ThaOGDreamWeaver

So, binged through the first 3 episodes... WARNING, CITIZEN! RADIOACTIVE SPOILERAGE AHEAD... All in all, very watchable stuff. Looking forward to another double or triple helping tomorrow, I think...

They've been a bit hit and miss, I'll admit. I quite liked the Willow TV series, and while not perfect, it didn't deserve to get Batgirl'd out of existence. There is far worse lurking in the bowels of the House of Mouse. Discovery's had its high and low points, but so did all the other series. And the magic mushroom drive that taps into dark matter or whatnot is, admittedly, pretty silly. But then quantum physics in general can stretch credulity to breaking point. (Not least, as a cat owner, I postulate the cat is neither alive, nor dead, but in a quantum state known as "hiding behind the sofa plotting your demise"). Tried to watch Wheel of Time... never read the books, couldn't get behind the characters. Ignored the LOTR series. Absolute dregs: Witcher: Blood Origin. I have never seen an actor have more obvious contempt for the script he's been given - with good reason - than Lenny Henry as the moustache-twirling Grand Vizier type. To the extent his accent goes more back to his native Brummie the more annoyed he gets. Me myam won't let me do the Ritual Of Eternal Damnation in the kitchen, I gotta go and do it in the gaaaardiin... 'snot faiiir... And then of course, there's the good: Last Of Us. Nailed it. And more. Far better than a game adap deserves to be. And if what Bella's been foreshadowing on her socials is right about preparing to weather Internet hatred, I suspect they're not going to dodge anything in part 2. Back to Fallout: the series should stand up or blow up on its own merits - and given what we've seen in the trailers, I think they've got the worldbuilding and characteristic dark humour down pat, plus one hell of a cast. That's no guarantee, but since it's dropped worldwide now, I expect to be seeing your thoughts...

So Joker gets a sequel… and Gaga gets a shot at an Oscar? Being the massive movie nerd I am, I’m loving all the tiny nods to classic musicals in the dream sequences, and the way tiny splashes of colour start to drift into Arthur’s grey-green world. And of course, there’s Burt… The relationship gets a (slightly unlikely) new origin story, and we get a new key character - Steve Coogan as a prison official, probably a therapist, who I suspect may be just arrogant enough to think his star patient is fixable. I’m not sure it’s gonna be everyone’s cup of La La Land, including some of the first one’s more vocal Internet fans. I’m sure the YouTube screaming has already begun. But… twisted love story with show tunes? Yeah, that could be more up my dark, red-lit alley full of lonely silhouettes…

Can't wait. Incidentally...

Replying to m'learned coll's threads:

A surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one…

On principle: ergh. But that said, if it's a new movie with new characters using the Matrix worldbook... maybe? Not least because the Wachowskis encouraged all kinds of different takes on the lore, with the manga tie-ins, short films, comics, a ballet (do you do bullet-time ballet with ballet-time bullets?), albums, books and games (of variable quality on that last one - The Matrix Online was pretty decent, and if it had lived as long as CoH would have got a lot more of the polish it needed: Enter The Matrix, not so much, even with the starry cast delivering pretty well.) I honestly don't mind that much if people use stock characters and worlds we know, as long as they bring something new to the table. Do it well and you can give the whole thing a new lease of life, not just a new topcoat and New Rocks. Very, very side note: I was a Matrixgoth growing up - well, as much as I've ever bothered growing up. Finally sold my Reactors - very Gene-Simmons-Casual footwear - late last year to a young and awestruck goth. I loved 'em, they gave me a good extra two to three inches, and regularly scared the hell out of airport security. Apart from one smöl-but-FIERCE TSA lady in St Louis who was a dead ringer for Marion Ramsey, who just looked at those things going past on the belt with starry eyes... "You want to, don'tcha?" "Oh hell yeah." "Be my guest." ...so we strap her in, and she starts clumping around ordering people about, including her supervisor, who just squeaked "Yes, Mistress." Neither of them are gonna forget that in a hurry.

