In a new promo, HBO has given us some of their most hotly-anticipated series, perhaps none more so than Craig Mazin’s adaptation of The Last of Us. Based on the popular video game series, the Chernobyl creator has teamed with the video game’s writer and creative director, Neil Druckmann, to give us a 10-episode season centered on the dangerous journey of Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) across a devastated American landscape in a post-apocalyptic world.
The promo gives us a shot of the staggering ruin of America, with blown-out buildings leaning into each other and a sky sooty with fire and smoke. Like the previous teaser, we are plunged into this nightmare alongside Joel and Ellie, who need to find a way to get out of the quarantine zone without being killed by one of the infected or twitchy, untrusting survivors. “Everybody I cared for either died or left me,” Ellie says during the new promo. Joel, however, will try to do neither of those things.
Joining Pascal and Ramsey are Nick Offerman, Gabriel Luna, Storm Reid, Merle Dandridge, Nico Parker, Murray Bartlett, Ashley Johnson, Graham Greene, Anna Torv, Lamar Johnson, Keivonn Woodard, and Troy Baker. In fact, Dandridge, Baker, and Johnson all did voice work on the original video game series.
The promo also teases some of HBO’s other hot commodities, including season two of Mike White’s razor-sharp satire The White Lotus, a new 4-part documentary about, and titled, Shaq, a new season of We’re Here, a new limited series titled The White House Plumbers, the new series The Idol, the new limited series Full Circle, the new limited series Love & Death, and new seasons of Barry, Winning Time, Somebody, Somewhere, The Righteous Gemstones, Curb Your Enthusiasm, A Black Lady Sketch Show, How To With John Wilson, The Gilded Age, Hacks, Tokyo Vice, Julia, Our Flag Means Death and the Emmy-darling Succession. The promo does a good job of reminding you why HBO so routinely mops up Emmy Awards year in and year out.
Check out the video below.
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Ramy Youssef’s consistently excellent self-titled Hulu series Ramy centers on his titular character, a young Muslim trying to reconcile his elastic identity. He’s the son of Egyptian immigrants living in New Jersey stretched in multiple directions, between his Muslim community, God, his friends, and his still murky future. The series was a critical hit when it premiered, and Ramy didn’t lose any of its intellectual heft, hilarity, or bite in season 2. In that season, Ramy tried to be a good Muslim man by the standards of today, with disastrous results.
Now that season 3 is available on Hulu, it’s safe to say that Ramy has established itself as one of the most reliably interesting and richly drawn comedies on TV. The action takes place a year after the events in season 2, with Ramy still employed in the diamond district for his closeted Uncle Naseem (Laith Nakli), who is now actively on dating sites for young available Muslim men. Meanwhile, Ramy’s personal life is in a tailspin after having sex with his cousin Amani (Rosaline Elbay) the night before his marriage to Zainab (MaameYaa Boafo)—and not for the first time—and now forced to deal with the aftermath of that disastrous infidelity. Ramy hasn’t only torpedoed his own life; his actions have blown a hole in the lives of the people around him, too.
Season 3 is abundant with storylines, indelible performances, and Ramy‘s trademark unflinching, offbeat humor and pathos. It’s unlike anything else on TV. Jumping into this rich world was costume designer Nicky Smith, who took over the reins from Dana Covarrubias. We spoke to Smith about what it was like coming into a successful show, how she hoped to subtly shape viewers’ experiences through the wardrobe, and why sometimes the best wardrobe choices are the ones performers bring from home.
After watching the first two seasons, what were you thinking about your approach to season three’s aesthetic?
One of the great things is that season one and two feel very East Coast, very New York. It really has the stylized look of what we consider like that tri-state area vibe. So it was really easy for me as a native New Yorker to kind of move into that world and to bring what had already been done in previous seasons into my own tone. For example, one of the things that I tried to do this season was really create color matching to try to tell a color story. I did that with color vignettes so that when you’re looking at the scene, it’s kind of telling a story visually.
Ramy — “merchants in medina” – Episode 308 — praying. be back soon. Majid Al Maskati, and Jordan Ullman, shown. (Photo by: Jon Pack/Hulu)
How did you approach the evolution of Ramy’s style?
We were really lucky on this season because we kind of had the overall arc of what all the episodes were gonna be like. That allows you to design your main core characters in a way that you can show the evolution of where they go. For example, for Ramy, we really started with him still in the hoodies and the puff jackets. His look had been previously established so that, by midway through season 3, we had him in the really great wool coat, turtlenecks, and sweaters. So when I started, I started with those trends [from past seasons] and then got to explore where I saw the characters arcing visually.
Ramy — “harry potter” – Episode 301 — are you watching horse porn? Ramy (Ramy Youssef), shown. (Photo by: Marcus Price/Hulu)
And how did you approach outfitting the rest of this diverse cast in a way that reflects their faith, their socioeconomic status, and their sense of self?
It starts with the research. Ramy is a really wonderful writer, which we all know, and the world that he creates has so much detail and nuance to it that it gives me a palette to find images that match what the words are. I’m searching Pinterest, Instagram, I’m going to the photo library, and anywhere I can go to source imagery. It’s really important to me that the imagery is of people of the culture. As much as I can have faces that look like our actors on their wardrobe boards, I think it really brings an added depth to where the story starts. I want to make sure that the actors who are playing the characters, especially the main actors who have been in these roles for two years, feel themselves when they look at the boards and that they feel the evolution of the character. Like with Dena, who was played by May [Calamawy], we talked about how we could evolve her from the sweaters and the looks that she wore in previous seasons to where she is now as a young woman in law school.
The style board for Dena (May Calamawy’s character). Courtesy Nicky Smith.Ramy — “we gave it all up for hot dogs” – Episode 310 — maktoub. Dena (May Calamawy), shown. (Photo by: Jon Pack/Hulu)
You hear a lot today about how productions are so much more mindful of their environmental impact. How often on Ramy are you re-using items or borrowing clothes?
I broke down some of the closets from the previous two seasons for day players that weren’t gonna come back, and then we put that into our general stock so we can pull from it as needed. Then I reached out to other costume designers that are friends of mine, and if they had things that weren’t in storage units that they weren’t using, I asked if I could borrow that. For example, we borrowed police uniforms from Blue Bloods, we borrowed hospital uniforms from FBI: Most Wanted. It’s about using your network and figuring out how we can help each other. Budgets aren’t always as expansive as we want them to be, and it helps us just add an extra layer of detail and authenticity to the clothing that we use on camera. Especially when you’re doing secondhand thrift, you find things you would never find in a store. Like there’s always some weirdness that you could put on a character, and you’re like, ‘Look at this beautiful hand-painted coat that I didn’t paint, but someone’s grandmother painted in 1989 for their Bat Mitzvah.
I imagine this also works really well because some of these characters would be shopping at thrift stores anyway.
Yes. I’m really big about making sure that the brands and the sourcing I use to match a character’s socioeconomic status because I wanna make sure that if that character would shop at a mid-range store or like a Zara or an H&M, it looks like the character would shop from there. It doesn’t necessarily mean all the clothes come from there, but I want the overall look to match what that person could afford.
