ThaOGDreamWeaver

Not sure how all of us missed this before, but here’s the full teaser trailer… Yep, looks the business, including the beautifully chosen Nat King Cole needle drop, the Brotherhood of Steel, rad roaches, and the “Please Stay Calm” gag. Some surprises too though… why are the other Vault Dwellers going psycho?

Fun thing. There’s a whole bunch of people making Funko Pops of themselves over on Insta with AI art: and it turns out there’s a template. It’d have been rude not to: …and here it is. You’ll need a Microsoft signin but a free Hotmail/Outlook account will do fine. It also doesn’t like the word “superheroine”, but there are ways around that… https://designer.microsoft.com/image-creator?p=Funko+figure+of+[an+activity+or+role]%2C+[female+or+male]%2C+called+[Name]%2C+wearing+a+[specific+clothes+and+glasses]%2C+[specific+hair]+and+has+[accessories].+Holding+a+[something].+The+Funko+is+displayed+inside+a+Funko+box+with+[text]+text+and+[logo]+logo+for+the+box%2C+allowing+visibility+of+the+figure%2C+typography%2C+3D+render

MXPX - Auld Lang Syne

Ep6: Enjoyed Kahhori’s episode, definitely something we’ve not seen before, but might well see again. Ep7: maybe the weakest so far plotwise and the dialogue noticeably creaks, but still highly enjoyable, and Annoyed Blanchett is great. Ep8: no wonder the whole voice cast came back for this one, bar RDJ and Evans. Less the dark medieval universe of Gaiman’s 1602 than Avengers: Men In Tights, but a ridiculous amount of fun. And a not-quite-cliffhanger for our finale… what is Strange up to now? And once someone is aware they’re being Watched, do they have to listen to them monologue the whole damn time? Ep9: pulling the face/heel so early in the episode was a giveaway, though I get why: they had to make room for all of the cameos (hi again, Cate, though you need a new intro line) and the end battle felt like they were throwing literally everything they could find at each other (no pool table, but I guess Strange isn’t a grav controller). And we end on Peg taking a scenic route home - and the promise of more stories to come. So… Season Three, anyone? That looks like David Harbour's Red Guardian pulling a Fear And Idiocy in Las Vegas road trip with Bucky... …and do my ears deceive me or is that Larry “Cowboy Curtis” Fishburne taking a random guest shot?

You might have spotted comics legend Dave Gibbons (Watchmen, 2000AD, dozens more) credited for that ep, along with writer Pat Mills. And here is their original Dr. Who Weekly comic from 1980. Quite a lot of straight lifts... On M'learned coll' Coin's thoughts...

Just thought of a good comparison: the OG Pitch Black vs Chronicles of Riddick. Same characters, same 'verse, but you don't need overlong portentious explainer scenes to tell a good story. Your mind can cheerfully fill in a lot of the blanks about where and how the whole lot takes place. It's odd, but sometimes total creative freedom is a bad thing. Having a ludicrously small budget and other constraints force you to make choices that improve the movie - or anything you do, in fact. I wound up being a computer nerd: but watching a young and somewhat thinner Sam Raimi when I was a teen left a strong impression - and I borrowed that "screw it, there's a simpler way to do it" attitude. Has served me well. Most stuff I do doesn't even explode. Much.

Other than being Eastenders legend Anita Dobson (and, incidentally, Mrs Brian May, so hopefully Murray can borrow him for a suitably epic theme tune...) BTW: we happy about what we saw in the preview trailer? No Daleks, but we've got Beatles (or an Whoniverse version thereof, because those guys would not pass as a cover band), Bridgerton, giant killer snails, an Alien ripoff, Mel on a moped, a Watcher type character (as in the one who was hanging around pre Tom Baker's exit, not Uatu), the return of the Nobles... this new "Season 1" could be fun.

