#we have also gotten--wait for it--some of the characters from this franchise appearing in disney heroes!

[kalique]

boy, i sure love [redacted huge movie that grossed billions]. it’s too bad disney has done absolutely nothing with it in years and has released 2 crumbs of new content pertaining to it and thus the fandom died off after a year or two and me and my 5 buddies in our grimy, musty corner of the internet (discord server that miraculously is still up after 5 years worth of insane fandom drama) are the ONLY people still talking about it

[avatar-news]

The Fire Nation Awaits 🌺 An in-depth look at the ever-elusive islands in the era of Korra and when we will finally pay them a visit

[Artwork by Avatar News; not official.]

Note: This article was published before the official announcement of Avatar Studios at the Paramount+ investor day.

“Water. Earth. Fire. Air. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked.” We’ve all heard those words a million times. The four elements, and the power to control them bestowed by four subspecies of giant lion-turtles, are at the very heart of the world of Avatar. The balance between them was once upon a time broken by one of the four, the Fire Nation, forming the main conflict of Avatar: The Last Airbender. For much of Aang and the Gaang’s quest at the close of the Hundred Year War, the Fire Nation was a forbidden, far-away location, until the curtain was finally drawn back in the aptly-named Book Three: Fire when our heroes entered the inferno, undercover behind enemy lines. A dramatic tropical destination! New outfits! Culture shock! Needless to say, it was a big deal.

→ 🌺 The big reveal of the Fire Nation in Book Three: Fire had its own marketing push, matching public anticipation.

When the Hundred Year War ended, the newly-instated Fire Lord Zuko dedicated his life to righting the wrongs of his forefathers and working with Avatar Aang to bring the Fire Nation back into the fold under peace. By the time Aang’s successor debuted as the next Avatar in the titular The Legend of Korra, Zuko had abdicated the five-pointed crown and his daughter, Fire Lord Izumi, took the stage leading a reformed, rebalanced Fire Nation.

There was no more war, no more enemy lines, yet the Fire Nation became more distant and mysterious than ever before.

Korra’s close encounters with the land of fire

To this day, Korra has never visited the Fire Nation, nor has it been seen at all, nor do we know anything about it in her era. In fact, practically the only thing we do know is that its leader is a noninterventionist, which conveniently gets it out of the way of making an appearance in Korra’s journey as the Avatar so far.

The closest we have come to seeing the Fire Nation in The Legend of Korra was in Book Two: Spirits, Chapter Five: Peacekeepers. In the midst of the Water Tribe Civil War, Korra sets out across the sea to get help from the royal family, however, she is intercepted by a dark spirit and never makes it to her destination. In the next episode, she washes up on a secret island home to the Bhanti sages, which probably technically counts as Fire Nation territory, but as we know from The Shadow of Kyoshi (more on that later), this faction predates the Four Nations themselves so it doesn’t really count.

→ 🌺 Korra washes up on the beach of Bhanti Island in Book Two: Spirits, Chapter Six: The Sting.

No, as cool as that location and the events of the Beginnings two-parter that happened there were, it wasn’t the main draw of seeing the Fire Nation that we’re still waiting for: seeing how the Fire Nation, which was already industrializing in Aang’s time, changed over the decades, compared to places like Republic City and Ba Sing Se; meeting new characters; visiting new and familiar locations; worldbuilding both new and expanding on what we already learned.

After this aborted tease in Book Two, we never come close to the island country again (at least not with this Avatar and in her era; yes I’m leading up to something...). Instead, the focus turns strongly to the Earth Kingdom in the third and fourth Books, and beyond.

Keep in mind that The Legend of Korra aired for about two-and-a-half years total from 2012 to 2014. Since then, the story has continued in comics. The comics era has lasted from 2015 to present-- seven years to the animated series’ two. In that time, there have only been two comic trilogies due to various production troubles, and neither have touched the Fire Nation. Instead, they directly continue the Earth Kingdom-focused threads started in Books Three and Four of Korra, both originally airing in 2014. Or, in perspective: we had a focus on Republic City in 2012, the Water Tribes in 2013, and the Earth Kingdom from 2014-2021.

Will we finally see the Fire Nation in the next graphic novel trilogy?

This question comes to mind every time new Korra content is supposed to roll around, and the powers that be know it-- it’s a pretty obvious gap in the world of Avatar right now. This franchise is iconically built around four elements and the Four Nations based on them, so one of them being MIA is quite glaring, and for that reason everyone is understandably always asking about it.

The most concrete confirmation we’ve gotten was this AMA answer from franchise co-creator Michael Dante DiMartino in 2016, two years after the show ended and a year before the first graphic novels did come out:

“Yes, hopefully in the [Korra] comics, we’ll have a chance to go to the Fire Nation and see how it has changed since A:TLA.”

Since then, as previously discussed, two comic trilogies have come and gone, obviously not getting closer to the Fire Nation-- and I would actually argue entrenching themselves further away from it.

I want to make it clear that I’m against fan entitlement. Creatives telling the tales they want to in service of the story and the artform is how the industry should run. I’m just hoping to offer some perspective on how we got to where we are almost a decade into the era of Korra and the metatextual pacing of the franchise itself.

Either way, the next Korra comic trilogy has been official confirmed by the editor for Avatar at Dark Horse Comics in this informal statement on Twitter:

We’re not ready to announce any details yet, but we are working on the next trilogy. I really appreciate your patience and hope it’s worth the wait! ✨

There’s currently some kind of holdup for which we really have zero context or information, and we of course have no idea what this next trilogy will be about. (I do speculate a bit on what it could be a few paragraphs down.)

But, like what turned out to be Ruins of the Empire before it, I faithfully made a mockup graphic for my post announcing the confirmation of the next The Legend of Korra graphic novel trilogy. And like before, I chose to completely speculatively and blindly make it Fire Nation-y, as if the next comic could/would(/should?) feature it. This is mainly because I feel like that’s what most people’s eyes would be caught by and thus result in the most successful post (hey, at least I’m honest), but also because it’s just fun.

Here are both images, from 2018 and 2020 respectively:

→ 🌺 Speculative edits I made for my posts on the announcement of previous and upcoming Korra comics before we knew anything about them.

In both cases, the response was huge, and people were super excited about the prospect of Fire Nation content just from my quick speculative mockups. I am of course hoping that the new artwork I made of the Krew for this post will have a similar effect (it’s the first time I just straight-up drew it instead of editing existing images) but again it’s really mostly just for fun.

Anyway, until the next trilogy is properly revealed, we’ll just have to wait and see.

However, that’s not the only place this could happen.

Are they saving the Fire Nation for an animated movie?

With Avatar’s HUGE success on Netflix last year, interest in the franchise rocketed to an all-time high. The streaming wars have begun, and Avatar’s owner and its parent company, Nickelodeon and ViacomCBS, have finally started to notice.

ViacomCBS is launching Paramount+ on March 4th, a relaunch of its existing streaming service CBS All Access. Paramount+ is meant to be a big expansion and refocus to compete with the big hitters: Disney+, HBO Max, and, yes, Netflix. (There’s quite an entanglement there, with Netflix being the home of Avatar’s big year and the upcoming live-action series.)

One of the keys to a successful streamer today is high-profile originals to drive new subscribers. ViacomCBS knows this and they know Avatar has just become among the highest profiles a property can have, breaking records and going toe-to-toe with other big-hitting sci-fi/fantasy/genre franchises. This knowledge goes right to the top of the food chain: the CEO of ViacomCBS mentioned Avatar by name when discussing potential originals for Paramount+.

I have previously discussed how The Search relates to this. The Search was the second ATLA comic trilogy, focused on the search for Zuko’s mother in the thick of the Fire Nation, and if you didn’t know, it was originally pitched by Bryke as an animated movie after the original series ended.

I just want to be clear that what I’m discussing here is purely speculative, but this is the only other piece of the Avatar franchise that we know was optioned for animation besides the shows themselves. It’s possible they would be interested in going back to this idea as a Paramount+ original (and it would certainly be popular among audiences), but it is of course set during the era of Aang and thus covers both a time period we’ve already seen, and also by nature of already being released as comics, events we’ve already seen too.