What’s your process of working with the actors?
It’s definitely a collaborative process. I always start a fitting by saying that at the end of the day, I want the actor to feel comfortable because they’re the ones playing the character; they’re the ones who are on camera. I really wanna let them know that if something feels uncomfortable, I’d rather someone just vocalize it in the fitting so we can correct it, solve it, and make sure that by the time they’re on camera, everyone in the room is happy with the look. So I show them the boards that I present to the director or the showrunner so they can see the research of how I got to that place with the character. And then we kind of talk through the rack, and if there’s something they really absolutely hate, which doesn’t happen often, I’m fine to veto it. Like it’s not about ego; it’s really about the collaborative process.
Ramy — “we gave it all up for hot dogs” maktoub. Lena (Bella Hadid), shown. (Photo by: Marcus Price/Hulu)
Talk to the rack is a fantastic phrase.
[Laughs]. We talk through the rack, but I actually do talk to the rack. When I pull [clothes], I get into this hippy Matrix mind zone and then, like, put looks together. It’s a whole thing.
Last question—any favorite looks from season 3?
In episode eight, we’re at the Muslim Conference. It really felt like we brought out all these different characters from Muslim culture. There were Afro-Muslims, and Palestinian Egyptians, and we really made sure that a lot of the background actors, if they were from those nationalities, brought their own stuff. Because as much as we can provide, there’s nothing better than people representing their own cultures.
Ramy — “merchants in medina” – Episode 308 — praying. be back soon. Yasmina (Rana Roy), Ahmed (Dave Merheje), and Mo (Mohammad Amer), shown. (Photo by: Jon Pack/Hulu)
Ramy is streaming now on Hulu.
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Featured image: Ramy — “bad momma” – Episode 305 — i don’t care about your halal/haraam ratio. Bella Hadid, and Ramy Hassan (Ramy Youssef), shown. (Photo by: Jon Pack/Hulu)
Guillermo del Toro was never going to make a wooden Pinocchio. What we mean by that admittedly bad pun is that the visionary director was always going to take the deathless story of Pinocchio and mold it into something unique and personal. And Pinocchio is deeply personal to the auteur, who has said that it’s the story that probably shaped him more than any other. “No art form has influenced my life and my work more than animation, and no single character in history has had as deep of a personal connection to me as Pinocchio,” he said in a statement when the film was announced.
Yet Guillermo del Toro’sPinocchio (its official title) represents his first foray into animation, and even for a director as resolutely unique as Del Toro, one might still be surprised to find out that he’s created an animated movie that’s “thematically” linked to two of his most celebrated, harrowing works—Pan’s Labyrinth and The Devil’s Backbone—both of which dealt with the Spanish Civil War. The Devil’s Backbone takes place during the war, while Pan’s Labyrinth is set during the beginning of Franco’s brutal reign. For Pinocchio, Del Toro set the action in Benito Mussolini’s Fascist Italy.
“The three movies are to do with childhood coming up against something that has to do with war and violence,” he said during a special event held by Netflix before the film’s world premiere this coming Saturday. “I think for me, it’s always been the movies about fatherhood and being a father or being a son, and I think in those iterations, Fascism seems to be concerned with a father figure of a different kind and the desire to deliver ourselves to a father that unifies thought. So I think it’s both a background and it is something interesting thematically.”
Del Toro explained that the reason his name is attached to the film’s title is that he embraced how his vision for the character will be different from Carlo Collodi’s original and Walt Disney’s adaptation.
“For me, there is Carlo Collodi’s Pinocchio, there is Walt Disney’s Pinocchio, and there’s Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio. Because to me, the interesting thing was: Can I make a Pinocchio that celebrates disobedience as opposed to celebrating obedience? Can I make a Pinocchio in which he doesn’t have to turn into a real boy at the end because he was obedient?”
Del Toro said he was inspired by some insight shared by the legendary Gabriel Garcia Marquez, author of “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” during a night of partying in Brazil.
“He said there were 10 characters in the history of literature that can be interpreted any way they want, including Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes, Dracula, Frankenstein, Pinocchio, and the Count of Monte Cristo. He said you could use them for symbols of many, many different things. You can put them in space, you can make them president, you can put them in a political or financial context. Anything. There will always be songs that will change with the key of the singer. And I thought that was incredibly liberating.”
Del Toro is one of the most liberated directors around already, so to hear him describe his vision for Pinocchio is very exciting indeed.
Del Toro’s film boasts a voice cast that includes Ewan McGregor, Christoph Waltz, David Bradley, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton, Ron Perlman, Finn Wolfhard, and newcomer Gregory Mann as Pinocchio.
Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio will hit select cinemas in November and begin streaming on Netflix on Dec. 9
While Colin Farrell is on a publicity tour for the critically acclaimed The Banshees of Inisherin, which finds him re-teaming with his In Bruges director Martin McDonagh and co-star Brendan Gleeson, he’s offered up some delicious details about HBO Max’s The Penguin. The upcoming series will find Farrell reprising his role from Matt Reeves’ The Batman and is set to start filming in early 2023. Farrell told Extrathat the series will pick up almost immediately after The Batman‘s ending, a mere week after the Riddler tried drowning Gotham City.
“It starts about a week after The Batman ends,” Farrell told Extra. “So, Gotham is still, somewhat, underwater. I read the first script of the first episode, and it opens up on my feet splashing through the water in Falcone’s office. Even that alone, when I read it, I was like, ‘Oh, Jesus!’ It’s lovely. It’s so well-written. Lauren LeFranc has done such an extraordinary job, and she’s writing the whole thing and show-running. She is formidable. It’s just an exciting prospect. I love that character. I was greedy with it. I felt like I didn’t have enough. I wanted to do it more and more and more.”
Speaking with Collider, Farrell had more to say about LeFranc’s writing.
“I read the first episode, which is just so tasty and so unusual as the character was on the page and what Matt Reeves kind of envisioned when he was thinking of this iteration of the bang-up of Oz. So yeah, it’ll be, I think six or eight hours. I’m supposed to read episodes two and three within the next week.”
We’re far too early in the process to know much more about The Penguin, but these early details are promising. Given the success of The Batman and the fact that a sequel has already been okayed, one can cautiously hope that The Penguin will get a chance to make a splash on HBO Max.
For more on The Penguin and The Batman, check out these stories:
Black Adam has arrived, and the DCEU won’t be the same again. Dwayne Johnson’s titular antihero had its world premiere last night in New York City, and the first reactions to his long-awaited debut as the ancient, unyielding superhero arrive with him. The Rock has been preparing for the role for ten years, and it sounds as if the wait was worth it.
A quick synopsis for you Black Adam freshmen: The film features Johnson as the titular, ancient antihero—born a slave, executed and resurrected by his son’s sacrifice, Black Adam views his immense powers as a curse. This is an antihero as powerful as any member of the Justice League (or the Justice Society, who we’ll get to in a minute), possibly even more so. What’s more, he’s angry. Awoken after 5,000 years of slumber, Black Adam is the type of guy who the authorities, and the bad guys, become immediately aware of and want to control or destroy. Good luck with that. Eventually, Black Adam encounters the aforementioned Justice Society—Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), Hawkman (Aldis Hodge), Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell), and Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo). They want Black Adam to play by the rules, but where (and when) he’s from, there are no rules, only the brutal hand of justice.