If you’re not familiar with Letters Live, this is a host of actors, singers and others showing up to read (in)famous and/or inspirational letters for charity, some from famous folks, some ordinary. The one that noted Sherlock and MCU actor Peppermint Doubleclutch reads above has attained near-legendary status in my beloved Canada, and involves an awful lot of pepperoni. Sticking with the sausage theme, the fabulous Olivia Colman provides a stock response for the DMs I get on Insta. ⚠️WARNING: Mild Swears, But In A Cut Glass British Accent So It’s Still Classy⚠️

Ep4: Lots of flash, good fun, not 100% memorable, easily spotted Gamora’s arc but kinda works. Ep5: do love me a Peggy episode. Not as solid as her first outing, though the training village was a properly creepy little idea. And the 1602 setup was fun: even Uatu gets surprised by chaos magick. Whether or not the plot runs the same with Peg thrown in the mix is a whole other story, to be told another time. (Well, couple of days’ time.)

Not that bad... for a Christmas weekend release. There's only been one flick that went above $60m for a festive opening weekend, and that was RDJ's Sherlock Holmes: with its closest rival being [checks notes] Alvin and The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel on $49m. ...told you Christmas was a weird time for movies... The Karen Gillan* Jumanji also had a Christmas release when it "only" did $36m, but had "legs" until May - went on to make $400m domestic, and just shy of a billion worldwide on word-of-mouth: Night At The Museum did $30.4m and was still running in June. All the other top festive flicks tend towards musicals, like Les Mis and Into The Woods. Though that seasonal sparkle didn’t quite stick to Spielberg’s West Side Story. Or Cats, but there may have been reasons for that. Momoa has at least demolished WW1984 ($12m opening, $44m total domestic… ouch, though that only had about half the number of theatres booked.) Releasing in the weeks leading up to Christmas is much better: all three LOTR movies were basically required Christmas viewing, but they all had at least a week to build audience (and by ROTK didn’t need it). So was Spidey: NWH. *there may have been some guys in the flick too, but not all that famous 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Dropkick Murphys - The Season's Upon Us 🎄Merry Christmas Ya Filthy Animals!🎄

Gwen Stefani - Jingle Bells

Episode 3: yeah, we gotcha Die Hard jokes, cameos from everybody (including “Chuckles the Elf”, if you’ve got subtitles on), and a boatload of solid wisecracks. But like every good kid’s Christmas book, have your pause button on standby to look at the background (and watch through the credits), especially in the armoury and the Avengers Werk Room. And I wonder who they’d need that yellow reel for…?

Lemmy / Tony Iommi / Dave Grohl - Run Run Rudolph

Zack Snyder returns following Justice League, and going on his cult status, Netflix clearly gave him $150m, free rein and no notes to execute his vision unfettered. This isn’t always a good thing. We’re basically talking a two part Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai In Space - though with none of the ludicrous fun of Battle Beyond The Stars. Instead, we get liberal borrowing from Star Wars, John Ford cowboy movies, Starship Troopers, John Woo sloooowwwmooooo forrrr draaaammatticc emmmmphassisss… but most notably WH40K (did he nick a manual from Cavill’s trailer?) Reviews are… not good. I stuck with it for about the first hour, predicted the main story beats easily, liked the production design and Tony Hopkins (on Alec Guinness gravitas duties as a burned-out battle droid)… and turned over to a comedy special. I’ll probably come back to it later. But whadda youse guys think?

Rolling into the new episodes and just wanting to say… …holy hellfire, anyone else want to see Gillan in a full series of CSI: Xandar, or a proper hard-boiled spy/detective flick? Plus all the Blade Runner stuff and new music? Yes. Yes, we like this a lot. Complete break to do a whole other kind of story with familiar characters. Slightly less sure about Ep2. You kind of know where it’s going from the moment Hope comes to work with Dad, but worth it for the gags, the possibility of Bucky going full Batman in a later series, and the Avengers ‘88 Walkdown Of Badassery. Complete with Peggy, Hank, Howard, and that very fine ginger member upfront…

If Max and Leo had tried that stuff in LA… [thinks] …yeah, they’d be heading a studio in no time. Here’s a fun thing. Whatever Internet Ranty People say, it is highly unlikely that WB/D itself will “lose money” on this movie. Because they didn’t make it. A specific, limited shell company, set up to make this specific movie did. Which WB/D and various investors can then loan money to for the flick, and get repaid… with interest. If the flick folds, they’re creditors and can write off the bad debts. They can charge as much or as little as they like for marketing and other “overheads” like studio execs’ time. They can charge distro fees to the sub company, and pay the shell corp for streaming rights - which they then get back - appearing as profit lines for both the parent and child company. And if - Gods forbid - a flick insists on making an above the line profit, you can merge that company with a loss-making one to hide them. Recent example: the LOTR and Hobbit movies, which made six billion bucks… according to one particular formula, have never made dime one in above the line profit - and neither has any of the spinoff merch. So Pete Jackson and the lead actors had to sue for their shares and image rights shares… which New Line can write off as another business loss.🤷🏻‍♀️