However, the whole point of this article is that there is one major, huge thing we haven’t seen yet, with massive anticipation building for a decade behind it: the Fire Nation in the era of Korra. So, again, this is just speculation, but it’s also possible that they could return to the very smallest seed of the original idea for a The Search movie, and do a Fire Nation-focused Korra movie now.

→ 🌺 ATLA’s Fire Nation-focused The Search was originally pitched as an animated movie.

You can skip this next part if you don’t want to see me embarrassingly promote my fan idea 😆 but this is where the artwork I made for this article comes into play. The general idea for it, and the reason I tried to replicate the show’s style as much as possible, is that it’s what a Fire Nation-focused movie could maybe look like. Something as standalone and unrelated to Earth Kingdom drama as possible, with fresh new looks for the Krew to get people excited for something fresh and new! I really feel like the Avatar franchise has so much potential for expanded content like this, that’s why I have high hopes that Paramount+ will make the most out of it! You can see the individual characters’ artwork in larger size here. Ok I’m done back to business.

If the idea of a movie seems too impossible to you, we can also take a deeper look at Bryke’s involvement with upcoming comics instead.

After Korra ended, they officially each went their separate ways. They vaguely consulted on Avatar stuff, and Mike of course wrote the Korra comics, but Bryan was planning on writing and drawing his own original non-Avatar comic series and Mike was releasing his own non-Avatar novels. This all appears to have come to a stop when they signed on to showrun the live-action retelling of ATLA at Netflix, officially reuniting the partnership and committing to Avatar again in a big way. Of course, they ended up leaving that project over creative differences, but it did result in a big, lasting change: this time they remained official creative partners and have indicated they’re still working on Avatar now, together. This is a far cry from the official breakup after Korra, so it begs the question what exactly they’re working on. I of course have my fanciful predictions of a sprawling expansion of the Avatar franchise at Paramount+, but what if it’s actually a combination of the ingredients from before the live-action series...

More speculation, but what if the reason for all the mystery behind the next Korra comics is because they will be made by Bryke, with the two of them co-writing and Bryan doing the art for the first time? If that’s the case, they could want to make them a bigger deal than the other Avatar comics have been so far, and maybe that’s why it’s taking so long to iron everything out, have a more significant story, have more of a marketing push, etc. If they’ve been saving the Fire Nation for something big, this could be it.

I personally think this is less likely than a show or movies or something, but it is possible. Anything is possible right now since we know so little about the large-scale direction of the franchise moving forward, just that it’s gonna get big.

⛰️🌋 The Fire Nation in the era of Avatar Kyoshi

We’re not done! Despite everything I’ve written here, believe it or not, the Fire Nation was actually the star of the show in the last year.

With the debut of the Avatar franchise’s first original novels, Kyoshi made a huge splash (in a way only she can). If you haven’t read them yet, you NEED to-- they’re some of the best Avatar content EVER. The Rise of Kyoshi hit shelves in 2019 and The Shadow of Kyoshi followed in 2020. The latter is of particular interest here, because it was almost entirely set in the Fire Nation and featured practically everything and anything you could want from a visit to elusive islands. Though obviously set in a historical period some four hundred years before Aang’s time, Kyoshi’s sojourn in the Fire Nation gave us a huge amount of new information, a depth and breadth of worldbuilding, culture, and character we’ve never really seen in Avatar before. It truly makes the most of the literary medium, so hats off to author F. C. Yee for the passion and effort he put in.

In The Shadow of Kyoshi, we learn about the era of the previous fire Avatar before Roku, Avatar Szeto. Through Kyoshi and her own Team Avatar, we learn about the different clans and islands of the Fire Nation, as they experience the fraught early reign of Fire Lord Zoryu and the conflict between the Keohso and Saowon clans, culminating in the Camellia-Peony War. We get a multitude of fleshed-out perspectives from the upper crust to the flea-bitten underworld, matching the heights of the worldbuilding quality of Republic City. It’s such cool, intricate stuff, and really shows Avatar’s potential (and that’s all just the worldbuilding-- the character work is also top-notch).

That’s not the only place the Fire Nation has shone recently. One of Insight Editions’ awesome scrapbooks, Legacy of the Fire Nation, gave us a tour through the royal family’s history, including never-before-seen looks at young Iroh and Ozai and much, much more.

All this just goes to show that the Fire Nation has been a hot ticket throughout the ages and there’s one conspicuous gap in that history: the era of Avatar Korra. With so much recent expansion and development of the Fire Nation in our world, it would be perfect to see the culmination of it all in the current time period in the world of Avatar too.

If this made you excited for the potential of what the Avatar franchise could look like in the coming years, same boat!

The next concrete date where something could be announced is February 24th, when ViacomCBS will host their investor day and present their streaming strategy, including Paramount+ originals. There’s no guarantee Avatar is mentioned, but I’m keeping a hopeful eye out.

As for comics, Dark Horse’s schedule marches to its own beat, so there’s no way to know when the next drop of information is coming our way.

Could this finally be the comics that take us to the Fire Nation, or could the much-anticipated visit be in another medium like animation? Stay tuned-- as always I’ll post as soon as we learn anything new!

[darth-schism]

Evidence to Suggest that Luke was NOT all that he seemed in TLJ

Luke Skywalker may have isolated himself because of his guilt/depression. But I also believe he did it for practical reasons, and that his “totally given up” act, was just that, an act. Evidence for this Head-cannon/interpretive take:

1. He made a map to his location

Not only that, but it was so specific, it was literally called “The Map to Skywalker.” The only way it would have gotten a name as tailored as that is if someone else had found him before Rey, or, if he told people about it himself. In any event, to whatever varying degree, Luke wanted to be found and/or influence the galaxy around him.

One piece of the map was  tossed around to all sorts of corners of the galaxy, while the rest of it was entrusted to R2D2. 

2. This was a deliberate combo to serve two different purposes

          - Keep Snoke distracted: The entirety of TFA was Kylo and Snoke obsessing over Luke’s location. Their preoccupation with it was evident and, instead of letting them focus on relentlessly attacking the New Republic, Luke gave them a reason to go on wild goose chases. Consider that Snoke doesn’t go ‘all in’ on trying to destroy the Resistance until after he realizes he lost the race to get to Skywalker. Which shows just how much stock he had put into that singular Jedi. What’s more, even if they had succeeded, they’d only have a useless fraction with no reference as to where in the galaxy Luke’s secret location actually was.      

          - Meanwhile, R2D2 would also play the role of a “given up/powered down” hero: But we see that, soon as the coast is clear, and some plot heroes arrive with the map, he assessed the situation, turned on, and sent them right to Skywalker. I think it’s safe to say that R2D2 was merely in ‘sleep mode,’ as opposed to ‘shut down.’ However, despite all this, the element of being powered down/unassuming was still crucial because... 

3. Snoke made it abundantly clear that when he found Skywalker, he’d blow up the entire landmass he was found, or even theorized to be, on

Luke would never put a population of innocents at risk of complete annihilation just because someone might to recognize him at a local market. So it’s no wonder he chose a place as isolated as he did (On top of that, considering his critical stance towards the Jedi Order by 28ish ABY, it wouldn’t necessarily be a heartbreak to him if the island did end up getting destroyed, or one to anyone else really, because of how obscure/unknown it was...or so he convinced himself).

4. He was picking his battles

If Luke Skywalker wanted to be found. Then why was he so dismissive of Rey? There’s no solid evidence here (aside from the whole existence of the map scheme), but I think there’s good reason to believe that Luke’s instant stand-offish behavior is one of caution and assessment not dissimilar how how Yoda and Kenobi put up an initial façade when they were discovered in exile (but more on that later). In any event, this approach would give him the means to offer personalized help to those who ended up on his doorstep. It honestly didn’t take Luke long to go from tossing his father’s lightsaber, to offering Rey the three lessons she needed to understand the force better. Although I believe Rey’s visit to Luke was far different than what others had probably been but (again) more on that later.

5. He was able leave anytime he wanted

The very clear image of Luke’s submerged X-Wing in the ocean painted a picture of cut ties, and a “no going back” stance. However, it wasn’t the first time that starfighter had been at the bottom of a water bed, and clearly it wasn’t the last. I’m inclined to believe that this is another part of Luke’s deliberate presentation of a hero who had lost all hope. But all speculation aside, there was nothing to physically stop Luke from leaving that island whenever he wanted. There’s nothing to say that he didn’t break form/character operate to find a way to undermine Snoke further.