Without further ado, let’s check out the early reactions below:
.@TheRock is terrific in #BlackAdam, which includes a hearty amount of real world touchstones (most affecting is it reinforces the need for heroes in bleak times). Director Juame Collet-Serra lays out building blocks for a larger, grand universe. Action is lively & BIG in scale. pic.twitter.com/pDBkSHRDrI
— My Scary Name *is* Courtney Howard (@Lulamaybelle) October 13, 2022
#BlackAdam is a game-changer!! This is the #DCComics movie I’ve been waiting for & it did not disappoint. @TheRock is electrifyingly brutal as Black Adam! This is what I wanted Black Adam to be. The action in the film is non-stop & seeing the #JSA on the big screen was a thrill! pic.twitter.com/NigTxsfmd7
— Joseph Deckelmeier #BlackLivesMatter (@Joelluminerdi) October 13, 2022
Black Adam is everything that I hoped it would be and more. A Snyder-esque antihero spectacle that delivers big action and impressive set pieces. Dwayne Johnson transforms into Black Adam, a role that he was born to play. Centineo & Swindell are so damn fun to watch. #BlackAdampic.twitter.com/V1tY0liyph
#BlackAdam is DC’s most action-packed film to date. It’s a non-stop thrill ride that is all about spectacle, and it knows it. Ther3 is barely anytime to breath, or even talk. @TheRock is a perfect Black Adam, plus Pierce Brosnon is a standout. The film will leave fans buzzing! pic.twitter.com/HxCYYNw71w
have seen #BlackAdam. @TheRock is fantastic as Black Adam. He spent 10 years getting ready for this role and he literally kills anyone and everyone in his way and I loved that he didn’t pull back on who Black Adam is. Left the theater wanting to see the sequel immediately. pic.twitter.com/oLQc9lg7KR
DC’s #BlackAdam ROCKS! Tons of action, characters you’re instantly invested in & terrific pacing. Dwayne Johnson finds a great balance in being menacing & badass, but also empathetic. Especially loved Aldis Hodge’s Hawkman & Pierce Brosnan’s Doctor Fate. More JSA movies please! pic.twitter.com/YSCco9zYA3
#BlackAdam is built on some epic, non-stop action. It made me want a sequel with a smoother story immediately.
When it moves, it’s a straight shot of adrenaline. The characters are dope, especially Teth-Adam and Doctor Fate. It’s a bad-ass film. pic.twitter.com/XeMFgcB3OG
I have seen #BlackAdam! This was one of my most anticipated films of the year, and it did not disappoint. The action sequences were incredible, especially the ones with the JSA. The Rock crushes it as Black Adam. The film’s end left me with high hopes for the future of the DCEU. pic.twitter.com/vd0Zy35lWT
Featured image: Caption: DWAYNE JOHNSON as Black Adam in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures
“They think we’re vulnerable. They’re welcome to find out.”
This challenge is issued by Shuri (Letitia Wright) in a new Black Panther: Wakanda Forever teaser, which Marvel released today to celebrate the film’s rapidly approaching release date just a month away. It’s a thrilling, bite-sized glimpse of the film, and it offers us a few closer looks at not only Wakandan heroes like Shuri, M’Baku (Winston Duke), Ramonda (Angela Bassett), Okoye (Danai Gurira), and newcomer Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) but also the film’s presumed villain, Namor (Tenoch Huerta). This is who Shuri is speaking about when she says they think we’re vulnerable—it’s Namor and his vast army, which hail from the underwater kingdom of Talocan.
Why do we write “presumed” villain when speaking about Namor? Because the way director and co-writer Ryan Coogler, the cast, and Tenoch Huerta himself have talked about Namor suggests he’s not so much a villain as an immensely powerful king of his own nation trying to protect his own people. In the comics, Namor, one of Marvel’s oldest characters, has battled with Black Panther, but they’ve also been allies. In the teasers and official trailer for Wakanda Forever, Namor is being positioned as if he’s the villain, but if you’re paying close attention to the way the sequences are cut, you might notice that the reality is far less clear. In this new teaser, Namor tells Ramonda, “Wakanda will fall,” but we don’t get to hear the context of why he’s saying that. Is there a condition here, a “Wakanda will fall if” we’re not hearing? We think it’s likely.
As for Shuri, she’s going to be a huge part of Wakanda’s protection plan going forward after the loss of her brother, T’Challa (the late, great Chadwick Boseman). In the comics, Shuri becomes Black Panther, and there are indications that might be the case here. We already saw a female Black Panther arrive on the scene at the end of the official trailer, and Shuri certainly sounds like she’s ready to take on the mantle in this new teaser.
Check out the teaser below. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever hits theaters on November 11, 2022.
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Brendan Gleeson is having quite a moment. The highly regarded performer just hosted Saturday Night Live, and he’s been making the rounds promoting his starring role in director Martin McDonagh’s critically acclaimed black comedy The Banshees of Inisherin. That film, which sees Gleeson re-teaming with his In Bruges co-star Colin Farrell (which McDonagh directed), is getting serious Oscar buzz, which is no surprise considering the talent involved. It’s currently sitting at 98% fresh on RottenTomatoes.
Yet Gleeson has another little movie he’s working on, Joker: Folie á Deux, which will see him joining Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga, the latter reportedly playing the Joker’s main squeeze, Harley Quinn. As Gleeson was talking to Colliderabout The Banshees of Inisherin, he did have something interesting to say about what drew him to the Joker sequel.
While most of the time an actor will tell you he wanted to board a project because of a stellar script or a deep respect for the director, which were both assuredly draws for Gleeson here, he points out the main attraction was seeing what Phoenix did in the 2019 original. Here’s what Gleeson had to say to Collider:
“It wasn’t the material, which is a great way to get me out of having to answer any questions about the criteria. It was the achievement of the first film. I worked with Joaquin before on The Village… And so I knew him from then. And that performance, I’m still in awe of it. That performance as Joker in that first movie. It was one of the most extraordinary achievements I’ve ever seen. And for Todd to have – Worked the movie around to allow for that, I didn’t have to be asked twice. I really didn’t.”
It seems like a million years ago now, but when Joker bowed in 2020, it drew a massive amount of attention, ticket sales, critical response, and, eventually, eleven Oscar nominations (with a Best Actor win for Phoenix, no less). Phillips and co-writer Scott Silver’s dark, downbeat vision for a Joker origin story had none of the superhero pyrotechnics we’re used to seeing in big-budget comic book movies. Instead, Joker was a character study of Phoenix’s Arthur Fleck, a deranged, floundering comedian and clown-for-pay swiftly losing his mind in a crime-ridden Gotham. The sequel is reportedly going to be a musical, and with Gaga and Gleeson on board, you can only imagine what kind of madness is being cooked up.