It's pretty faithful to the original - though as it's on cable... wait, streaming, they don't have ABC's Saturday Morning censors or angry cereal/washing powder execs to worry about. There is just one way they could have improved it...

Best. Quest contact. EVER.

Speaking of Guy Ritchie: if you like his movies, you probably want to check out The Gentlemen series on Netflix that m'learned coll' mentions above. It's not a reboot or remake so much as a massive expansion of the idea, taking the very basic set-up - a massive underground weed farm under a stately home - and pulling in a whole new cast of characters, setups and buckets of blood. Ritchie has clearly benefited from having a much bigger writers' room for the series. It's still wordy as hell, but less awkward, and regularly gutlaugh funny ("Sorry, what's a... what's a leccy bill?"). It also gains from three solid leads in Theo James, Kaya Scodelario and Daniel Ings, plus a big ensemble cast who still all get enough to do, and guest stars like oily-smooth Giancarlo Esposito who gets to drop epic quotes in every appearance. ("You know what I love about the British aristocracy? They're original gangsters. 75% of everything they got, they stole"). And no Hugh Grant, which - if you've seen the movie - is a good thing for once. Particular props to regular hard man Vinnie Jones - who's getting to show off a softer, more cerebral side a la Dave Bautista, and has clearly grown as an actor in the last few years. He's even a gentle, hesitant romantic, though it's gonna help a lot playing that against Joely Richardson.

MrWeebl - Rotate Your Owl

Lee was originally offered Dr No by Fleming and was stoked about getting the role: but Ian forgot to tell Harry Saltzman, and by the time he remembered they had already cast Joe Wiseman. Who hated every minute of it and preferred theatre, dahlink. Oddly, that works: Connery might not have shone quite as much against a truly charismatic villain, whereas Wiseman’s obvious disdain oozes through the screen and ramps up his superiority complex. By the time Fleming died, Lee was a superstar in his own right. And when Jack Palance turned down Golden Gun, Harry remembered what Ian had asked for… and who better to play the Anti-Bond? EDIT: while I'm at it and dreaming up roles for folks, I'd like to alter history a little bit and have whoever's playing young Chris Lee retrieving Lin Manuel-Miranda, who's playing Juan Pujol Garcia. One of the strangest/funniest stories of WW2... ...and would allow Chris (or his avatar) to sing on film, which he really only got to do the once. But it's magnificent.

Just scrolling through old threads, and if there are any movie producers out there reading this... Christopher probably wasn't Two-Face. But he was near as dammit a real-life James Bond - and as one of Fleming's friends, may have been a bit of an inspiration. So I would quite like to see a movie or TV series about Christopher Lee, Nazi Hunter. He was attached to SOE for a time during WW2 as well as RAF Intelligence, and then spent a couple of years tracking down escaped SS scum. Are there any current actors out there who could do tall, dark and evilly attractive (as well as that baritone?)

...that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it.

I don't go out and buy actual comics/graphic novels often, let alone preorder months ahead. But the subject is a true superbeing, seemingly invincible to the last, who could outfight Lobo, outdrink the Thing, out-wisecrack Deadpool, and had conquered more demons than fellow Brit John Constantine. It can only be... Ian Fraser Kilminster. https://z2comics.com/products/no-remorse-the-illustrated-true-stories-of-lemmy-kilmister-and-motorhead-hardcover/ As told by a large number of his friends and associates, including Lita Ford, Lars Ulrich, Neil Gaiman, "Philthy" Phil Campbell, Dee Snider, Triple H and Corey Graves of WWE, and some young upstart named Dave Grohl. Each story will also have a different illustration team on it. If you've got serious cash to splash (I don't), this also comes with a limited-edition vinyl copy of 1984's No Remörse best-of album, which you should be playing loud enough to kill your neighbours' lawn.