6. He was actively protecting others close to him

There was a reason Luke getting Grogu at the end of Season 2 of The Mandalorian caused such a stir in Disney, and caused Kennedy to go for Faverau’s throat. All “who’s idea was who’s” arguments aside. At the end of the day it created two possible outcomes for this element of the Star Wars franchise: Either Grogu died in Kylo’s attack. Or there were survivors. Since killing the money making Baby Yoda isn’t necessarily on Disney’s to do list, it’s a reasonable bet that he survives the slaughter (unless he’s returned to Din’s side before Kylo goes ballistic, in which case he avoids it all together). But even if that does happen, this theory still holds a little water). Luke lying low, and operating in secret may have been the only way he was keeping himself, the galaxies citizens, and his few remaining students from getting hit with an orbital strike. 

7. He was never fully disconnected from the force.

Perhaps, somewhat disconnected, but it’s clear that Luke hasn’t cut himself off from the force as much as he, perhaps, wanted to admit. Luke is still able to effortlessly summon a weapon, keep control of the duel between himself and Rey, and gently lower his body to the ground when he loses his footing. Despite his stance on using/taking ownership of the force in TLJ, it seems as though Luke kept just enough around so that he could still fight. This theory is more optimistically minded than some of the others, but I still can’t help but think that Luke kept these reserves of power ready, because he already had to use them more than once during his supposed isolation.

8. Rey’s visit was different than the others who had come before.

“You went straight into the Dark. It offered you something you needed, and you didn’t even try to stop yourself.” 

“I've seen this raw strength only once before, in Ben Solo. It didn't scare me enough then. It does now.”

Other plot heroes/adventurers may have come, gone, or even convinced Luke to help them in secret. So assuming all, or even some, of the above is true, then that means Luke wasn’t just pushing to dismiss Rey, but also disillusion her. I think this is because Rey wasn’t there to get help with a specific mission, rescue, etc, but there to have Luke become the public symbol of hope again. And we’ve already listed the reasons why this couldn’t happen. On top of that, this push was done in a way that directly conflicted with all the “none theorized” reasons Luke had isolated himself. Luke knew he couldn’t accommodate this. He sensed the darkness in Rey. He sensed her connection to Kylo. In many ways his lessons also doubled as a means to properly evaluate Rey, and confirm his suspicions. In any event, all of this brought up an element of his isolation that no one else knew. He already had the, half truth, story as to what happened to his temple well rehearsed. But it was Rey’s visit that dragged out his greatest regret, which was his near attempt to take Ben’s life, due to both the mind bending fear Snoke had manipulated into palce, and the hypocritical, and self destructive Jedi philosophies that had been drilled in to his head. This was the final straw that made him want to destroy the Jedi texts. But it was also the push he needed to find inner peace, and think of the means to make one last public appearance, without endangering anyone.  

9. In no interpretation is Luke an attempt child killer 

This is more of a bonus point in nature. I think so many people were caught off guard by the narrative choice Luke undertook in this part of the film, that it painted the whole ordeal in a far more unfavorable light than it actually was. For starters: Ben was no child. He was 23 years old when he fell to the darkside. Luke was saw the images of planetary destruction, and the deaths of friends and family alike at the hands of an adult. But even at that, Luke’s ligthsaber had already lowered, and his face expressing that of shame and sadness, when Ben glances over, and decides to take up his lightsaber, and make the first strike. Luke doesn’t even ignite his lightsaber in response until after Ben swings it. The influence Snoke had over Ben, and the mental attack he lured Luke into suffering, to make this moment come to pass cannot be understated.   

 - This also means that Luke’s isolation lasted only 7 years. Not twenty, not even 10. Just 7. Which is less than half the time both Yoda and Obi Wan imposed on themselves.

10. He was following in the footsteps of his masters

I think Luke’s response to trauma is a little unfair in some ways. Obi Wan and Yoda witnessed genocide, and imposed exile on themselves for twenty years. Now, in film, we know that Obi Wan, while playing the part of a delusional hermit, worked to protect Luke as he grew up on Tatooine, and that Yoda, playing the part of a silly swamp kook, did...something...on Dagobah (?), waited for Luke to grow up so he could train him for a few weeks at most (?). 

Those are two pretty limited things, and yet they don’t catch near as much flack for “abandoning the galaxy to the Empire” as TLJ Luke does, after he also witnessed slaughter, and went into isolation for only 7 years. But, of course, we know Obi Wan did more during his time in the desert, and that Yoda did more during his time in the swamp. So why can’t Luke have also done more while on his island? Everything about the parallels here point to Luke, despite his own misgivings, applying what he learned from his master. All three Jedi isolated themselves because of their personal tragedies. All three greatly reduced their presence in the galaxy. But all three had no choice, and all three still did what they could despite their circumstances.    

11. Luke may have been overcome with grief. But he hadn’t truly changed

Now, I fully admit that this is a very optimistic way of looking at things. But some of these points also have more weight to them than others. I also cannot stress enough that even though I think some of what Luke was doing was an act, I also know it was equally proportional to the very real, emotional reasons, and struggles he faced. I also definitely do NOT think Kennedy/Johnson meant for any of these possible theories to have any validity to them. But with how they are presented, they also can’t be disproven. 

If Favreau doesn’t formally put the sequels in it’s own little pocket universe, then I really hope he takes the opportunity to make something like ^the above^ happen. It could easily be established in one to two episodes in a live action show. Lots of things could be done to make the sequels a more bearable set of movies to watch. And as much as I’m worried that hoping for this is simply too optimistic, at least now there is a justifiable interpretive take that has both in film evidence to support, and a lack of otherwise to refute.  

At the end of the day (and as usual) the important part here is to see that Luke hadn’t given up. Struggling, disillusioned, forced into a tough spot, willingly keeping himself scarce, etc. All bearable. But knowing he hadn’t given up is super important to the character and fanbase, so hopefully we get something that makes that cannon. In any facet really.  

AND IT WOULD GET MARK HAMILL BACK ON SET GODAMNIT! XD

*Reblogged with new gifs and information

[rebelsofshield]

Star Wars: The Clone Wars: “ The Bad Batch”-Review

Seven years since its cancellation and six since the final episodes aired, Star Wars: The Clone Wars makes its final triumphant return on Disney+. Beginning this twelve episode conclusion is a familiar story to fans of the series that has been brought to thrilling new life. It may not be a series best, but The Clone Wars fans will be more than pleased with “The Bad Batch.”

(Review Contains Episode Spoilers)

The Republic defense of the shipyards of Anaxes have taken a turn for the worse. Separatist forces led by Admiral Trench have updated their tactics and are outpacing clone forces before they can react. Captain Rex has a theory, that Trench’s forces have somehow gotten hold of his battle playbook developed alongside deceased ARC trooper Echo. In the hopes of proving this theory and potentially changing the tide of the campaign, Commander Cody and Rex propose a behind enemy lines stealth mission, which will be assisted by experimental clone force 99, aka “The Bad Batch.”

Wow. On just a purely personal level, watching and reviewing a new episode of The Clone Wars is a surreal experience. Reviewing episodes of the series is how I became a Star Wars blogger and even when we first heard the series was returning in 2018, I still didn’t fully believe that we would be getting new episodes. Yet here I am, in 2020, watching a brand new (sort of) episode of The Clone Wars and the show doesn’t even seem to acknowledge that it’s been gone for over half a decade. Tom Kane voice over, fortune cookie, triumphant ending credits fanfare, it’s all there. In all its goofy, beautiful, and wonderfully strange glory. The Clone Wars is back for one last time. Just wow.

I’ll admit I was initially a little disappointed that one of the three arcs we would be receiving in the final Clone Wars season would be “The Bad Batch.” The unfinished story reels were a fun experience, but as a whole, even with some of the plot twists that will come in later episodes, this arc was never really a favorite of mine. Yes, I love clones and getting to see more clone episodes is always a joy, but I was hungry for new stories and it was hard not to see a redeveloped “Bad Batch” as taking away from any number of other Clone Wars plots that never saw the light of day such as the ever elusive Cad Bane/Boba Fett arc.  