Joker: Folie á Deux is slated for an October 4, 2024 release. You can next see Gleeson in The Banshees of Inisherin, which bows on October 21, 2022.
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Featured image: VENICE, ITALY – SEPTEMBER 05: Brendan Gleeson attends “The Banshees Of Inisherin” red carpet at the 79th Venice International Film Festival on September 05, 2022 in Venice, Italy. (Photo by Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images)
There’s a lot of movement in next year’s movie slate. The bright news comes from Warner Bros, with the studio revealing that Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two will now open on November 3, 2023, rather than its original release date of November 17, 2023. The move comes on the heels of Marvel Studios announcing that Blade, starring Mahershala Ali, will now be pushed back from its November 3, 2023, release as the studio searches for a new director.
Dune: Part Two is going to be one of next year’s most hotly-anticipated films, coming so soon off the heels of Villeneuve’s magisterial Dune, which bowed on October 21, 2021, and became a critical and commercial hit for Warner Bros. The sequel will tackle the second half of Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel “Dune,” which Villeneuve and his co-writer Jon Spaihts so eloquently halved in their Oscar-nominated screenplay for the first film. Part Two will find Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) strengthening his ties with the Fremen, led by Stilgar (Javier Bardem) as he attempts to free the planet of Arrakis from the oppressive, murderous House Harkonnen.
The returning stars of the original film joining Chalamet and Bardem are Zendaya as Chani, Rebecca Ferguson as Lady Jessica Atreides, Josh Brolin as Gurney Halleck, Stellan Skarsgård as Baron Vladimir Harkonnen, and Dave Bautista as Glossu Rabban Harkonnen.
The new members of the cast include Christopher Walken as Emperor Shaddam IV, the man who originally set up the Atreides family to be ambushed on Arrakis, Florence Pugh as his daughter, Princess Irulan Corrino, Austin Butler as Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, the nephew of Stellan Skarsgård’s Baron Harkonnen, and Léa Seydoux as Lady Margot.
Villeneuve’s made a big bet on himself, his cast, and his crew with his original Dune, designing it as only half of the story before he was guaranteed a second film. Heck, he even put Part One at the very start of his movie. That bet paid off, with Dune winning six Oscars, with the movie moving briskly and confidently without trying to capture everything Herbert put into his iconic, long novel. Part Two will finish the saga and arguably offers some of the book’s most breathtaking, thrilling sequences. Warner Bros. made a wise decision.
For more on Dune and Dune: Part Two, check out these stories:
Featured image: Caption: Escape from a sandworm in Warner Bros. Pictures’ and Legendary Pictures’ action adventure “DUNE,” a Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary release. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures and Legendary Pictures
There are times when a movie can feel like more than a movie, and that’s certainly the case with Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Made in the wake of star Chadwick Boseman’s death in August of 2020, Wakanda Forever was completely re-envisioned and made into something vastly different from what the sequel was supposed to be with Boseman as its star. The result of Coogler’s work with his cast and crew will be seen in exactly a month, but a new video gives us a good sense of what it meant to the people who made the film.
“Audiences have embraced Wakanda and Black Panther, and Chadwick, he knew exactly what this story, what these images meant to the world,” Angela Bassett says at the top of the video.Bassett plays Queen Ramonda, the mother of Boseman’s T’Challa, and the woman trying to hold Wakanda together in the aftermath of his loss. This new video reveals how Bassett and other members of the Wakanda Forever cast approached the sequel without Boseman by their side.
“Chad was very much our artistic partner; I would spend time with him, just he and I talking about where we wanted to see the story go and how much he admired the other characters,” says co-writer and director Ryan Coogler.
“It was really moving to come back to Wakanda and for us to be able to do it with a sense of celebration,” says Lupita Nyong’o, who plays Nakia in the film.
“In the telling of this story, we were all able to honor him together,” Bassett adds.
Letitia Wright, who plays Shuri, T’Challa’s sister, points out that this return trip to Wakanda also includes meeting new characters, like Dominque Thorne’s Riri Williams, aka Ironheart, as well as venturing into a brand new world beneath the waves, where the film’s supposed villain, Namor (Tenoch Huerta) rules his underwater kingdom.
“Introducing Namor was a character we were really excited to portray in the film. Arguably one of the oldest comic book characters there is,” says Coogler.
“Playing a character like this—it’s a dream,” says Tenoch Huerta.
More so than any previous Wakanda Forever trailer teaser, this video seems to more clearly reveal that Namor is unlikely to be the film’s true villain. The character has been both an adversary and ally of Black Panther in the comics, and in Coogler and co-writer Joe Robert Cole’s telling, Namor is a proud king to his people, considered a living god by many, and someone who likely wouldn’t lay waste to Wakanda for purely homicidal purposes, like some previous Marvel villains we’ve seen.
There are many mysteries to be revealed in Wakanda Forever, none bigger than seeing how this talented cast and crew honored Boseman, who will step in to fill T’Challa’s role as Black Panther, and who might the real villain be if Namor turns out to be more of a friend than foe.
Check out the video below. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever opens wide on November 11.
For more on Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, check out these stories:
We know the core details of Black Adam’s backstory thanks to both the comics and, more crucially, the teasers and trailers that Warner Bros. has released thus far. Black Adam (Dwayne Johnson) was born a slave, executed, and resurrected by his son’s sacrifice. This is an antihero as powerful as any member of the Justice League (or the Justice Society, who we’ll get to in a minute), possibly even more so. What’s more, he’s angry. Awoken after 5,000 years of slumber, Black Adam will depict an antihero with ancient ideas about how one delivers justice and more power than anyone he comes into contact with knows how to handle.
Warner Bros. has revealed a slew of new images which give us a closer look at some of the people Black Adam is about to cross paths with, most notably the Justice Society. Led by Doctor Fate (Pierce Brosnan), the Justice Society includes its own potent do-gooders; Hawkman (Aldis Hodge), Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell), and Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo). All of them are depicted below. Each of them will have to come to terms with the way Black Adam handles his business.
The new images also include looks at Adrianna (Sarah Shahi) and Karim (Mohammed Amer), two regular folks who will get swept up in Black Adam’s story.
This movie has been a long time coming, and at long last, we’re just a few weeks away. We’ll finally see how massive of an impact Dwayne Johnson’s arrival on the DCEU scene is and how Black Adam will fit into that interconnected ecosystem of superheroes. We know one thing for certain—Black Adam and Shazam will meet, on screen, in an epic clash.
Check out the new images below. Black Adam arrives in theaters on October 21.
