Charles Bramesco
IMPETUOUS FOOLS! Cower Before Noah Hawley’s Upcoming ‘Doctor Doom’ Solo Film!
One of the saddest aspects about the American film industry’s inexplicable inability to get the Fantastic Four right is the lack of a worthy cinematic representation of their primary foe, the menacing, megalomaniacal, mysterious Doctor Doom. He’s a great character, with all the gravitas of a disgraced royal (he rules over the fictitious kingdom of Latveria, which is not the same as Latvia, in one of my childhood’s most major disappointments) and the volatility of a man driven by revenge. His mythology — the trademark green cape and metal faceplate, his grandiloquent manner of speaking — has already inspired at least one legend in the world of music, and now the movies will finally catch up.
Gary Busey’s Real-Life Son Will Portray His ‘Predator’ Character’s Son in New Reboot
As Shane Black works on his planned Predator reboot, details continue to leak out of the production. The latest concerns a new casting notice with greater significance than one might think – an Easter egg embedded in a specific actor’s mere presence. Friends, the Busey family legacy is about to be carried on by the next generation.
What Really Happened With Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s ‘Han Solo’ Departure
If you’ve made use of the internet in the past week, then you may very well be aware of a recent personnel change-up on the set of the gestating Han Solo spinoff film. Original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller are out, Ron Howard’s in, but as with most showbiz behind-the-scenes drama, the details have been kept under wraps. That is, until The Hollywood Reporter ran an illuminating new item this morning, getting the dish on what really drove the two filmmakers away from this project. The catch-all code word of “creative differences” does not even come close to doing justice to the antipathy between the Lord-Miller brain trust and Lucasfilm.
As ‘Harry Potter’ Turns 20, J.K. Rowling Thanks Her Fans on Twitter
Two decades ago, could any of us have predicted the future that awaited Harry Potter? One massively successful book expanded to seven, which begat a theme park, a universe’s worth of merchandising, eight films, a play, and a new tangentially related franchise. And for those fans who still want more Potter, there is Pottermore.
Jar Jar Begs Ron Howard for ‘Han Solo’ Screentime in New Funny or Die Video
The news that Ron Howard would take the directorial reins on Han Solo from Chris Miller and Phil Lord was met with a mixed reception by the ardent Star Wars fanbase. Some remembered Howard as the director behind Apollo 13, a movie partially set in outer space (the same location as much of Han Solo, presumably!), and figured he’d be right for the job. Others had fresher recollections of Ron Howard’s Inferno, a.k.a. Bad Tom Hanks Hairpiece 3, and expressed some misgivings. But today, one ardent supporter of Howard‘s has made a statement from the shadows on why he’s a perfect fit for the franchise, though he may have some rubbery, alien skin in the game.
Jack Black Confirms That Robin Williams’ ‘Jumanji’ Character Has a Role (of Sorts) in Remake
With so many massive studio tentpoles springing up all over, you’d be forgiven for letting the gestating Jumanji remake slip your mind. The rework of the ’90s kid-friendly fantasy film, playing under the somewhat unwieldy title Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (yeah, tack the tagline right onto the title, why not!) will come to theaters December 20, but prying eyes have already ensnared some key details about the film. There was the whole brouhaha surrounding Karen Gillan’s hilariously impractical jungle outfit and her mealy-mouthed explanation as to why her character had to get all hotted up for a nature expedition, a controversy I have dubbed Midriffgate, and now today brings news of another curious detail of story.
Spider-Man Hits the Bodega in His Latest Teaser
Spider-Man’s a true New Yorker: he understands when to take the 6 train versus rolling the dice on the 2nd Avenue subway, he knows where to get the Bronx’s best chopped cheese, and when he needs a snack in a pinch, he hits up his friendly neighborhood bodega. In the latest promotional spot for the umpteenth reboot Spider-Man: Homecoming, the web-head is late to a big NBA Finals watching party at Tony Stark’s place. (The commercial was written to air specifically during the basketball playoffs this year.) But when he ducks into a nearby bodega — for those uninitiated, it’s really just a corner convenience store, but immeasurably better in every way — he has a chance encounter.
So Who’s ‘The Last Jedi,’ Anyway? Here’s a Hint From the ‘Star Wars’ Team
For those who engage in it, speculating on the significance of obscure clues in the Star Wars universe has gone beyond a hobby and grown into a way of life. Even something as simple as a three-word phrase — one word of which is “the” — can spark months of obsessive investigation. And while George Lucas’ disciples will have to wait until December to finally learn the identity of The Last Jedi’s title figure, that has not stopped the dogged gumshoes of Vanity Fair from pumping key figures for information.
Watch Will Ferrell’s Rousing Rendition of ‘I Will Always Love You’ at USC’s Commencement
Beaming families, teary smiles, mortarboards in the air — it’s graduation season, which means that more importantly, it’s celebrity commencement address season. While some high-profile speakers have received a chillier reception than others, the A-lister speech has long been a reliably amusing diversion in between long-winded orations from dusty academic types. Maya Rudolph took plenty of artistic license with “The Star-Spangled Banner” at my graduation ceremony from Tulane a few years ago, an unforgettable experience that I was too drunk to currently remember. But today brings video of another movie star taking the stage before a mass of fresh-faced students blissfully unaware of how hard getting a job is. Ladies, gentlemen, Will Ferrell is in the house.
‘Beauty and the Beast’ Knocked ‘Star Wars’ Out of the All-Time Domestic Box Office Top 10
This past weekend, a seismic shift in box-office history took place and went largely unnoticed. The writing was on the wall for Star Wars’ legacy in the all-time top 10 highest-earning films, as noted on Reddit prior to the start of this past weekend. Box-office behemoth Beauty and the Beast continued to generate healthy grosses in its fifth weekend of release, ending the weekend with a princely (or should I say, princessly!) sum of $471.1 million. This gave the film a slight edge of the next-most-lucrative film on the list, which just so happened to be George Lucas’ original space opus. Star Wars and its lifetime gross of $461 million have now slid down to the #11 spot.