by Kim Filchak, Senior Reporter
Howdy. You may or may not have noticed my absence last week. Unfortunately I am unable to break the many non discloure agreements I was made to sign and ummm…. I was in an undisclosed location deep underground, possibly even off planet… yeah that’s the ticket, and was therefore unfortunately without WiFi access. I am not saying this was a case of alien abduction but…
But! I am now home and now with internet access as well as all of the caffeine in the known universe to fuel me we can launch right into this weeks Rampant Speculation!
Avengers: Age of Ultron- This is the news you have all been waiting for. Stan Lee has confirmed that he will indeed be making a cameo in Avengers: Age of Ultron! Excelsior!
DigitalSpy is reporting that Stan the Man himself confirmed this bit of awesome news while appearing at the London Film and Comic Con all the while talking up the actors who have brought the creations of Marvel Comics to life.
“People that had not been big stars before like the fellow who plays Thor (Chris Hemsworth) – he’s wonderful! I was with him yesterday – I did my cameo of course [for Avengers: Age of Ultron].”
From this quote I have deduced that his cameo involves the God of Thunder and, going by past appearances, plenty of sass from the wily old wise man of Marvel Comics.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice- Cinematographer Larry Fong (Watchmen, Now You See Me) tweeted some photos of Clay Enos, set photographer, on a black draped set taking behind the scenes photos.
When Enos re-tweeted the photos he added, “What a fun, historic day. Thanks to everyone involved.” To which he then added, “Not gonna lie; I got a bit of the chills there for a second.”
All of which clarifies nothing, so I leaves it to you to weave your own narratives as to both the photos and the tweets meaning.
Tweet and photo via comicbook.com.
Constantine: For a show that has not even aired its pilot episode there is some serious drama coming from the show about the misanthropic exorcist and the demons who want to disembowel him.
With the pilot episode in the box and a premiere date a few months away NBC’s Constantine is saying goodbye one of its leads and hello to a new one.
According to The Hollywood Reporter Lucy Griffiths (True Blood) has left the show amid a flurry of controversy. Griffiths was cast as Liv, “an offbeat woman who finds herself teamed with Constantine after she is marked for death by a powerful demon. With the ability to see the supernatural world among us, she becomes a key player in the battle between good and evil.” But in the 11th hour the character is being written off and replaced by Zed, a character from the “Hellblazer” comics, who it has just been announced by Variety will be played by Angélica Celaya (Burn Notice).
Constantine producer Daniel Cerone (The Mentalist, Dexter) spoke to EW.com about the decision to switch out characters.
“When you put a wide-eyed innocent into that world, she’s just very reactive,” he tells EW. “The nice thing about Swamp Thing, when he first teamed up with Constantine, was that Swamp Thing had abilities, Swamp Thing had skills. Constantine needed those skills. One of the coolest things about Constantine he doesn’t have any ‘powers.’ He came out of a time with all these superheroes with their garish colors and flashy powers, and he just comes out with a rumpled coat, wearing browns and greys, and he just knows a lot magic and spells, but it’s all knowledge-based. Anything he can do is based in knowledge and his own studying. Zed is actually one of the first women Constantine meets in the comic books, and she has various psychic powers. We felt ultimately she’s going to service the first season better as someone to pair Constantine up with. She can get in his face a little bit and have some of her own realizations and skills and really push him. But if whoever Constantine is working with is constantly on her heels, that just wouldn’t service the show really well.”
The character of Liv was created for the series, filling the role of “outsider drawn into the world of the supernatural after she comes to the attention of a demon” role that was filled by character Angela Dodson, Rachel Weisz’s (The Mummy, The Bourne Legacy) hard boiled psychic cop, in the 2005 film version of Constantine. Like most point-of-view characters, Liv’s role would have been as an audience stand-in as both she and we find out all we need to know about how this world operates, the problem being that as a new character created as an audience surrogate she was being shoe horned into a story she did not fit in. Sometimes viewers do not need a dewy eyed innocent to be shocked and awed by the world they are seeing, sometimes we just need someone to cowgirl up and say “I got this”. Plus thrown into a world as dangerous as the one presented in “Hellblazer”, one where even the hyper competent have a high mortality rate, it stretches the bounds of credulity with the idea that a “wide-eyed innocent” who is a very “reactive” character would not end up dead pretty darn quick.