Caption: (L-r) PIERCE BROSNAN as Dr. Fate and ALDIS HODGE as Hawkman in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Frank MasiCaption: DWAYNE JOHNSON as Black Adam in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. PicturesCaption: (L-r) SRAH SHAHI as Adrianna and MOHAMMED AMER as Karim in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Frank MasiCaption: PIERCE BROSNAN as Dr. Fate in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Frank MasiCaption: ALDIS HODGE as Hawkman in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. PicturesCaption: NOAH CENTINEO as Atom Smasher in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Frank MasiCaption: QUINTESSA SWINDELL as Cyclone in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Frank MasiCaption: (L-r) PIERCE BROSNAN as Dr. Fate and DWAYNE JOHNSON as Black Adam in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Frank MasiCaption: PIERCE BROSNAN as Dr. Fate in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. PicturesCaption: QUINTESSA SWINDELL as Cyclone in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures
Featured image: Caption: DWAYNE JOHNSON as Black Adam in New Line Cinema’s action adventure “BLACK ADAM,” a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo Credit: Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures
Kenneth Branagh is slipping back into a dual role that he’s come to know inside and out—directing and starring in his third Hercule Poirot murder mystery for 20th Century Studios. A Haunting in Venice will make the esteemed performer and auteur’s Agatha Christie adaptations a proper trilogy, and he’s bringing along another A-list cast of suspects to populate his whodunit.
Following Branagh’s first two Christie adaptations, Murder on the Orient Express (2017) and Death on the Nile (2022), A Haunting in Venice will take the action to that iconic, shadowy jewel of a city on the Adriatic Sea. A Haunting in Venice will boast a delicious menu of potential murder suspects, including Tina Fey, Michelle Yeoh, Jamie Dornan (re-teaming with Branagh after starring in Belfast), Jude Hill, and Kelly Reilly. They’ll all join Branagh, along with Riccardo Scamarico, Ali Khan, Camille Cottin, Kyle Allen, and Emma Laird. It remains a mystery, for now, who these folks are playing.
Branagh’s third trip into Agatha Christie’s gem-sharp world of betrayal, murder, and meticulous attention to detail by her formidable sleuth is set to begin production this Halloween. It’s a fitting start date for a film inspired by Christie’s 1969 novel “Hallowe’en Party.”
Christie’s novel is kickstarted by a 13-year-old girl who’s found dead in an apple-bobbing tub. The young girl had previously claimed she’d witnessed a murder when she was younger, so her own demise now reeks of a killer tying up loose ends. The adaptation is being written by Michael Green, and 20th Century Studios has revealed A Haunting in Venice‘s logline:
“Now retired and living in self-imposed exile in the world’s most glamorous city, Poirot reluctantly attends a séance at a decaying, haunted palazzo. When one of the guests is murdered, the detective is thrust into a sinister world of shadows and secrets.”
Poirot retired in Venice? That sounds about right, but if he really wanted to stay retired, shouldn’t he have gone to some small, remote village where the chances of foul play were far less than that infamously seductive, sin-filled city? Nevertheless, the mustachioed master detective is back.
“This is a fantastic development of the character Hercule Poirot, as well as the Agatha Christie franchise,” said Branagh in a statement. “Based on a complex, little-known tale of mystery set at Halloween in a pictorially ravishing city, it is an amazing opportunity for us, as filmmakers, and we are relishing the chance to deliver something truly spine-chilling for our loyal movie audiences.”
For more stories on Century Studios, Searchlight Pictures, Marvel Studios, and what’s streaming or coming to Disney+, check these out:
With co-writer/director Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever now just a month away, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is about to enter Phase Five. Coogler’s film, the last installment in the MCU’s Phase Four, was always going to expand the world of Wakanda that he and his creative team explored so masterfully in 2018’s Black Panther, but that was a world led by Chadwick Boseman’s T’Challa. With Boseman’s tragic passing in August of 2020, Coogler and his Wakanda Forever cast and crew had to reimagine what that world would look like without Boseman. The results will be seen when the film bows on November 11, and new images (and the recent official trailer) reveal that it’ll be led by the women of Wakanda.
The images do include one great shot of M’Baku (Winston Duke), the leader of the Jabari Tribe, a key figure in Wakanda, and a crucial ally in the fight ahead in Wakanda Forever.
Yet, by and large, the images show how it’s the women of Wakanda who will shape the future of the technologically advanced society. We already saw that a new female Black Panther will be revealed in Wakanda Forever—in the comics, it was Shuri, T’Challa’s sister, depicted in the films by Letitia Wright. While Shuri seems like a safe bet, there are other candidates, including Okoye (Danai Gurira) and Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o), both of whom are more than capable.
The new images include the main photo in this article, which shows Okoye and Shuri in street clothes and wearing shades, presumably on a mission outside of Wakanda. There are also two great shots of Queen Ramonda (Angela Bassett), T’Challa’s mother, and the most potent voice we’ve heard thus far in the teaser and official trailer.
In the above image, we see Okoye and Ramonda in conversation; in another image, we’ve got Okoye showing us why she’s the leader of the Dora Milaje, Wakanda’s fiercest sworn protectors and special forces.
In another new image, Shuri stands in a burning throne room, looking very much like the picture of a person embarking on a dangerous, transformative journey—perhaps prior to becoming the new Black Panther.
The MCU’s Phase Four has seen a lot of changes, as well as the birth of Marvel’s Disney+ series, greatly expanding the universe. But it’s been the most bittersweet phase due to Boseman’s passing, and it seems fitting that Wakanda Forever will end one era for the super studio and begin another. Phase Five will continue the MCU’s expansion into a more diverse universe, with the Nia DaCosta-directed The Marvels, the introduction of Mahershala Ali as Blade, and the first feature film starring Anthony Mackie as the new Captain America in Captain America: New World Order. While Wakanda Forever marks the end of Phase Four, its diverse cast and crew, and its powerful female characters, point to the future of the MCU.
For more on Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, check out these stories:
The Planet of the Apes franchise is getting a new installment. Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes has begun production at Disney Studios in Australia (formerly Fox Studios in Australia) in Sydney. This new installment will begin an all-new chapter in the epic saga that was last directed by The Batman helmer Matt Reeves in his excellent 2017 trilogy capper War for the Planet of the Apes.
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is being directed by Wes Ball (director of the Maze Runner trilogy) from a script by Josh Friedman, Amanda Silver, Rick Jaffa, and Patrick Aison. The creative team is taking on one of the most iconic franchises of them all, one that has spanned generations, starting with the first film, Planet of the Apes, which arrived in 1968 and starred Charlton Heston, was a huge hit that spawned four theatrical sequels, two TV series. Then came Tim Burton’s 2001 remake of Planet of the Apes, followed by the critically and commercially successful reboot, begun in 2011, with director Rupert Wyatt’s Rise of the Planet of the Apes, followed by Matt Reeves’s Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) and War for the Planet of the Apes.
Here’s what Steve Asbell, the President of 20th Century Studios, said about the new film in a statement: “We’re thrilled to be in Sydney filming Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes at the world-class Disney Studios Australia. Planet of the Apes is one of the most iconic and storied science fiction franchises in film history and an indelible part of our studios’ legacy. The extraordinary director Wes Ball and cast and crew are continuing the series’ tradition of imaginative, thought-provoking cinema. We can’t wait to share this new chapter with audiences in 2024.”