Boy was I underestimating just how much this animated glow up would add to this story though. In its final seasons, The Clone Wars was undeniably some of the best looking television on the airwaves and now with production assets that are helped by a robust and experienced studio and seven years of technological advancement, the result is truly stunning. However, it’s not just that the show looks prettier, The Clone Wars is now a more confident and stylistically directed show then it’s ever been.

“The Bad Batch” ends up having two real stars. The obvious one is Dee Bradley Baker who once again gets to flex his voice acting muscles. Baker proved early on into the series’ run that he was more than able to carry entire episodes on his own by voicing ensemble casts of almost a dozen near vocally identical characters and giving them unique personalities and traits. Baker does more heavy lifting here since season four’s classic Umbara story arc and the results are no less impressive.

The second star is director Kyle Dunlevy. Dunlevy worked on many classic episodes of The Clone Wars and “The Bad Batch” may be his most assured stylistically. In addition to the improvement in animation quality, The Clone Wars in its final seasons was really beginning to experiment with creative shot composition and cinematography. I think most often of the stellar sequence in “The Unknown” which follows a single clone officer cowering from a droid invasion. Dunlevy takes this and ups it, delivering outstandingly shot action sequences and even some outstanding tracking sequences that feel more intimate and cinematic than almost anything the series has ever pulled off, or any Star Wars animated show for that matter.

I may be talking a lot about the technical aspects of “The Bad Batch” and that may be that at the end of the day, they prove to be the most impressive parts. As a narrative, “The Bad Batch” is pretty standard Clone Wars fare. Undeniably fun and explosive at times, but there isn’t quite anything here that massively strays outside some of the shows traditional formula.

In a way, it’s interesting to see that many of The Clone Wars’ old storytelling shortcomings are very much on display. The anthologized seasonal structure allowed for many things in the series’ original run such as a sprawling cast and freedom to tell stories of widely different tones and genres. However, The Clone Wars always struggled as a result in being a serialized story. Sure, events from some arcs would undoubtedly influence others, but the sort of stop and start nature of the show lead to many moments where character and story arcs disappear or burst into existence with surprising frequency.

This is very much the case with “The Bad Batch.” At its heart, “The Bad Batch” is two clone related stories. One, a narrative of clones coming to accept diversity within their own community and another in Rex having to grapple with the loss of so many brothers over the war. The second is the most emotionally interesting and engaging as Rex is easily the most war weary character the show has at this point and in a way has always functioned as something of a mouthpiece for the clones as a whole. However, Brent Friedman and Matt Michnnovetz’s script makes some logical swerves here that end up feeling surprisingly hollow. Having Rex mourn his clone brothers makes sense and its direction at some specific clones such as Fives, whom he worked closely with in multiple episodes, feels emotionally appropriate. It’s the focus on Echo and even more oddly, Hevy, that feels odd. Echo and Rex certainly appeared in tandem in multiple episodes but the only time the two really appeared as equals was in the Citadel arc where the character perished. We don’t understand Rex’s emotional connection to Echo because it was never really established in past episodes and we have no cues to fall back upon. The work done here to build context for their relationship, both professionally and emotionally, can’t help but feel a little stilted. Regardless, Baker is still able to sell Rex’s hurt and longing for hope with the right resonance and it helps carry us through these rough patches.

Also, on a very basic level, The Bad Batch are just a really fun bunch of characters. At the moment they fit a little too cleanly into various archetypes: the brutish dumb clone, the cool and badass tracker, the silent sniper, the nerdy tech, but they are fun archetypes. Their designs are creative and vivid. Baker has a hell of a time voicing them. The action with these characters is, as mentioned before, enjoyably creative and visceral. Having classic clones like Jesse and Kix get to butt heads and also grow to appreciate these new clones is a fun and upbeat little story beat for a story that’s otherwise about the lingering trauma of war. Also, Jesse got a promotion and Kix let his hair grow out! Good for them. I hope nothing bad happens to them and their futures remain Sith free.

It’s overall just a joy to have The Clone Wars back, hiccups and all. It’s a special piece of the Star Wars franchise and it’s going to be great to have it in our lives again for a few months. I can’t wait to blast more clankers alongside you all.

Score: B+

[demigodofhoolemere]

Saw The Rise of Skywalker last night. I went in totally expecting to hate it because that tends to be the way with my favorite franchises these days and I’d heard about how bad everyone seemed to think it is. No one is more surprised than me, but... I really liked it?? I do understand why others don’t, plenty of the content is pretty subjective in terms of the tastes of individuals. But I really didn’t have all of the problems I thought I was gonna have.

