Matthew Monagle
New Study Shows Rotten Tomatoes Scores Don’t Affect Box Office
Well, that’s kinda awkward timing. On Thursday of last week, the New York Times published an article titled “Attacked by Rotten Tomatoes,” an in-depth look at the popular review aggregation site and the role it may have played in this summer’s disappointing box office numbers. The article ends with a prolonged examination of the various ways that studios are trying to “battle Rotten Tomatoes on multiple fronts,” seemingly accepting the idea that Rotten Tomatoes has been bad for the movie industry (despite the fact that Rotten Tomatoes is, in fact, owned by said members of the movie industry). The article may have been an interesting read for those unfamiliar with the controversy, but for those in the know, it was old news, part of an ongoing debate that tried to argue that critics were duping poor, easily misled moviegoers.
Sylvester Stallone Hints That ‘Creed 2’ Will Begin Filming in 2018
Despite the fact that Creed 2 remains very early in the pre-production process, Sylvester Stallone hasn’t shied away from providing fans with regular updates on his screenwriting process. That’s included photos of his handwritten Creed 2 script as well as a promise that his character would face off against Dolph Lundgren’s Ivan Drago in the much-anticipated sequel. And while star and studio have avoided giving us a firm timeline for the sequel’s release — I mean, other than a rumored 2017 release date that they, uh, are clearly going to miss — it sounds like Stallone is making a lot of progress on he film.
Danny Trejo Calls Out Actors (Cough-Tom Cruise-Cough) for Doing Their Own Stunts
It was the set video seen around the world: Tom Cruise, leaping between rooftops for a Mission: Impossible 6 stunt, and slamming into the side of the building at high speed. In the weeks since the accident was officially confirmed — it turns out that Cruise had broken his ankle in the fall — the entire production has been trying to put a positive spin on the news, with director Christopher McQuarrie saying Cruise’s injury actually offered the crew an ‘opportunity’ to tinker a bit with the edit mid-production. Still, the injury shows the downside of Cruise’s legendary attention to detail for movie stunts, and at least one fellow actor had a few unkind words to say about the whole process.
Paramount Sets a Release Date Befitting a Blockbuster for ‘Top Gun 2’
Let me make this perfectly clear: I’m less of a Top Gun fan and more of a fan of putting Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer in more blockbuster movies, but the end result is pretty much the same: I am ready for a little Top Gun 2 action. The long-rumored film — or perhaps just long-desired film — was finally confirmed by Cruise earlier this year, and now Paramount Pictures is cranking up the movie-making machine to deliver on the promise of more midair dogfights and subtle homoeroticism. With Cruise back, and Kilmer hopefully soon to follow, this could be the perfect throwback to the heydays of studio filmmaking of the late ’80s and early ’90s.
Happy Production-Has-Officially-Started-on-‘Deadpool 2’ Day, Dear
It’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for: Deadpool 2 is officially underway! Even though we’ve spent more than a year analyzing and talking about Ryan Reynolds’ merc with a mouth, the success of the original Deadpool movie is still kinda hard to believe. A $58 million R-rated superhero movie that went on to gross $780 million worldwide? A comic book movie that broke the mold so thoroughly that now every major studio is openly courting the R-rated crowd? Deadpool was a phenomenon, and none of us can wait to see if Reynolds and company are capable of avoiding the sophomore slump.
‘Venom’ and ‘Silver and Black’ Will Take Place in the Same Universe as ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’
For months now, we’ve assumed that any possible Spider-Man spinoffs would exist in a world separate from that of Spider-Man: Homecoming. With Sony and Marvel weaving a complicated web of licensed properties and revenue sharing, the safe bet was that Sony would choose to build up its own parallel world independent of Marvel’s, giving them complete ownership of those characters and their events without having to plug into a larger established canon. This seemed to be confirmed by Marvel boss Kevin Feige earlier this week, when Feige said in no uncertain terms that Venom would not be invited to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Disappointing for some, curious to others, but on the surface, it did make sense.
Weekend Box Office Report: ‘Cars 3’ Dethrones ‘Wonder Woman’
It’s a pleasant Sunday afternoon in the world, which means it’s time for your weekend box office updates! While this was a disappointing weekend overall for a handful of new releases, there’s good news to be had: after a disappointing $144 million total gross last weekend, the box office bounced back to $187 million total over the past few days. That takes some of the pressure off Wonder Woman to, you know, save the summer blockbuster as we know it. Here’s the totals as of Sunday afternoon:
Judge Declares a Mistrial in the Bill Cosby Rape Case
For years now, America has been struggling with the allegations that Bill Cosby — once a beloved television father and comedian — may have used his position in Hollywood to commit a series of violent sexual assaults. For those unfamiliar with the timeline involved in the Cosby case, I would encourage you to check out ABC’s detailed recap of everything that led up to this past month’s trial, including the civil cases brought against the actor-comedian and the Hannibal Burgess joke that is widely regarded as the instigating event in bringing these accusations to the public. And today, as noted by Deadline, a Norristown, PA jury has forced the judge to declare a mistrial in Andrea Costand’s case against Cosby.
‘The New Mutants’ Adds a ‘Stranger Things’ Star
For a movie that hasn’t even begun production yet, we certainly seem to know a lot about Josh Boone’s The New Mutants. We know that Boone has pitched The New Mutants as an X-Men take on a “full-fledged horror movie.” We know that James McAvoy will probably appear as Charles Xavier at some point. We know that the Maisie Williams and Anya Taylor-Joy, two of the biggest rising stars in Hollywood, have joined on to play Wolfsbane and Magik, respectively. And now we know who will be playing Cannonball, a fan favorite from the original series.
Charlie Sheen Apparently Has the ‘Major League’ Cast Lined Up for a Sequel
It’s been a few years since Charlie Sheen has appeared in a feature film of any type, but to hear the actor say it, he’s already lined up his big comeback project. For a while now, Sheen has been talking up the possibility of a Major League sequel that brings back the cast and crew of the original film. And now it sounds like the actor has put in the work and might be closer than ever to getting that film made with a bunch of familiar faces.