For more stories on Century Studios, Searchlight Pictures, Marvel Studios and what’s streaming or coming to Disney+, check these out:
You knew that King Viserys wouldn’t likely survive another time jump in House of the Dragon, so when we learned at the beginning of episode 8 that we’d leaped ahead another 6 years, it was bad news for the ruler of the realm. And sure enough, after seeing that Princess Rhaenyra and Queen Alicent’s children are now more or less adults, we also got a look at the King. The poor man is in a dreadful state, yet the affairs of House Targaryen, and the realm, run on without his input, thanks to his dutiful Hand, Otto Hightower, and his newly pious Queen, his dear Alicent. That is, until Princess Rhaenrya, Prince Daemon, and their children arrive for some important business—you know how family reunions go with these people.
“As the years have gone by post-Alicent’s outburst, Alicent’s found religion as a way to redeem herself,” says season one showrunner/executive producer/director Miguel Sapochnik in this week’s “Inside the Episode” video. In episode 8, we learn that Alicent has begun taking seriously the new religion of the Seven Gods, which is not the Targaryen custom. It spooks Rhaenyra and Daemon to return to King’s Landing, there to deal with the issue of who will take up the throne at Driftmark in the absence of Lord Corlys Velayron, aka the Sea Snake, who is missing and presumed dead. Lord Corlys’ brother, Vaemond Velayron, believes he is the rightful heir to the Driftmark throne, his blood true Velaryon blood. Princess Rhaenyra believes the throne belongs to her son Lucerys. Upon arrival for this weighty business, they find their former home has been renovated with images and architecture based on the Queen’s new religion.
“In the scene where Rhaenyra and Daemon return to King’s Landing for the first time, they see a difference,” says episode eight director Geeta Vasant Patel. “The difference is the giant seven-pointed star that’s hanging in the main hallway,” says Emma D’Arcy, who plays Rhaenyra. “Gaudy, if you ask me.”
Gaudy and creepy. The bursts of light and Targaryen-infused erotica that were evident in the early episodes in King’s Landing have been replaced with a somber palette, more befitting a monastery, as co-showrunner/producer/writer Ryan Condal says, and one that functions like a hospice in episode 8. That’s because King Viserys is at the end of the line, delirious on the milk of the poppy when he’s not writhing in pain, too far gone to help run the realm. Or so Queen Alicent Otto Hightower would have Rhaenyra and Daemon believe.
Because episode 8 deals with the question of who will rule Driftmark now, the decision would usually be made by the King, but in his absence or inability to decide, it would be handled by his Hand and the Queen. This means Rhaenyra must ask her enemies (unsworn but well-known) to recognize her son as the rightful heir to Driftmark. As Condal puts it in the video, this is a farce. Rhaenyra knows it, Alicent knows it, and everyone in the room knows it. Whenever Rhaenyra and Alicent are together, you almost wait for some King’s Landing flutist to play a cover of Kendrick Lamar and Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood.”
But as the petition gets under way, the episode’s first big twist arrives. King Viserys hobbles into the throne room on his cane, barely enough strength to make it across the room. His brother Daemon has to help him to the throne (and pick up his fallen crown, no less.) This heroic effort comes the day after Rhaenyra visited him by his bedside to ask him if Aegon’s vision he told her about when she was a child, the reason he said she would rule, was real or just a dream. The King didn’t seem to understand Rhaenyra at the moment, but although hobbled, he’s clearer than he’s been in weeks (maybe months or years) in the Throne Room. King Viserys doesn’t understand why there’s even a petition being heard when his grandson Lucerys is, by law and custom, the heir to the Driftmark throne. When Vaemond Velayron explodes in anger, insulting Rhaenyra and calling her a whore, Prince Daemon cuts his head in half (it’s the season’s goriest shot by far).
The episode draws to a close with a tense dinner that the King arranges and attends—for as long as he can. He uses the last of his strength to beg his family to stop their quibbling and quarreling, if for no other reason than out of respect for an old man who loves them very dearly. For a little while, his heartfelt plea seems to work. Princess Rhaenyra raises a toast to Queen Alicent, and Alicent does so in return. There seems to be a legitimate thaw in their years-long feud. Their children aren’t nearly as thoughtful, however, and soon the King needs to be carried back to his room.
Ewan Mitchell is Aemond Targaryen in “House of the Dragon.” Photograph by Ollie Upton / HBO
The King’s time is up. As he’s dying, he tells Alicent (who he clearly thinks is his daughter Rhaenyra) that, yes, Aegon had a real vision about a “prince that was promised” to save the realm from darkness. Only now he realizes the prince is “you,” a princess, his daughter. Alicent was confused for a bit but, by the end, seemed to have made some sense of her dying husband’s words. Has she realized Princess Rhaenyra crept into their bed chamber late at night before the King surprised everyone and showed up at the petition? Only time will tell, and in House of the Dragon, time is a fluid thing indeed, with years slipping by in mere days. It seems safe to say that in the future, the Queen and the Princess will resume their battle.
Check out the “Inside the Episode” video here:
For more on House of the Dragon, check out these stories:
Marvel Studios is a global powerhouse that has created its own universe of films, each one connected yet capable of standing on its own as a major box office draw. When Marvel turned its sights to streaming, its new series only extended its vaunted MCU on Disney+, further cementing the studio’s claim as the biggest hitmaker in the world. Which is why Marvel’s Werewolf By Night is so unexpectedly delicious. Here, then, is a brief, potent horror film, a completely different avenue for the studio to explore without nary a superhero to be found (although the main character, played by Gabriel Garcia Bernal, does have a connection to Moon Knight, the superhero played by Oscar Isaac in the Disney+ series). And the reviews are overwhelmingly positive, giving Marvel another genre to potentially master. And they deployed master composer Michael Giacchino to not only score the film but direct it, too.
Werewolf By Night is inspired by 1930s and 40s horror films and is led by Gabriel Garcia Bernal’s monster-hunting werewolf, Jack Russell. The film is centered on a simple and effective conceit; Jack is summoned, along with a bunch of other monster hunters, to the Bloodstone Temple after the death of their leader, the legendary monster hunter Ulysses Bloodstone. Their somber reunion turns into a ferocious competition as they’re all after the same thing—a potent relic that has been left for a yet-to-be-determined heir. Of all the monster hunters who gathered at the Bloodstone Temple, the lycanthropic Jack Russell is said to be the best. The stakes are set—a ferocious monster will be let loose on the Bloodstone Estate, and whoever can catch it wins the relic.
Onto the reviews!
The creepiest and bloodiest Marvel project by far, #WerewolfByNight is a triumphant first effort at losing the capes and spandex and diving into campy, old-school horror. Read @jordanmoreau_‘s review here: https://t.co/Kyk1fCQcFb
Rolling Stone‘s David Fear says, “Taken on its own, Werewolf by Night feels less like a franchise detour than a fun day trip into previously untrampled genre territory.”
indieWire‘s Marisa Mirabal writes, “Utilizing elements of dark comedy, light romance, and friendship, Werewolf by Night is successfully able to balance fun and fright.”
Bob Strauss of the San Francisco Chronicle calls the film “An hour of pure cinematic delight.”
