Despite the superhero fatigue, Marvel’s engine keeps on chugging. While not exactly the same as DC’s The Suicide Squad, Marvel’s Thunderbolts brings together a group of heroes & villains together in the hopes that they can work together against a larger threat. If you haven’t studied, watching AntMan & the Wasp, Black Widow, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and The Falcon & The Winter Soldier will get you caught up on recent events.
Thunderbolts focuses on Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh), who is caught in a crossfire that includes the U.S. Agent, John Walker (Wyatt Russell), The Ghost, a.k.a. Ava Starr (Hannah John-Kamen), and the newly rehabilitated Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan). I’m happy to see that Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ Valentina Allegra de Fontaine is back in the mix, along with Yelena’s dad Alexei, played by David Harbour.
Marvel’s Thunderbolts will be in cinemas May 2025.
I’ve enjoyed Leigh Whannell’s streak of films since going solo. His work on the Saw and Insidious films with James Wan is well known. Upgrade was a fantastic film and is one of my favorites of his. I enjoyed The Invisible Man, which took a unexpected approach to the original story. He’s at it again with Wolf Man, and it looks like it’s a more personal story here.
Starring Christopher Abbot (Poor Things) and Julia Garner(Sin City: A Dame to Kill For) star in the film, which seems to be about a family defending themselves while camping from a beast in the woods. I just hope the effects in this are on par with Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman. We’ll have to find out.
One cool thing to note here is that like James Wan did with his partner Ingrid Bisu for Malignant, Wolf Man is a spousal / partner affair. Both Lauren Schuker-Blum (wife of Blumhouse CEO Jason Blum, who produces the film) and Whannell have writing duties on this, along with Whannell’s wife, Corbett Tuck (Insidious & Insidious: Chapter 3).
Wolf Man will being in Theatres and IMAX next January.
Much like Fortnite, Minecraft is a game that everyone has either played or at least seen if they’ve kids in their vicinity. It’s basically a low resolution world building game where you face off against sprite skeletons and spiders if you either dig too deep underground or hang outside at night. It can be pretty fun, and is available on every platform from computers to the Nintendo Switch.
Jack Black seems like he’s out to cover every Video Game there is. With Super Mario Bros. and Borderlands under his belt, A Minecraft Movie is his next target. He’s not alone, though. Joining him are Jason Momoa (Fast X), Emma Myers (Netflix’s Wednesday), Emmy Winner Jennifer Coolidge (HBO’s The White Lotus), and Danielle Brooks (DC’s Peacemaker).
The trailer for Sonic the Hedgehog 3 dropped today, and it has Sonic (Ben Schwartz), Tails(Colleen O’Shaughnessey) & Knuckles (Idris Elba) squaring off against Shadow, voiced by Keanu Reeves. Shadow seems to be too much, even for the trio. It looks like we might get a team up with Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey). Of course, both Tom (James Marsden) and Maddie (Tika Sumpter) are still on hand to cheer on our heroes with moral support.
Sonic the Hedgehog 3 will be in cinemas this December.
ALERT! They took down their whiny trailer because all those bad reviews from Christmas Past were FAKE! Francis listen, I get it- everyone likes attention or whatever, but you playing the I’m so Put-Upon card is really really really ANNOYING! Cut it out! Paisan, you’ve had a great career and made BANK- BE HAPPY.
Welcome all, I’m going to review the “Megalopolis” trailer and just so you know – this was directed by a GENIUS. Really, that’s in the trailer and not just for a little while; they give a middle-finger to anyone who didn’t like a Coppola film for a solid 44 seconds! If you don’t think this movie is genius, too bad moron- it’s awesome, you’re a filthy plebe!
From what I can glean from the trailer, Cesar Catilina (Adam Driver) is tired of New York decadence; so, he wants to make a new city that’s way fancier and weirder. I’ve played Sim City before; so, maybe it’s got like a lot of happy faces when the plumbing works and sad faces if there’s not enough power? Without question, that was a fun game and if you didn’t enjoy it – you are part of the great unwashed!
This trailer has A LOT of scowling. Cesar Catilina scowls A LOT in the trailer and no one can scowl like Adam Driver. He was born to scowl!!!! Cesar appears to be a magical city planner who wants to make a better city that is vaguely or overtly communist- it is difficult to discern. If it’s anything like real communism, Francis will like it a lot theoretically without any consequences.
