed never-before-seen footage, photographs, recordings, and interviews. The result is a film created entirely from Callas’s own words. It is a fascinating look at art, fame, and the life of a woman of her time. We spoke to Volf about the complications of building a film in that way,...
Jude Law Learned Everything There is to Know About Dumbledore for Fantastic Beasts
Fantastic Beasts is a fun and fresh take on the Wizarding World. The creatures are spectacular and Newt Scamander is a special kind of adorable awkward. Those period costumes are stunning and J.K. Rowling has promised the series will take us around the globe. However, nostalgia is powerful and it’s hard to let go of the characters we first fell in love with. A new featurette reveals how Jude Law captured the essence of a Harry Potter mainstay...
Aquaman and Associates Prepare for War Beneath the Waves in New Character Posters
These Aquaman posters are the coolest thing to happen to human-like underwater dwellers since mermaids. Who needs a fin when you can have shimmery gold scale leggings? If nothing else, these characters are going to be the flashiest cosplay to come out of the DCEU.
Warner Bros. released the character posters today, showing off the spectacle to come. Each one focuses on something a little different and equally cool. Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa) sports his classic green and gold suit and doesn’t share much of the spotlight...
The Breaking Bad Universe is Expanding With a Mystery Project
Vince Gilligan is back to work in New Mexico. Exactly what that means isn’t clear, but it is very, very exciting. The Albuquerque Journal sniffed out a new feature-length project by the Breaking Bad creator taking place where the series was filmed. The local paper connected some dots that give us a picture of a new project that is related to AMC’s meth-lab mega-hit.
The New Mexico Film Office director Nick Maniatis announced, “We are happy to welcome Greenbrier and Sony Studios to New Mexico...
The Girl in the Spider’s Web‘s Location Manager Shares Secrets of Swapping Cities
Later this fall, Stieg Larsson’s Lisbeth Salander, defender of women, computer hacker, and iconic pale Swede, returns to American cinema via Sony Pictures’ The Girl in the Spider’s Web. Claire Foy succeeds Rooney Mara and Noomi Rapace in the role, and Fede Alvarez replaces David Fincher in directing the sequel to the American adaptation of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. The story itself is the fourth in Larsson’s Millennium crime thriller series,...
Building the Bizarre, Beautiful World of The Nutcracker and the Four Realms
In The Nutcracker and the Four Realms, Disney’s live-action re-creation of the E.T.A. Hoffmann story and subsequent classical children’s ballet, Morgan Freeman plays Drosselmeyer, giver of enchanted gifts and leader of a star-studded cast that kicks off in picture-perfect Victorian London, giving way to the magical realms where Clara (Mackenzie Foy) hunts for a key to open a final bequest from her late mother: a filigree silver egg that obviously possesses significance beyond knickknackery and sentiment...
Modern Classic Shrek to Return to the Screen
And in the morning, I’m making a reboot! Ok, I’m not. Illumination animation is. If you didn’t pick up on my terrible and tacky reference, I’m alluding to Donkey’s infamous line in modern classic Shrek. The reluctant folk hero of the world’s fairytale creatures may be heading back to the swamp. Seriously, though. Did Heidi Klum already know?
Variety reports that Illumination Entertainment is working on a new Shrek film...
First Capernaum Trailer Reveals Director Nadine Labaki’s Cannes Jury Prize Winner
Nadine Labaki’s Capernaum earned a 15-minute standing ovation at this years’ Cannes Film Festival, where it earned the Jury Prize. The potent family drama is a frontrunner for an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, and now, Sony Pictures Classics has released the first trailer.
Set in Beirut, Capernaum revolves around the story of 12-year old Zain (Zain al Rafeea), a Lebanese boy who takes the remarkable step of suing his parents for the ‘crime’ of giving him life...
How Kin Kept Michael B. Jordan’s Role a Secret
Spoilers. We all hate them. We hope that whatever we are investing our time in is a cool idea that will surprise us. It is harder these days for filmmakers to be stealthy, however. Camera phones and social media keep constant tabs on today’s celebrities. Even the fairly innocuous IMDb can reveal a surprise appearance by a big-name actor. That’s why the surprise, relatively minor, cameos in Marvel films can be fun. However, one of the biggest stars on the planet slipped into a sci-fi film this summer and no one noticed...
Writer/Director Sandi Tan on the Incredible True Story Behind her Netflix Film Shirkers
Sandi Tan was supposed to be the next big teen sensation—not just in the indie film scene, but in the almost non-existent Singapore film scene of the early 1990s. Tan was just 18 years old when she started making the original version of Shirkers, a beautiful, mysterious film, with the help of her friends Jasmin Ng and Sophie Siddique and her film teacher, Georges Cardona. It would have been a revolutionary addition to the indie canon. The current rendition of Shirkers,...