Collider‘s Maggie Boccola writes, “The series is not just your standard stale Marvel tale masquerading under a layer of black-and-white Photoshop — no, it understands what makes a horror tale, down to the condensed nature that was so popular in the early days of film.”
Slashfilm‘s Valerie Ettenhoffer says that “Werewolf By Night, more than perhaps anything Marvel has ever done before, is proof that an epic runtime does not equal an epic cinematic experience.”
IGN Movie‘s Ryan Leston writes, “Werewolf by Night may not make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, but it will keep you on the edge of your seat with a slow, creeping tone that captures the very best of classic horror.”
For those folks not deeply vested in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review‘s Rob Owen assures you, “Werewolf by Night requires no knowledge or understanding of the Marvel multiverse, it’s just an entertaining, 52-minute program shot in the style of classic Universal Studios monster movies.”
Werewolf by Night is available on Disney+ now.
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The Super Mario Bros. Movie has released its official trailer, revealing the first animated take on the iconic video game with a star-studded voice cast. That cast is led by Chris Pratt as the indefatigable plumber-turned-hero Mario, and he’s joined by a slew of stars. They include Anya Taylor-Joy as Princess Peach, Charlie Day as Luigi, Jack Black as Bowser, Keegan-Michael Key as Toad, Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong, Fred Armisen as Cranky Kong, Sebastian Maniscalco as Spike, and Kevin Michael Richardson as Kamek.
This is not the first time we’ve seen the Super Mario Bros. in a film. Way back in 1993, we had the live-action film starring Bob Hoskins as Mario, John Leguizamo as Luigi, and, incredibly, Denis Hopper as Bowser. The new iteration is a collaboration between Nintendo and Illumination, the latter of whom is the animation studio responsible for the Minions franchise. Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto, the creator of Mario, teams with Illumination’s Chris Meledandri as producers. Your directors are Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic, the duo behind Teen Titans Go! To the Movies. The script comes from The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part writer Matthew Fogel.
The trailer reveals the film’s premise, which finds Bowser and his Koopa Troopas making some serious trouble for an ice kingdom ruled by penguins. What Bowser’s after is the luminous “Mario” star, which will give him immense powers. Once he has it, he asks, “Now, who’s gonna stop me?” How about an Italian plumber and his plucky friends?
Check out the trailer below. The Super Mario Bros. Movie hits theaters on April 7.
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Mike White’s Emmy-slathered comedy The White Lotus was one of 2021’s most deliciously deranged comedies, and now HBO has shared the trailer for season two, which moves the scourges of the privileged vacationers from Hawaii to Italy.
How do you come off a season that garnered 20 Emmy nominations across 13 categories and 10 wins (the most for any show this year), including Oustanding Limited or Anthology Series? One way is to bring back one of season one’s standouts, the unimprovable Jennifer Coolidge, who returns as the tipsy, sweet-natured Tayna McQuoid. Coolidge joins another stellar cast, including F. Murray Abraham, Adam DiMarco, Beatrice Grannò, Meghann Fahy, Jon Gries, Tom Hollander, Sabrina Impacciatore, Michael Imperioli, Theo James, Aubrey Plaza, Haley Lu Richardson, Will Sharpe, Simona Tabasco, and Leo Woodall.
Season two’s action takes place in the titular White Lotus resort in Sicily, where family squabbles (amongst the Italian American guests), marital squabbles, hard partying, and poor choices will once again be under a microscope. As was the case in the first season, the White Lotus Sicily staff will find themselves plunged into the pathologies of their moneyed guests. Let’s see if season two can top the fate of Murray Bartlett’s Armond from season one.
The trailer offers an apertivo of what’s to come. White hit a grand slam with the first season of his biting social satire, and there’s little doubt he won’t make the most of the Sicilian setting and comedic chops of his cast.
Check out the trailer here. The White Lotus returns to HBO on Sunday, October 30, at 9 pm ET/PT.
F. Murray Abraham as BERT DI GRASSO – Visiting Sicily with his son, Dominic (Michael Imperioli), and grandson, Albie (Adam DiMarco), Bert is getting frail, yet still sees himself as virile and capable.
Jennifer Coolidge as TANYA MCQUOID-HUNT – A wealthy, unstable woman, traveling with her husband, Greg (Jon Gries), and assistant, Portia (Haley Lu Richardson).
Adam DiMarco as ALBIE DI GRASSO – Dominic’s (Michael Imperioli) son and Bert’s (F. Murray Abraham) grandson, Albie is a sweet and observant college grad, who often serves as his family’s peacekeeper.
Meghann Fahy as DAPHNE BABCOCK – A stay-at-home mom visiting Italy with her husband, Cameron (Theo James), and another couple, Ethan (Will Sharpe) and Harper (Aubrey Plaza).
Jon Gries as GREG – Tanya’s (Jennifer Coolidge) husband, who is less than pleased to find her assistant invited on their romantic getaway.
Beatrice Grannò asMIA – A Sicilian local, Mia is a talented singer in search of her big break.
Tom Hollander as QUENTIN – an English expat, vacationing with his friends and his nephew, Jack (Leo Woodall).
Sabrina Impacciatore as VALENTINA – The passionate, dedicated manager in charge of the White Lotus resort in Taormina, who expects perfection from her staff.
Michael Imperioli asDOMINIC DI GRASSO – A Hollywood producer visiting Sicily with his elderly father, Bert (F. Murray Abraham), and post-college son, Albie (Adam DiMarco), to explore their ancestral roots.
Theo James as CAMERON BABCOCK – A wildly successful businessman from a wealthy family, Cameron is vacationing with his wife Daphne (Meghann Fahy), his college roommate, Ethan (Will Sharpe), and Ethan’s wife, Harper (Aubrey Plaza).
Aubrey Plaza as HARPER SPILLER – Newly wealthy after her husband finds professional success, Harper and Ethan (Will Sharpe) are visiting Italy with Ethan’s college roommate, Cameron (Theo James), and Cameron’s wife, Daphne (Meghann Fahy).
Haley Lu Richardson as PORTIA – A small-town girl and recent college graduate, Portia is traveling with her boss, Tanya (Jennifer Coolidge), hoping for adventure.
Will Sharpe as ETHAN SPILLER – After recently striking professional success, Ethan and his wife, Harper (Aubrey Plaza), are invited to vacation in Italy with his college roommate, Cameron (Theo James), and Cameron’s wife, Daphne (Meghann Fahy).
Simona Tabasco asLUCIA– a Sicilian local who frequents the White Lotus resort in search of work and opportunity amongst the wealthy clientele.
Leo Woodall as JACK – a magnetic guest staying at The White Lotus with his uncle, Quentin (Tom Hollander).
For more on Warner Bros., HBO, and HBO Max, check out these stories:
Featured image: Francesco Zecca as Matteo, Leo Woodall as Jack, Tom Hollander as Quentin, Jennifer Coolidge as Tanya McQuoid-Hunt, Haley Lu Richardson as Portia. Photo courtesy HBO.
You know a great way to hatch the long-gestating superhero project? Get three big-time superhero writers to team up on the script.