Also in Constantine News- io9 has a nice write up talking about the importance of the portrayal of Constantine’s bisexuality in the series, the producers decision to not emphasize it, and what that decision means to his characterization, which you can read here.
Daredevil- It was a tweet designed to launch a 1000 ships each carrying a 1000 rumors across a vast sea of disinformation and fandom born crazy. Daredevil show runner Stephen DeKnight (Angel) responded to a question on the twitter in regards to a question I am sure he gets am metric crap ton of in regards to everyone’s favorite classically named femme-fatale assassin with a penchant for wearing red and wielding a pair of sai.
“Because wait and see. RT @KnightGambit: @stevendeknight soooo why is Elektra not in the series?
3:00 PM – 9 Jul 2014”
This sparked the good folks over at the MoviePilot to launch into a fit of speculative free association about where they think Electra might fit in with what we know about Daredevil and who they think could be the one to play her. As Rosario Dawson (Sin City, Clerks 2, Josie and the Pussycats) is the only major female role that has been announced, you probably already know where they went with it. Still they give a good breakdown of why it might work, besides the fact that it would be awesome because Rosario Dawson.
However reality and the stupid facts always ruin all of our fun and so they also pointed out that the as yet unnamed character Dawson is playing has been described as “a dedicated young woman whose quest to heal the wounds of Hell’s Kitchen brings Matt Murdock unexpectedly crashing into her life, while her own journey forever alters the course of his battle against the injustices of this broken city.””, which does not really line up with the comics origin of the character as the kick ass assassin daughter of a crime boss.
Doctor Who- Uhhg, so much drama has gone down with Who while I was not looking! First there were the leaked scripts, five of them according to EW.com, that showed up on the web a week ago and unlike the script for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice these scripts were in fact legit. So legit in fact that the BBC issued a statement imploring fans to not read or distribute them.
“We deeply regret this and apologize to all the show’s fans, the BBC and the cast and crew who have worked tirelessly making the series.
“We would like to make a plea to anyone who might have any of this material and spoilers associated with it not to share it with a wider audience so that everyone can enjoy the show as it should be seen when it launches.
“We know only too well that Doctor Who fans are the best in the world and we thank them for their help with this and their continued loyalty.”
Quote via BBCnews.com
That seriously sucks, I mean as someone who writes about movie and television rumors on a regular basis I enjoy the cat and mouse game with the studios as much as the next person with wifi and too much time on their hands. It is fun to see if I can parse out what is happening from the bits and pieces they drop, it is an interesting puzzle to play with, but the leaking of five scripts all at once is not just the act of someone who wants to give fans a helpful spoiler-based hand out and feels more like an act of outright sabotage. This feeling of it having been an act of deliberate malice only increased when less than a week had passed before there was another hit to the sanctity of the T.A.R.D.I.S.. Someone has uploaded the as yet to air series premier episode on to Pirate Bay, making it available to all those willing to risk S.W.A.T. raids by the N.S.A. to see the show before it airs on the BBC. Though, come to think of it, maybe it’s only us in the U.S. who have to worry about that, so I guess everyone else can do as their conscience dictates.
TorrentFreak is reporting that the uploaded episode is obviously not the finished product, with missing CGI, the presence of an obvious watermark, and in black and white. The watermark on the footage reads, “Prepared for Marcelo Camargo at Drei Marc.” which leads many to think the footage was originally destined for Marc Drei Productions, a Brazil-based production company that does subtitling work. There is no reason to believe that Marc Drei Productions is involved with the leak; such heavily watermarked footage this could only hurt their reputation.
So far there is no hint as to who the villain of the piece may be, though it has been speculated that the same person is responsible for both leaks. My guess, it was the Daleks.