Yup. Thursday preview take was $4.5m and expected opening is $35m to $40m. Which might be a mind-melting mound of money to you and me: but it’s only two thirds of what the 2018 original clocked, and $6m less than The Marvels did. (Then again, Christmas is odd.) They’re banking on much stronger non-US openings - Momoa has a strong Chinese following - and it should breakeven* off the worldwide take. *while still making a loss to present to the IRS, cast and writers for tax and residuals, and profitable for investors and the studio, with all three states being simultaneously true and provable. Quantum accountancy tricks like rolling breaks, production shells, and these days streaming licensing fees - which WBD can pay to itself - have a lot to answer for as to why Hollyweird is why it is.

[/emote: DW reads spoiler] [/emote: DW blinks a bit, stares over glasses] [/emote: takes off glasses and reads again] [/pow_exec Psychic Wail] ...thewhatIsaywhatthehellmahaynow? It's supposed to be a fun splashy super-romp, that's... why would you do that? More to the point, what exec in their right mind would greenlight that for a tentpole movie? Yeesh. Anyhow, yes, multiple studio reshoots around a movie can be disruptive if the original story and vision is not strong, or you've got meddlesome execs, or both. They're also expensive, difficult to schedule - you've got to call talent and crew back off other jobs - and you're usually working against a preset marketing deadline, insurance terms, financing bonds, etc. Given the well-known WB/D finance issues, I'm kinda surprised this one didn't get consigned to Davy Jones' celluloid locker along with Batgirl. But I guess they decided to salvage what they could from the wreck.

Welp, that embargo just dropped. So far, 36% Rotten. Even the better ones suggest that someone was trying for a Very Serious Movie about Serious Stuff, while still trying to capture the spirit of the first one. Nah. Empire Strikes Back, this ain't. Look, the great thing about the first one is that both the movie and star knew exactly what they were doing - a big, goofy, slightly messy spectacle that knew that a guy who talks to fish is a weird story beat. It had a sense of its own ridiculousness and played to it. And that energy made up for a lot of the weaker stuff, like an adorable puppy that's run in from the beach and is shaking all over your car's upholstery. So if the end of the DCEU turns out to be a damp squib, that gives Gunn & co a clear run at their new vision. Wish them luck. They're gonna need it.

The original was a fun popcorn flick, especially watching Momoa having a blast, some really imaginative visuals and production, and a battle sequence that felt like it came from a different, better movie. (Kind of expected to see Peter Jackson hanging around in a wetsuit waving a cricket bat at the extras.) But beyond that, there was a lot that didn’t float. Ignoring the tittle-tattle around Amber Heard, the fact that Jason had much better chemistry with Nicole (his mom) was noticeable. Yet again, we have a villain problem: Yahya does what he can with Kane/Manta, but that outfit would have been rejected as too ridiculous by Power Rangers. Pat Wilson’s Orm pales by comparison with Hiddlestone’s jealous relative. And then there’s the script… This time around, we’ve got the same cast, a well-worn main thread about being bored of the job and having it taken off you, a hideously clunky shoehorned climate subplot (even by my goodie-goodie little Guardian-reading Social Justice Rogue standards… look, if you’re gonna run with that stuff, do it properly), and two Curse Of Forbidden Power McGuffins for the price of one. In short, while I might catch this on whatever streaming service survives the 2024/2025 shakeout... ...EDIT: which seems to be already happening... BBC News: Paramount and Warner-Discovery in early merger talks https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-67782869 ...I’m not enthralled enough to slap down a tenner for it, and I want my wine and fast forward button on standby.

…”haven’t I seen you before somewhere?”

Meco - Star Wars Theme (Purrfection Remix)

Side note: I would watch a Mullet Cinematic Universe. Though this list is clearly missing Momoa and early Hemsworth. https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a543060/13-hair-raising-movie-mullets-hugh-jackman-kurt-russell-david-bowie/