Plenty of spoilers below.

~~~

Negative:

- I can really only think of one huge negative which is just knowing behind the scenes info, assuming this redditor’s source is telling the truth (looks credible to me and we already know that things have been disastrous behind the scenes of the sequel films in general so I really have no trouble believing this): https://www.reddit.com/r/saltierthancrait/comments/eisnd8/heres_what_ive_been_told_from_a_source_that/ . In which case my biggest problem is how severely Disney/Lucasfilm screwed JJ and the cast over and altered what they’d made. From the perspective of ‘this isn’t what we created anymore’, if I were among them I’d be ticked, too, and I am ticked on their behalves. I do want to see the un-altered, complete version that they did and even though I enjoyed the movie as is, I would probably enjoy that version even more because it sounds like important emotional stuff got shelved, and it didn’t deserve to be (Finn being force sensitive, dang it!). There were a couple of things that made less sense because of the way it got pared down (like the fact that Han’s appearance was apparently Leia manifesting him to Ben and that’s what sapped her strength so badly - that wasn’t made clear at all to me) and I’d love to see what it was like before it got messed with. But this knowledge is really my biggest problem. If I’d never seen this, I wouldn’t have anything truly bad to say about the released product.

Iffy:

- Re: Leia, without it being made totally clear what was happening, I thought they were repeating Padmé’s ‘lost the will to live’ send-off. It’s not something that particularly bothers me about RotS, Padmé did just have the stress of pushing two human beings out of her body all while living with the stress of her husband falling to the dark side and all of the Jedi are being murdered and the list of awfulness goes on, so even though she definitely has her kids to live for, I also know that she was undergoing unimaginable agony both physically and emotionally, and you CAN die from your body physically giving out and from broken heartstrings, so I don’t think that was stupid the way others seem to. But they needed to make what happened to Leia clearer, because I thought they were reusing that, and *that* I did think was weird, and kind of a cheap way to take her out of the picture. Not that Leia hasn’t been through hell enough for broken heartstrings, and losing her son on top of having lost her husband and brother could certainly do it, but because the movie didn’t give any further context for what was happening and what she was doing, it just looked like she passed out and then the next time we see her she’s covered with a sheet and I’m like, “Wait, that’s it?” So I do wish we’d gotten a little more in the way of explaining that sequence, so that Leia didn’t die from just passing out. That didn’t feel completely right to me. I much prefer the idea of her using up her strength to save her son.

- Leia dying at all. I get why, but... owie.

- Shortchanging Rose. I don’t feel terribly strongly about her but in any case it’s not fair to her and especially not to Kelly.

- Very convenient dagger rofl.

- The Palpatine stuff was very sudden. No prior hints anywhere. I don’t know if it’s something they decided late in the game, or if they were going to allude to it but felt TFA was too early and would have in TLJ if Rian hadn’t had such full control over doing whatever he wanted, but whatever the story there is, it felt very out of nowhere. We’re supposed to suddenly accept that Palpatine survived the fall down the shaft and has been living on life support in a cave making creepy clone Snokes. And like... it seems like the sort of crap he’d pull, so I can buy it and I’m not really too bothered, but wow. I can also get behind Rey being his granddaughter, I thought they dealt with that very well and I surprisingly enjoyed it, but again, it’s very sudden, and also because of the implications of that I have to live with the mental image of Palpatine getting it on with someone and for that alone I could have added another to the ‘negative’ list.

- So... Reylo. I constantly have mixed feelings about Reylo. I’ve very much enjoyed their force bond (one of the only things I did like in TLJ), I love the focus on redemption and good winning out, their dynamic is very interesting and I can see the allure of pairing them because of the balance of light and dark, they just have a fascinating thing going on. But I also can’t help but think about him having tortured her in TFA, and as much as I’m here for redemption and I love Rey’s heart I still think it’s weird how TLJ is like three days later at best yet she’s so ready to look past what he did to her, what he did to Han, and to plenty of other people, and those things still really aren’t acknowledged. We can have redemption without having amnesia lol, especially when those are the things he needs to redeem himself of. By all means, redeem him, I love a good redemption and I’ve found myself far more attached to his character than I would have ever expected, but don’t have Rey immediately ignore the past to do it, and... I don’t know how to feel about that kiss. Part of me liked it (especially his sweet genuine smile), but part of me still kind of goes, ‘Wait... no. Didn’t want this. Not like this.’ It’s not the affection that bothers me at all, but the fact that it’s romantic affection. I love the dynamic that’s been built between them but considering their history I’d prefer that they actually get some footing as proper friends (whether that be before anything else happens, or it just stays that way). Way too sudden for anything romantic. And really I just wish this trilogy hadn’t attempted any new romances at all, because I feel like things would be more meaningful if they were all left to be platonic friendships. There really wasn’t room for couplings in this trilogy and it sours things a bit for me that they tried to fit them in anyway. So tl;dr, I very much enjoy Rey and Ben as a dynamic but I’m more here for a platonic Reylo.

- I get the poignancy of having him use his life force to save her, I understand killing him off, but for ONCE can I have a redeemed character continue to live their new life and figure out how to navigate that? It also makes better sense to have characters like Ben try to pay for their past while they’re still, idk, alive and have the chance to do more. For once. Please. I’m not mad that they did this but I’m tired of redemption=death.

Positive:

- Pretty much everything else. I can’t believe how much I actually liked this movie.

- LANDO CALRISSIAN LANDO CALRISSIAN LANDO CALRISSIAN LANDO CALRISSIAN LANDO CALRISSIAN

- FORCE GHOSTS!!!!! ANAKIN. OBI-WAN. AHSOKA. ALL OF MY FAVORITE JEDI FOLKS. LIGHTS OF MY LIFE. I’VE BEEN WANTING TO SEE THEM THIS ENTIRE TRILOGY AND I FINALLY HAVE THEM EVEN IF THEY’RE JUST VOICES. NEW HAYDEN-AS-ANAKIN CONTENT. I’M OVER THE MOON. Ahsoka must be dead then but I’m overlooking this.

- Whatever the heck they did to use the deleted Carrie Fisher footage to give us more Leia in such a seamless way... hats off.

- Seeing the sequel trio actually all be together and working as a trio. I can finally feel like they’re actually a unit.

- That hug between the three of them at the end, my heart.

- I really do adore Rey. She has such a good heart. Seeing her fight against her ancestry and adamantly trying to be a force for good makes me happy, I love that she believes so strongly in redemption despite her anger, and I love that they still keep character details like her brilliance with mechanics and the way she’ll use scrap to slide down sand hills. I’m so proud of her progress with using the force. Rey is precious and I love her.

- Ugh I love Finn, too. He has a strong spirit and he’s come so far. I love that they delved (or tried to delve) into him being force sensitive as well, and that he has such belief in it now. It made me so happy to see other former Stormtroopers who couldn’t live that life and that Finn can have those people to relate to. Can’t say enough good things about Finn. Very proud of him.

- Interesting learning more of Poe’s past, and I enjoyed getting to watch him try to be a leader in Leia’s absence and feeling like a failure, since I felt he was the least developed of the trio up to this point so I’m happy I have more to go on. He felt a lot more fleshed out in this one and I really appreciated it. I’m glad to be able to say that I genuinely love all of the new trio now, because it used to be that I casually liked them but couldn’t connect. Although I connected to Poe’s love for BB-8 from the start and that’s still going strong. Only he and Anakin have ever truly understood my droid love.

- Always a sucker for redemption arcs. I never used to have many feelings about Ben one way or another, I didn’t feel there was anything in TFA to make me like or dislike him from the get-go because it was too soon to say, but TLJ (for all my issues with it) made me care more about what happened to him, and now this movie got me super invested. Did not see this coming. I’m glad I was able to like him and be emotional about his conflict and his ending.

- Already covered this but I really like Rey and Ben’s dynamic. I loved seeing them use their force bond to their advantage and work so well as a team. And I love that her healing his wound also healed his scar, symbolically healing him of Kylo Ren. GAH.

- Han!!! Just Han.

- CHEWBACCA GETTING A MEDAL. Both incredibly emotional because that’s probably Han’s medal and incredibly satisfying because darn right he deserves a medal! In your face, ceremony scene from A New Hope! Now give them to the droids and I’ll be appeased.

- Chewbacca just generally destroying me. His wailing hurt me even more than Leia’s passing itself did. Did not need that but also thank you. (Why am I such a masochist?)

- C3PO taking one last look at his friends 😭 I cannot tell you how relieved I was that R2 really did have his memory backups, because I was fully prepared to put “C3PO losing his memories!!! 😡” under the negative column. Thank goodness for droid friendship.

- Speaking of droids, new droid! D-O really had little purpose for being there but I’m a sucker for a new cute droid to love so I’m all for him. Bring on all of the new cute droids!

- Really liked that planet with the festival. So many cute baby creatures and I loved the subtle Easter egg of 42 years referencing the original release in 1977.

- Rey healing the snake thing! I’m all for NOT shooting or killing Star Wars creatures, there’s too much of it and it makes me sad (R.I.P. Rancor, so sorry Rancor handler. And I’ve never gotten over Ratts Tyrell and his crying family and I never will. Stop killing Star Wars creatures 2k20). Rey gets me.

- Liked the new characters. Zorri was interesting and Jannah made me emotional.