However, in way less cloak and dagger Doctor Who related news, here is the first official trailer for the next series featuring Peter Capaldi (The Hour) as the 12th Doctor and Jenna Coleman (Death Comes to Pemberley) as Clara the manic pixy human plot device.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TivqZTq5u6Y]
Guardians of the Galaxy- As we get closer and closer to the August 1st release date of Guardians of the Galaxy the more bread crumbs are scattered to the fan base to get us even more excited than repeatedly showing us images of a raccoon armed with a machine gun already has. Latest to drop is a feature about Gamora, she likes to stab people.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZtJwdtAaO2s]
And here’s one about Peter Quill, aka Star Lord, which I totally forgot about because who the heck is Star Lord?
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Btx3nJxD_lE]
Gotham- Richard Johnston over at Bleeding Cool has already seen the pilot for the show that is shaping up to be one of the most highly anticipated premiere in years. From what he has to say, Gotham just might be setting a new bar for what we can expect from television shows based on comic books. You can read his review over here along with getting a look at some sweet screen caps, just be warned this it is pretty much the Webster’s definition of SPOILERS; if you want to watch the show without any preconceptions you may want skip it. Either way, as always, it is your call River Song.
The Hobbit: Battle of the 5 Armies- The fan site OneRing has reported that Warner Bros has released a synopsis for the final film in the trilogy based on The Hobbit, perfect for those who want to be spoiled but are too lazy to read the book, and have compiled a fact sheet about all that is currently known about the upcoming film.
From Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson comes “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies,” the third in a trilogy of films adapting the enduringly popular masterpiece The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien.
“The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies” brings to an epic conclusion the adventures of Bilbo Baggins, Thorin Oakenshield and the Company of Dwarves. Having reclaimed their homeland from the Dragon Smaug, the Company has unwittingly unleashed a deadly force into the world. Enraged, Smaug rains his fiery wrath down upon the defenseless men, women and children of Lake-town.
Obsessed above all else with his reclaimed treasure, Thorin sacrifices friendship and honor to hoard it as Bilbo’s frantic attempts to make him see reason drive the Hobbit towards a desperate and dangerous choice. But there are even greater dangers ahead. Unseen by any but the Wizard Gandalf, the great enemy Sauron has sent forth legions of Orcs in a stealth attack upon the Lonely Mountain.
As darkness converges on their escalating conflict, the races of Dwarves, Elves and Men must decide – unite or be destroyed. Bilbo finds himself fighting for his life and the lives of his friends in the epic Battle of the Five Armies, as the future of Middle-earth hangs in the balance.
Source: Official Warner Bros. synopsis”
Horns- There is a teaser trailer out for the new Daniel Radcliffe film based on the book by Joe Hill and I have to say Harry Potter is going to some dark ass places.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ3NBFwzel0]
Hunger Games: Mocking Jay Part 1- Speaking of teaser trailers, the is a second part to the awesome ongoing Panem propaganda campaign “Unity”, because the Capital knows how to work a complicit populace… Too bad the rebels in the outlying districts have other ideas.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4e-qJdEAXo?list=PLJ7A97yl9oXpflp5XrObOsUd60LaDdHTi]
Jurassic World- This bit of investigative journalism comes from the folks at HitFix, where they have a great analysis of the possibly leaked/possibly clever bit of viral marketing that popped up in twitter in the form of a tourist pamphlet for The Jurassic World Park. I agree that this is perhaps just a little too slick to be an actual leak, here are a few of the photos you can find the rest here along with what HitFix thinks they might mean.
The Amazing Spider-Man 3- Just when things were looking up for Sony’s nascent web-crawling Mega franchise Roberto Orci (Star Trek, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Sleepy Hollow) has decided to leave the building, or at least the franchise. Orci had previously been partnered with Alex Kurtzman (Star Trek, The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Sleepy Hollow) on the spider scripts, but in the no-fault split between the two it looks like Kurtzman got custody of Spider-Man as well as his amazing friends and the people who want to kill them all.
Oric spoke to ING about where things now stand with him and the franchise he helped restart.