Livingston - Shadow

Even if the Bat isn't in it per se, I suspect he'll be some kind of lurking threat/presence.

Probably a cigar made from the dried and rolled leaves of stolen human lives, like most billionaire investors.* EDIT: reminds me of one of my favourite gags from The Mentalist: PAT: ...surely you don't think she's a witch? KIM: If dark forces did exist, stands to reason there could be people who control them for their own ends. PAT: They're called investment bankers, and they don't live around here, I assure you. Being in startups, I know two billionaires realtime. And yes, one's a bit of a pillock with a taste - or lack thereof - for sparkly things he likes to own but not use: and the other is a genuinely terrifying character I don't like being in the company of for multiple reasons. Neither shows an interest in the appropriate things I feel they should be doing, such as donating to hospitals, helping out the arts, building new technology, or patrolling the streets of London in high-tech armour while nursing multiple psychoses. Though given how scary the latter one is, I think he might make a fine Joker or Kingpin. And m'learned coll' Ghost is correct, I was just trying not to use the "W" word. *bonus points if you know that reference

Yes. There are varied dates on the rumour mill for a movie, but Thanksgiving 2025 was one of them - which would be one hell of a rush if true. This isn't entirely Kevin or anyone's fault. I sometimes talk boringly about the biz side of things, but one of the pressures the Mouse is under right now is a chap called Nelson Peltz. He is a high-profile "activist investor" - someone who deliberately stirs around companies to extract "shareholder value", ie dividends or increased stock price - and is less than shy about trashing the management publicly and privately to get their way. If he succeeds in persuading shareholders to vote two of his minions onto the Disney board, expect some major changes, quite a lot of sell-offs, and Disney a much leaner but lesser company afterwards. Amongst many, many other things, he has started to Have Opinions about what kind of movies Marvel should be making. I'll admit he's not wrong that Marvel have had a pretty awful run of form at the box office the last few times out, but I'd focus on... well... poor story choices and rushed development, rather than... erm... casting choices. Making better movies, with plot, and characters, and heart and soul, would get better results. It's possible that they'll begin the crossover in the Secret Wars arc, assuming that the DPvWolvie movie doesn't rewrite canon of its own accord, or in another Marvels movie: and given the Kang Dynasty has come to an abrupt end, anything could happen. I do like the idea of Jubilee and/or Gambit as your "introducing the audience" focus characters. I'm assuming there are some expectations (audience and otherwise) that Wolvie will be in it somewhere, though probably not Hugh. Kamala has also been flagged as a mutant, first half-jokingly, then as canon. I'd quite like to see them pull in some really leftfield ones as well, like X-Stacy, Sunspot or Honey Badger.

Just for once, I've gone the other way round. This is the Star card from the AI tarot deck I made... ...and this is (after much trial and error with available names)... Lady Starheart. Could use being able to move the star badge to the chest (and maybe need to choose a different, slightly more armoured top...) but yep, that works.

So here’s me getting in really early on a movie… Since Q4 last year, Marvel have been taking open script pitches for a new X-Men flick. So far, nobody has been appointed; and Marvel needs an out and out hit. If I’m already disappointed in this, it’s simply because the release date is supposed to be already scheduled and marketing budgeted, without even a concept in place. That seems… unwise. So if you fancied giving it a go… …what would you do? Would you adapt a classic arc or do something completely new? Who would be in your squad, your leads, and your antagonist(s)?

One of the many fine things about Matt Reeves’ The Batman was Colin Farrell’s transformation into one Oswald Cobblepot - and it’s rare these days when you want to see more of a villain. So, you got it. The series picks up a week after the movie ends… SPOILERS FOR BOTH THE MOVIE AND SERIES BELOW… There’s not much to go on beyond the teaser (plus the in-production original teaser from 2023 below) and cast notes at this point. Matt Reeves is only EP on this, but the directors and writers have some decent creds to their names. What do we think?