I have the distinct impression that this movie is more like a painting; it is visually stunning but with no plot. If you don’t like the film, remember you’re a petite bourgeois rube who brushes his teeth with his fingers. This film seems like “The Darjeeling Limited”- really pretty and Jason Schwatzman was in that film too and it revolved around finding good … tea??? I originally wrote it as “The Darjeeling UNLIMITED” now that would’ve been a film- Think of all the tea we could’ve watched them drink! Remember kids, you only rent Darjeeling Tea!!!
If you want a film where if you say you liked it, you’re 12% more sophisticated- “Megalopolis” is for you! For me, after this trailer, I think I’m going watch something with Dwayne “THE ROCK” Johnson in it. Maybe he’ll do a “Rampage 2”?
In conclusion, this film is GENIUS and the director is a GENIUS and if you don’t think so, I’m going to register you as a pederast and put garbage on your lawn!
When I recommended AMC’s Interview With the Vampire to my cousin, she watched the final episode of Season 2 in reverse, despite having read the novels numerous times. She doesn’t handle anxiety when it comes to stories very well, and as such, she never reads a book or watches anything unless she can know the ending in advance. Watching her view a film for the first time is like tossing a person into a room with whatever they fear. She gets squirmy, and asks tons of questions. Whenever I watch a new movie, I tell her everything about it, scene for scene (which is partially how I got into writing about movies). On the one hand, you could argue that knowing ruins all the surprises. On the other, you’ve moviegoers that spoil movies online while they’re still in the theatre.
She’d be fine with the final trailer for Fede Alvarez’s Alien Romulus, which really does give too much of the story away. If you’re planning to go in blind this August, I wouldn’t recommend watching this. I love how they worked in Ripley’s “Lucky Star” song into this. It looks great, and anything’s a step up from Alien Covenant.
I stumbled onto this while going through my music playlist on YouTube, and I had to figure out if this was an official teaser or was just a fan-made one. Sure enough, it appears the official teaser for Marvel Studios Captain America: Brave New World is available.
Picking up after the events of The Falcon and The Winter Soldier (or Captain America and The Winter Soldier), the film shows there are numerous changes & surprises afoot. Our long time Hulk adversary, Thaddeus Ross, shaved his mustache and changed his look with Harrison Ford taking over the role from the late William Hurt. It also looks like Isiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly) and Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez) have appearances.
Can the New Captain America handle these new threats? What is going on with Isiah? And will we finally get some information on that defeated celestial from The Eternals?
Captain America: Brave New World is set to hit theatres in February 2025.
I don’t know how or why we have a sequel to Ridley Scott’s Academy Award Winner Gladiator, but here it is in all its glory. It looks quite interesting, I have to say. In my opinion, Ridley’s films are a coin flip. This can go either way. And who knows? Maybe if we’re lucky, we’ll get a Kingdom of Heaven follow up. One can only hope.
Gladiator II looks like it’s expanding on the first film, at least in terms of the fighting arena. We have naval battles in the Colesseum now. Despite the fall of Commodus in the first film (Joaquin Phoenix), Rome still has issues. A young gladiator (Paul Mescal, All of Us Strangers) seems to have an issue with General Marcus Acacius, played by Wonder Woman 84 and The Last of Us’ Pedro Pascal. Ridley’s also reunited with American Gangster‘s Denzel Washington, as well as Gladiator‘s Connie Nielsen and Derek Jacobi. Also on hand are Joseph Quinn (A Quiet Place: Day One), Rory McCann (Jumanji: The Next Level), May Calamawy (Marvel’s Moon Knight) and Peter Mensah (300).
Harry Gregson-Williams (Man on Fire, Kingdom of Heaven) will be scoring the film, taking over for Hans Zimmer.
The trailer for Robert Zemeckis’s latest technical experiment, Here, dropped today. The film follows Tom Hanks and Robin Wright over the course of many decades and it uses de-aging technology to make them look younger. The reaction online seems to be mixed, with some saying that Hanks and Wright look like wax figures of themselves.
Personally, I would have cast Hanks and Wright’s respective children as the younger versions of themselves but de-aging is the hot thing right now.
Last Friday, I caught the trailer for Robert Eggers’ adaptation of Murnau’s Nosferatu just before Jeff Nichols’ The Bikeriders. While I’m not expecting it to be the masterpiece that Werner Herzog’s Nosferatu the Vampyre was, it definitely has The Lighthouse and The Norseman director’s familiar imprint on it. Willem Dafoe and Ralph Ineson (The Witch) are both on hand, along with Lily-Rose Depp , Bill Skarsgard and Nicholas Hoult. I’m very excited for this.
Robert Eggers Nosferatu will be in theatres this Christmas.
Through the Shattered Lens 