That’s precisely what’s happened for Blumhouse’s Spawn, based on Todd McFarlane’s comic book character, with none other than Jamie Foxx attached. The potential film now has three major stars collaborating on the script—The Falcon and the Winter Soldier‘s scribe Malcolm Spellman (he’s also co-writer on the upcoming Captain America: New World Order), Joker writer Scott Silver (co-writer on the upcoming Joker 2), and rising star Matt Mixon.
Foxx has been attached to the project for a while, which has been in development at Blumhouse since 2017. The antihero made his first appearance in McFarlane’s comic book in 1992 and has been beloved ever since. In the comics, Spawn is a former black-ops agent who makes a very dark bargain with a demon after he’s betrayed and killed. The deal is that the demon allows Spawn to return to Earth, but when he does, he finds that the place isn’t like he left it. His wife has moved on, and he’s doomed to roam the planet in his disfigured form, a literal spawn of hell.
McFarlane, one of the film’s producers, wrote a previous draft and has hoped that he’d end up in the director’s chair. Yet what he’s most passionate about, as he made clear, is that the film gets the best possible people on board. Nabbing Spellman, Silver, and Mixon is a good start.
“If we’ve got an A-list actor, A-list producers, A-list writers, then do you want to shoot for A-list directors, A-list cinematographers?” McFarlane told The Hollywood Reporter. “The answer is, ‘Of course.’ Let’s keep the momentum going.”
Spellman, meanwhile, explained in a statement why he was so excited to be working on the film.
“I grew up in Berkeley, which is a comic book city. Todd McFarlane’s Spawn character was always one of my favorites — a Black superhero that was no bullshit; he was cool and dealt with modern issues. Myself, Matt Mixon, and Scott Silver are pledged to honoring what Todd started and what Spawn is at its core, delivering something that’s relevant and edgy and unlike any other superhero movie out there.”
Spawn was made into a movie back in 1997 from director Mark A.Z. Dippé and starring Michael Jai White. For the new iteration, MacFarlane said he was inspired to reach out to Joker‘s Scott Silver after seeing the film, a surprisingly dark, R-rated story that was nonetheless a massive success.
“Why not just go for the guy who wrote the movie?” MacFarlane said to THR. To his surprise, Silver said he was interested. “It was a complete Hail Mary. Sometimes timing is everything.”
Featured image: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – DECEMBER 13: Jamie Foxx attends Sony Pictures’ “Spider-Man: No Way Home” Los Angeles Premiere on December 13, 2021 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Amy Sussman/Getty Images)
It was a good day to be an attendee at the Busan Film Festival in South Korea. Select audience members at the fest paid $5 for a pair of 3-D glasses for a chance to see 15 minutes of James Cameron’s Avatar sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water.
It goes without saying at this point that Cameron’s been working long and hard, along with his cast and crew, to bring off a sequel that won’t only match his 2009 epic but exceed it in all ways. Cameron isn’t just making Avatar: The Way of Water, but two more films in the franchise, too. In fact, Avatar producer Jon Landau revealed to the festivalgoers that Avatar 4‘s first act is almost completed.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For Avatar: The Way of Water, those select audience members at the Busan Film Festival got a crash course in what Cameron and his team have been doing in order to make the sequel a one-of-a-kind filmgoing experience. The throughline of the presentation and screening was that The Way of Water utilized revolutionary technology to create something we’ve never quite seen before, much the same way Avatar did 13 years ago.
The events in The Way of Water take place more than a decade after the battle for Pandora that ended the original film. In the sneak peek that the Busan crowd saw, Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) are in the oceanic wonderland that is Pandora, the home planet of Neytiri’s people, the Na’vi. As the title suggests, Cameron’s sequel will be set both above and below the water, utilizing the aforementioned bespoke technology to capture novel shots, with creatures both familiar, like the majestic flying Toruks from the first film, and brand-new aquatic animals. Landau told the crowd that the filmmaking technology used in The Way of Water far exceeds what was on hand for the original Avatar, and that included a team of specialized VFX artists who created a brand new kind of underwater motion capture technology. Landau said that if Avatar was after creating effects that look photographic, the sequel is after photorealism.
Cameron is a longtime environmentalist and an oceanic explorer himself. During the footage reveal, he appeared via video link to talk about the sequel’s inspirations, which come from the increasingly dire threats to our besieged marine ecosystems. This follows Avatar‘s example, which showed the ruthless pursuit of profit as humans decimated Pandora’s forests. Cameron’s passion for conservation is the engine that has fueled this mega-franchise.
Returning alongside Zoe Saldana and Sam Worthington from the original film are Sigourney Weaver as Dr. Grace Augustine and Stephen Lang as Colonel Miles Quaritch. Two of the big-name newcomers include Vin Diesel and Kate Winslet.
Avatar: The Way of Water is due in theaters on December 16.
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Now that Daniel Craig has finished his run as James Bond with 2021’s emotional sendoff No Time To Die, attention has naturally turned to who will become the next 007. This past June, franchise producer Barbara Broccoli said that a new Bond film was at least two years away and that casting was going to take time because they were doing a complete “reinvention of Bond.”
“Nobody’s in the running,” Broccoli said to Deadline at the time. “We’re working out where to go with him, we’re talking that through. There isn’t a script, and we can’t come up with one until we decide how we’re going to approach the next film because, really, it’s a reinvention of Bond. We’re reinventing who he is, and that takes time. I’d say that filming is at least two years away.”
Now, at a British Film Institute panel celebrating the 60th anniversary of the deathless spy franchise (h/t Deadline), producer Michael G. Wilson revealed a few very key details about the next Bond. The biggest detail? The new Bond won’t be some young whippersnapper, but, crucially, he won’t be in his 40s, either, which means a lot of the older fan favorites, like Idris Elba, who seemed to take himself out of the running anyway, and Tom Hardy wouldn’t meet the age requirement.
“We’ve tried looking at younger people in the past,” Wilson said during the panel. “But trying to visualize it doesn’t work. Remember, Bond’s already a veteran. He’s had some experience. He’s a person who has been through the wars, so to speak. He’s probably been in the SAS or something. He isn’t some kid out of high school that you can bring in and start off. That’s why it works for a 30-something.”
So you can cross off the younger potential Bonds from your list, too—names like Tom Holland and Jacob Elordi. But, a Bond in his 30s does make it possible for somebody like Henry Cavill or Bridgerton‘s Regé-Jean Page to serve His Majesty’s Secret Service (it’s weird writing that, but it’s our new reality after Queen Elizabeth’s passing).
Not only does the next Bond require a few miles on his speedometer to account for having served with some distinction before the first film for the new character begins, but he needs to be young enough to absorb the decade (at minimum) of playing the character requires. The youngest Bond ever cast was George Lazenby, at 29, while Daniel Craig was 38 for his first rilm, Casino Royale. Roger Moore was the oldest first-time Bond, at a healthy 45 when he first appeared in The Man With the Golden Gone, while the original Bond, Sean Connery, was 32 when he appeared in the first film in the franchise, Dr. No.
If you’re jonesing for some Bond now, good news—you can now stream all 25 Bond films on Prime Video.
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