- With the context of Jannah having been meant to be Lando’s daughter, the scene she has with him in the end has even more to it than on the surface (not that either of them would know, but still), but I really do just appreciate Lando reaching out to a stranger to help her uncover her past and recover her life. Sweetheart.

- I loved that Hux was the spy, and not because he cares one wit about the rebellion but just because he really hates Ben. Talk about petty.

- The fact that Palpatine was behind every voice Ben has ever heard means that he manipulated him his whole life just like he manipulated Anakin and now I hate his guts all over again for the same darn thing. Incredibly satisfying to watch him shrivel away. Screw you Palpatine.

- LUKE AND LEIA FLASHBACK. LEIA TRAINING IN THE FORCE AND OWNING A LIGHTSABER. FINALLY.

- Briefly seeing other old characters like Nien Nunb and Wedge Antilles. That kind of thing just makes my day. Also pretty sure I saw Naboo ships in that enormous fleet and I know I’m never getting Padmé back in any shape or form so I’ll take it.

- Seeing Luke’s old home wrecked me. Seeing the binary sunset wrecked me. Luke and Leia’s force Ghosts wrecked me. Rey calling herself a Skywalker wrecked me. That ending wrecked me.

I think I covered most of it which leads me to my verdict:

I understand why this isn’t popular with everybody. A lot of it is completely dependent on personal taste. Luckily for me it actually was very largely to my taste, somehow, which I never would have seen coming because I’m usually so frustrated with recent things in the big franchises like this, and after TLJ I had no trust. But I was pleasantly surprised and actually pretty satisfied. They hit a lot of nostalgia buttons for me, made me care a lot more about the new characters, made me cry a ton, and generally delivered something I could be pleased with. Don’t know how it happened but I really liked this movie and no matter what people feel about it I don’t think it deserves the sheer vitriol it’s received (there’s criticism and then there’s yikes). I thought it was a pretty good movie and I’d watch it again willingly.

[nicomoviewatchinpsychopath]

Sonic the Hedgehog Movie Review

SONIC THE HEDGEHOG: VIDEO GAME BASED MOVIE IS FORMULAIC BUT OFFERS PLENTY OF FAST-PACED FUN FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY AS WELL AS LONGTIME FANS! 

By Nico Beland

Movie Review: *** out of 4

The world’s fastest hedgehog hits the big screen in Sonic the Hedgehog

PARAMOUNT PICTURES AND SEGA

The blue blur (or Blue Devil as the movie calls him) makes his big screen debut in Sonic the Hedgehog, based on the beloved Sega video game franchise of the same name. Believe it or not out of all the video game franchises, my favorite is and always will be Sonic the Hedgehog and have been a proud supporter of the hedgehog since childhood.             

Granted, it wasn’t until after Sega became a third-party developer for consoles like PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo when I became a fan of the blue hedgehog, but ever since I got my hands on the Nintendo GameCube port of Sonic Adventure 2 as a kid, my Sonic fandom was pretty much instant. I’ve played many of the video games both old and new, watched all the cartoons, read the comic books published by Archie Comics at the time, and I owned several action figures, plushies, and other Sonic merchandise throughout my childhood…in fact I still have most of those even to this day.             

I’ve been clamoring for a Sonic the Hedgehog theatrical movie for years despite video game film adaptations usually being critical and/or box-office poison. But given the popularity of Sonic especially during the 90s when he was rivaling Nintendo’s Mario franchise who already had a theatrical film released in 1993, I’d assume one would have been made back then or at the very least in the early-late 2000s when Sonic Adventure DX: Director’s Cut, Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, and Sonic Heroes as well as the hit Saturday morning anime series, Sonic X were released, I was so eager for a Sonic movie that a couple of friends and I got together and made movies of our own when we were kids (They sucked BTW!).             

After years of waiting and Sonic making a few big screen appearances prior in Disney’s Wreck-It Ralph movies and Steven Spielberg’s Ready Player One, the beloved hedgehog finally gets a movie of his own which leads us to today. The film is directed by newcomer Jeff Fowler in his directorial debut, produced by Neal H. Moritz (Fast & Furious franchise, XXX, 21/22 Jump Street), and executive produced by Tim Miller (Deadpool, Terminator: Dark Fate) and is a live-action/animated hybrid (Yep, just like Alvin and the Chipmunks and The Smurfs), which had me very worried when it was announced back in 2014 and was even more worried and disgusted when the first trailer came out last year which had an absolutely atrocious design for Sonic, fortunately they fixed it.

So, how does Sonic’s first movie hold up? Honestly, while I can’t call it the Sonic movie I wanted as a child, I had a fun time with it. It isn’t a perfect representation of its source material and the plot is pretty generic, but the charm of the film’s leads, humor, and subtle references to the games that inspired it are enough for me to overlook that flaw.             

The film follows Sonic (voiced by Ben Schwartz-Parks and Recreation, The Other Guys, The Walk), blue anthropomorphic talking hedgehog from another dimension with extraordinary speed who travels to Earth to escape from those who want to capture him and harness his power. However, when he accidentally causes a power outage while hiding out in the town of Green Hills (Get it?), Sonic is targeted by the government and the tyrannical mad scientist, Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey-Ace Ventura 1 and 2, The Mask, The Truman Show) who plots to use Sonic’s power for world domination.             

This forces Sonic to team up with Green Hills sheriff, Tom Wachowski (James Marsden-X-Men franchise, Enchanted, Westworld) who agrees to help Sonic on his adventure to find his missing bag of magical rings that have the power to get him home. Of course, while getting into all sorts of trouble along the way.             The film also stars Tika Sumpter (Ride Along 1 and 2, Get On Up, Southside with You) as Tom’s wife Maddie, Adam Pally (Happy Endings, The Mindy Project, Iron Man 3) as Wade Whipple, and Neal McDonough (Star Trek: First Contact, Band of Brothers, Justified) as Major Bennington.             

Overall, Sonic the Hedgehog probably isn’t the movie longtime fans wanted, but it still manages to be an entertaining and fun adaptation in its own right. It’s easily one of the best films based on a video game alongside Pokémon: Detective Pikachu and The Angry Birds Movie 2 and shows that we’ve come a long way since the dark days of Uwe Boll’s directing career.

As mentioned before, the plot is nothing special and rehashed from other kids’ movies however what sets this apart from things like The Smurfs or Masters of the Universe is that Sonic and Tom do have a strong chemistry together. It’s amusing to see them interact with each other on their road trip, cracking jokes, getting into trouble, and over the course of the film they learn more about one another thus making you care more for them over ANY Smurf or Chipmunk. 

While there are a few jokes that don’t quite stick the landing, the humor for the most part not only made me laugh but there were moments in this movie where I laughed hard. Whether the film was poking fun at the entire Sonicfranchise, a particular running sequence that’s obviously a reference to the Quicksilver scenes from the X-Men movies, or Sonic breaking the fourth wall similar to Deadpool, I was laughing while also admiring how clever some of these jokes are, and let’s not forget Jim Carrey as Dr. Robotnik, but we’ll get to him momentarily.

The redesigned Sonic is a lot better than what we could have gotten, he doesn’t have those ugly small eyes, questionable muscular arms and legs, or the terrifying human teeth anymore. Now, his appearance is more faithful to the source material recreating the hedgehog’s cartoony nature but is different enough to stand out from the rest of the character’s previous designs and be its own unique creation, this is a really good design for Sonic and had the filmmakers went with their original version, this movie would have crashed and burned even harder than Sonic ’06.

Besides Sonic being more appealing to look at now, he’s also just as entertaining to listen to, Ben Schwartz while he’s far from being a replacement for Roger Craig Smith, Ryan Drummond, Jason Griffith, or even Jaleel White, does a solid job providing Sonic’s voice and captures the cocky, arrogant, but good-natured attitude Sonic is known for having. He actually almost sounds like Ryan Drummond’s Sonic voice without sounding like a cheap impersonation.             Moving on to Sonic’s new friend that doesn’t have two tails, James Marsden as Tom, his performance is decent even though he doesn’t quite make as big an impression as Ben Schwartz’ Sonic and especially Jim Carrey’s Dr. Robotnik. With that said, he gets some funny lines once in a while and as mentioned before has good chemistry with Sonic, so yeah, believe it or not James Marsden was partnered up with another CG animated character and this time came out with his dignity unlike his performance in Hop.             

Jim Carrey as Dr. Robotnik owns every scene that he’s in, he’s no Mike Pollock and is a radically different Robotnik than from the games, but Carrey’s energetic and wildly animated personality shines through and gives a million percent whenever the crazy evil genius is on-screen. He’s certainly a lot better than Dennis Hopper as Koopa from the Super Mario Bros. movie.

Hopefully, this movie will be a hit during its theatrical run because I’d love to see a sequel especially if it introduced other Sonic characters like Tails, Knuckles, or even Shadow. Don’t make this like the recent Power Rangers movie, I need my big screen version of those characters!

Whether a fan, newcomer, or just looking for something fun to take the kids to, Sonic the Hedgehog should make everyone happy. It’s not perfect but it has enough action, wit, and charm to make it worth checking out. You’ll be “Up, Over, and Gone” before you know it.

For more movie reviews please visit: https://moviewatchinpsychopath.blogspot.com

[sparklegemstone]

San Diego Comic Con 2019 -- Sat. Marvel Studios Panel

Got back from a long weekend at SDCC Sunday night and wanted to post my reactions. This first post will be about the Saturday Marvel Studios panel since that is what has captured most people’s interest.  Fair warning, half of this is going to be my own personal waffling and stream-of-consciousness that you may not care a wink about.