“I don’t know what their plans are for that franchise,” Orci said when asked about his continued involvement. “I don’t ever want to say never, but we have to figure out what their scheduling is in terms of when they want each movie. I’ve read probably as much as anyone else. There’s a love for the Sinister Six, the idea of Venom — there’s an idea of Spider-Man’s going to be one of these characters that’s part of our business. He’s such a popular character. Spider-Man’s not going to go away any time soon. When it all happens and how and all that has yet to be determined.”
When specifically asked if he will be a part of The Amazing Spider-Man 3 Orci pretty much ruled that out.
“What is interesting, is that when asked specifically about the third Amazing Spider-Man film, Orci said that he was, “not officially involved in it.”
“I don’t want to say anything about what they should do,” the writer said. “I don’t want them to think I’m spilling the beans about something.”
On the plus side Kurtzman will be staying with Sony to direct Venom, though as of right now there is not a set timeline for when the rest of the movies in the Spider-verse, including The Sinister Six, will be out. Sony seems to be less driven than Warner Bros to compete with the Marvel Studios machine, either that or they are actually putting some thought into exactly how they are going to manage and sustain something as complicated as a Mega franchise before announcing their lineup. Or more likely they got distracted by Call of Duty and are putting off their homework until the last minute, when they will just throw something together and hope that their teacher is too hungover to notice the sub par work.
Star Trek- Continuing with Roberto Orci themed news, Collider talked to the writer/possible director about his in progress scripting for the third movie in the second incarnation of the series about going where no one has gone before.
“Well, I don’t want to count my chickens before they hatch. The studio has yet to even read the script. I’m in the middle of writing it, with the talented team of [John D.] Payne and [Patrick] McKay. They are true Star Trek fans, as well. So, I can’t even think anything about the future until I give them a script and they greenlight it. Until that happens, everything else is just a rumor.”
“If I’m lucky enough that Paramount loves the script and that we go forward, it’ll be because I have loved Star Trek for so long and the idea of having seen one of the best guys in the business direct two of them already, and to have seen it from the vantage point of a producer too, I know where a lot of the challenges are and where a lot of the fun is. If we’re lucky enough that everything goes right, then I’ll start to feel the pressure. Once it’s really happening, it’s like, ‘Oh, my God, the 50th anniversary! Holy, moly!’ As a writer, I feel the pressure as the returning screenwriter to this franchise. I feel it at the story level. I can’t speak for Payne and McKay, but they seem to be having a good time. They don’t look as nervous as I feel, but maybe they’re just good at hiding it.”
Gah! Come on Paramount! Don’t make me wait another 5 years! Let’s see some hustle!
Star Wars Episode VII- According to the people at The Independent Harrison Ford (Star Wars, Raiders of the Lost Ark) has been spotted at a store in London eating a sandwich. What Ford’s appearance on the other side of the Atlantic might mean for the production remains to be seen. Though if he is already in England that can only be a good sign that things are getting back on track after being sidelined by Ford’s injury.
Additionally in Star Wars Episode VII News– I have always had a soft spot for Andy Serikis, ever since watching him bring Gollum to life in the Lord of the Rings movies, so I was super excited to see that he is going to be in Star Wars: Episode VII. He recently talked to the people at MTV News about the film and was as adorable as you would expect him to be.
Also in Star Wars Episode VII News– I would not want to be the PA who was in charge of this. The production, which had been filming in the Forest of Dean, did not do it’s due diligence about breaking down the set. The Daily Mail is reporting that fans have found the remnants of the production in the forest by way of equipment left all over the place. Which of course leaves people to ponder just what was filmed in these beautiful, otherworldly, locations as well as one other important question. Seriously, Lucas Films, how hard is it for you to pick up your sh*t?
Whatever the case they are lucky they have such a honest, if obsessive, fan base who found it. That stuff looks expensive and limited edition replica light-sabers don’t buy themselves is all I’m saying.
And with that we have reached the end of the alphabetical order of the movies I remembered to report on this week. I hope everyone’s upcoming days are filled with amazing fun adventures that do not involve dinosaur petting zoos or collapsed Gothic blanket forts. For those of you attending the San Diego Comic-Con have fun, stay hydrated, and may the force be with you.
Keep speculating along with ComicsOnline.com on Facebook and Twitter for more rumor mongering and for everything geek pop culture!