I've been trying to get a SDCC badge for, what, 4-5 years now?  Year after year, the lottery did not look kindly on me. So towards the end of 2018 when I finally succeeded in getting a badge for 2019, not only was I excited to have gotten a badge at all, but I thought I was extra lucky and that, if I were to be able to attend any year, this would be the year to attend because 1) it would likely be the concluding Game of Thrones panel, which after almost a decade would be a monumental event and 2) under the impression that the Loki series was going to be some of the first content available for Disney+ released late 2019/early 2020, without really having any expectations I was daydreaming about how great it would be if Hiddleston were to be there promoting Loki+ as well.  Turns out both of these were true! 

So flash forward to the weekend of SDCC.  Since we'd learned that Loki+ was still on the far horizon I'd completely forgotten about any wistful idea of Hiddleston being at the con.  In the aftermath of Endgame, I was not feeling interested in the upcoming Marvel Studios content, but still my love for Phase 1 and 2 and completionist tendencies were compelling me to try and get into Hall H on Saturday for the Marvel Studios panel regardless.  If only 50-100 more Star Trek fans hadn't felt it worth sticking around for Marvel, I would have gotten in, it was very close, but I didn't quite make  it. But I did get to see the official recording of the full panel sans promotional videos Saturday night 3 hours after the live event as part of the "playback" programming at the con.   

So! Feige's introducing movies and bringing their casts onto the stage, but my brain's so comfortably seated in my prior belief not expecting Hiddleston to be here that the possibility didn't even dawn on me.  I was so dense you guys, it did not dawn on me until literally 5 seconds before Hiddleston came out on stage, even after Feige had started talking about Loki+, lol. But what a delightful surprise! 

People are talking about the bit of music that played while Tom walked onto stage. There's another piece of music, though. In the playback of the Hall H panel that I watched, there was some introductory video for the Loki+ bit of the panel for which the video itself was redacted but the sound for the video still played.  For that piece of music, whimsical is the wrong word, I don't want to bring people's minds to the cartoony/whimsical character of the first Loki+ logo we saw because the music wasn't of that nature, but it kind of felt quirky and unearthly, not heavy, grounded, and driving like a lot of the powerful MCU themes. I thought it had to be for Dr. Strange 2 until it became clear it was for Loki+. 

I was delighted that the audience started chanting "Loki! Loki!" in callback to his previous SDCC appearances.  That's a good group of fans there. 

Also, seeing these huge groups of casts and creative teams coming on stage for 10 minutes at a time to introduce each of their movies, and then seeing Hiddleston up there by himself to introduce his own show, given equal weight and importance among the other MCU announcements at the panel, it just uniquely dawned on me then how proud and happy I felt that Hiddleston now had a front and center role carrying his own show and was getting the recognition for it, no longer a supporting character in a larger ensemble film.  He was the only one that had the stage all to himself during the panel.  Coming close would be things like Falcon & The Winter Soldier, which featured Mackie and Stan, but it's unclear to me how much that show is going to be about their characters vs. just featuring their characters, being about their interaction and the situations that arise when you throw them together.  I have hope that Loki+ is going to be specifically about Loki as a character. 

I enjoy the fandom content featuring Strange, Wanda, and Loki together as the trifecta of powerful magic users, and so when they announced Wanda would be making an appearance in Dr. Strange 2 I was lightly miffed that Loki was left out. In practice, though, I'm not sure how challenging it would be / how likely it would be that the creative team would execute such a Loki appearance well so I'm not going to focus on it. 

And then Thor 4.  Despite having negative interest in anything Thor-related at this point and agreeing that Loki as a character is not well-served by the sensibilities of another Waititi film, the thing I was most interested in was seeing if Hiddleston was going to join them on stage for that one, and when he didn't, I will admit that I felt a juvenile, knee-jerk reaction of irrational and undeserved resentment on Hiddleston's behalf, as if he was being excluded and deemed not good enough to be in another Thor film after all that he's brought to the Thor franchise, but of course it made no sense to feel that way when my brain kicked in. I'm not going to touch any of the 'behind the scenes relationship' wank, but in the most general possible sense, different stories have different needs.  Either a character furthers a specific story or they don't, and for a piece of work where service to the story comes first, it should be as simple as that and needn't be about the character at all.  Plus in this case logistically I don't even know if Hiddleston would have the time to act in both Loki+ and Thor 4. 

With how Jane was carelessly brushed aside in Ragnarok, and not being aware of anyone in Marvel Studios having talked about Portman since TDW, I was very surprised about the announcement that Thor 4 was going to feature Jane again, and intrigued as well at her larger role, just not enough to actually see the film.  Maybe there's hope for Betsy yet (I don't actually believe that).  What's interesting is that the Marvel comics and Marvel Studios exhibit that was in Seattle earlier this year featured artwork of Jane-as-Thor (if I remember correctly, it was created specifically for the exhibit) next to Hemsworth's costume, and now looking back I wonder if that was deliberately added to the exhibit by someone that had knowledge of Thor 4 or whether it was just a coincidence. 

I cannot decide which has the sillier name: "Thor: Love and Thunder" or "Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness".  Oh wait, yes I can. 😋 

[t-shirtclassic]

Thor Love And Thunder Release Date Cast And Everything Else We Know About Thor 4

Thor Love And Thunder Release Date Cast And Everything Else We Know About Thor 4 Prior to the release of Avengers: Endgame, there was a broad assumption that Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor were seeing their time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe come to an end. The three heroes had seen individual solo trilogies play out in full, and it felt like the massive capstone blockbuster would serve as a big goodbye for the trio. But while the massive film did provide a farewell for Tony Stark and Steve Rogers, Chris Hemsworth’s run as the God of Thunder is not over, as he will soon be back in Thor 4 a.k.a. Thor: Love And Thunder. The feature is easily one of the most exciting films planned for the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Phase 4, and in so being it is the subject of endless questions and speculation. That in mind, we’ve created this guide to specifically sort out everything that we know about the film so far – with the plan being to repeatedly update it as Thor: Love And Thunder continues to develop. What will the movie be about? What characters will be featured? Who is making it? When will it be out? Find answers for all of those queries and more below! What Is The Release Date For Thor: Love And Thunder? When Marvel Studios announced their Phase Four film slate at San Diego Comic-Con 2019, fans were delighted to discover that Thor: Love And Thunder was being planned as the franchise's big release in November 2021... but then a little thing called COVID-19 happened. All of the MCU's plans ended up being pushed, with all of the 2020 features moving to 2021. Fortunately, this huge shift has coincided with Marvel suddenly being comfortable with the idea of releasing four movies in a calendar year, and as such we don't actually have to wait too much longer for the fourth Thor movie. Now set to be the second Marvel movie out in 2022 (following Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness), the film will be hitting theaters on May 6 , 2022. What Is Thor: Love And Thunder’ Rating? Not being a character who speaks with a lot of adult language and isn’t known for being overly excessive when it comes to violence, Thor is a hero who hasn’t needed an R-rating to be himself on the big screen thus far, and there is little expectation for that to change with Thor: Love And Thunder. Every film in which Chris Hemsworth has played the Asgardian hero has received a PG-13 rating from the MPAA, and it’s expected that the Thor: Ragnarok sequel will be no exception (though technically that won't be something that is confirmed until a cut of the movie has been assembled). Who Is Directing Thor: Love And Thunder? In the making of Thor: Ragnarok, director Taika Waititi breathed new life into what had been considered by many to be the weakest of the solo Marvel Cinematic Universe series – so it came as a surprise to literally nobody when it was revealed that Marvel Studios wanted him back for Thor 4. In addition to directing, he is also taking care of screenwriting duties, though that is a job that he is splitting with co-writer Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, who came aboard the project in February 2020. While in pre-production on Thor: Love And Thunder, Taika Waititi is also simultaneously busy directing his seventh feature film, Next Goal Wins, which is a sports comedy based on the 2014 British documentary of the same name. What Is The Story Of Thor: Love And Thunder? Other than the fact that Thor: Love And Thunder will pick up where Avengers: Endgame left off with the titular character, there really isn’t much known about the plot of the movie. At the end of the massive 2019 blockbuster, the God of Thunder decided to depart Earth with the Guardians of the Galaxy on a mission to discover who he is beyond all of the trappings of his birthright. No longer serving as the king of Asgard, he will be on the hunt for a new purpose. What does do a nice job upping our anticipation, curiosity, and excitement, however, is that Thor 4 will see the return of Jane Foster, the character this time around getting a superhero upgrade. There is an assumption that the film will be drawing details from writer Jason Aaron's run of Thor comics, which is when Foster first took on the mantle of Mighty Thor, but little has been confirmed. The Thor: Love And Thunder Cast As is the case with all Marvel Cinematic Universe sequels, Thor: Love And Thunder will feature a hefty mix of both returning stars and new faces – and while we don't know about everybody who is involved in the production, these are the folks who have been confirmed to have roles in the blockbuster. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) Back in 2011 when the first Thor was released, Chris Hemsworth was almost exclusively known for his part playing James T. Kirk’s father in the opening sequence of J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek reboot, but the world has totally changed for the actor since then… and his time as the Asgardian hero has had everything to do with it. His role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe has helped him become one of the biggest stars in the world, and while the movies hasn’t always been the greatest time for him as a performer, his wonderful experience making Thor: Ragnarok inspired him to make a fourth solo film as the God of Thunder. Chris Hemsworth will have more than 10 years under his belt playing Thor by the time Thor: Love And Thunder comes out, having played the character in seven different movies during that time. We can’t say for certain how much more time he will spend playing the role beyond the new Taika Watiti-helmed adventure, but we hope it’s indefinite. Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) With Thor: Ragnarok not spending a great deal of time on Earth (save for a quick trip to Doctor Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum and a cliff in Norway), the film didn’t really have any time to feature the Thor series’ cast of human characters. That, however, is changing in a major way with the fourth installment. It was confirmed at San Diego Comic-Con 2019 during the Marvel Studios Hall H panel not only that Natalie Portman would be returning to play Jane Foster in Thor: Love And Thunder, but that the blockbuster will see her become worthy of the titular god’s mantle and become The Mighty Thor. Not counting the archive footage that was used in Avengers: Endgame, Natalie Portman hasn’t appeared in a Marvel Cinematic Universe film since 2013’s Thor: The Dark World. According to Taika Waititi, she was primarily interested in reprising the role of Jane Foster in Thor: Love And Thunder because it offered her the opportunity to do something different than what she did in her previous two go-rounds with the character – namely become a full-blown superhero. Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson) When we last saw Valkyrie, she was set to take on a rather hefty responsibility. With Thor deciding to do some soul searching to learn who he is beyond being a member of Asgardian royalty, he left the responsibility of ruling the kingdom (now located in Tønsberg, Norway) to her. With the character confirmed to return in Thor: Love And Thunder, we’ll presumably get an update in the film on how her time as a monarch has been going. Thor: Love And Thunder will be the third Marvel Cinematic Universe movie for Tessa Thompson following both Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Endgame. Off-screen in Avengers: Infinity War she narrowly escaped Thanos’ initial attack on the Asgardian arc, and then was one of the heroes who wound up surviving the Mad Titan’s snap with the Infinity Gauntlet. All things considered, she’s had a rather good string of luck since meeting Thor on Sakaar, and hopefully that luck won’t run out any time soon. Gorr The God Butcher (Christian Bale) It was confirmed in early January 2020 that Christian Bale was boarding the cast of Thor: Love And Thunder, and a few months later Tessa Thompson confirmed that he will be playing the villain in the film, but it wasn't until the 2020 Disney Investor Day that we learned the actor will be playing Gorr The God Butcher in the upcoming blockbuster. In the comics, the character is an alien who grew up on a desolate and superstitious planet, constantly told that he had to believe in the gods for salvation. He experiences years and years of death and tragedy with none of his prayers being answered, but things only get worse when he denounces his faith. After being cast out by his society, he discovers that gods are actually real, and furious that his calls were never answered he makes a vow to kill every god in the universe. And what gives him the ability to accomplish this task is All-Black, a powerful and deadly sword. As many have pointed out since talk of the casting started swirling, this is far from Christian Bale’s first time at the superhero movie rodeo. From 2005 to 2012 he reigned as the big screen version of Bruce Wayne/Batman in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy, and to this day he is considered by many to have delivered the definitive cinematic take on the character. It will definitely be interesting to see how his Marvel Cinematic Universe role winds up comparing and contrasting with his time as the Caped Crusader. Korg (Taika Waititi) Not only is Taika Waititi set to return as the director of the next Thor solo film, but he’ll also be reprising his part as the fan-favorite Korg. We first met Korg in Thor: Ragnarok as a failed revolutionary forced to compete in the Grandmaster’s gladiator fights, but his life has gotten considerably better since then. He helped the people of Asgard escape the clutches of Hela, and then became an important figure in the life of the God of Thunder when he was struck with depression following Thanos’ snap. We have no idea what his part in Thor: Love And Thunder will be, but it’s certainly going to provide comedic relief. Since helming Thor: Ragnarok, Taika Waititi has kept busy both in front of the camera and behind it, most notably writing, directing, and starring in the Academy Award-winning World War II satire Jojo Rabbit. Following his appearance in Avengers: Endgame he played a supporting role in the hit Disney+ series The Mandalorian, and also has roles in the upcoming films Free Guy and The Suicide Squad. Sif (Jaimie Alexander) Due to commitments to her long-running network television series Blindspot, Jaimie Alexander was unable to reprise her role as Sif from the first two Thor movies in Thor: Ragnarok... but in a weird twist of fate, that scheduling conflict may have saved her character's life. In her first two appearances, Sif primarily spent screen time alongside The Warriors Three – Volstagg (Ray Stevenson), Fandral (Zachary Levi), and Hogun (Tadanobu Asano) – but all of those characters were notably killed in their last adventure when Cate Blanchett's Hela arrived in Asgard. There isn't an official canon explanation as for where the heroine has been, but we'll presumably get one soon because she is set to make her comeback in Thor: Love And Thunder.Because she also didn't appear in either Avengers: Infinity War or Avengers: Endgame, Jaimie Alexander has spent more than half a decade away from the Marvel Cinematic Universe – her last appearance as Sif being in a 2015 episode of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. We're definitely excited that she is coming back, though, and we're particularly anticipating the character's reinvention in Taika Waititi's hands. The Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum) At the end of Thor: Ragnarok, the fate of Jeff Goldblum's The Grandmaster is left open-ended. The character actually gets the last word of the film, featured in the movie's post-credits stinger, but he's not exactly featured in a fortuitous position – his shipped having crashed in the wake of the revolution in Sakaar and left face to face with a gang of armed rebels. The moment left a fun question mark on the end of the blockbuster, but it seems that we'll be getting an answer regarding the character's fate in Thor: Love And Thunder. Jeff Goldblum was one of many stars to be spotted down in Australia during the production of Thor 4, and that fact has led to wide spread speculation that he will be back reprising his role as the Grandmaster in the Marvel movie. It seems like a pretty safe bet, but it should be noted that it's not 100% official yet. The Guardians Of The Galaxy As noted earlier, the last time that we saw Thor he was hanging out with the Guardians of the Galaxy – requiring a ride off of Earth after leaving Asgard in the very capable hands of Valkyrie. This led to speculation regarding the possibility of the God of Thunder appearing in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3... but that was before Thor: Love And Thunder was B) announced as a project, and B) announced to have a release date earlier than the James Gunn film. That shifted the conversation to the question of whether or not the Guardians would appear in Thor 4... and the answer is yes, it turns out that they will. There isn't a whole lot of reason to believe that the Guardians of the Galaxy will have a large role to play in Thor: Love And Thunder (they literally may just drop him off some place and then quickly say goodbye), but at the very least it has been confirmed that the characters will appear. Chris Pratt (Peter Quill a.k.a. Star-Lord), Pom Klementieff (Mantis), Dave Bautista (Drax), Karen Gillan (Nebula), and Sean Gunn (Rocket/Kraglin) were all spotted in Australia during the 2022 blockbuster's production. Where Can You Stream Thor Movies? As noted, Thor has had seven big screen adventures to date, and all of them can be streamed online instantly provided you have subscriptions to the proper services: Thor (2011) If you wish to go back and watch Thor’s origin story, and see how he went from conceded jerk to hero, the 2011 film from director Kenneth Branagh is now available to watch on Disney+. The Avengers (2012) Disney+ is also the only place where you can watch the blockbuster that totally changed the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with Thor teaming up with Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America, Black Widow, and Hawkeye to save the world from his adopted brother, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki. Thor: The Dark World (2013) Thor: The Dark World isn’t exactly considered the best film of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but Disney+ can nonetheless witness the eponymous god’s battle against Malekith (Christopher Eccleston) and his army of Dark Elves any time they want. Avengers: Age Of Ultron (2015) While Thor particularly specializes in extraterrestrial threats, he had the chance to battle a totally Earth-centric one rejoining Earth’s Mightiest Heroes to fighting the titular villain in Avengers: Age of Ultron, and you can watch all the action now on Disney+. Thor: Ragnarok (2017) Taika Waititi totally changed Thor’s legacy on the big screen with Thor: Ragnarok, and if you’re really looking to get a sense of what to expect from Thor: Love And Thunder, rewatching the blockbuster on Disney+ is the best way to get that done right now. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) While Avengers: Infinity War was sold as a massive team movie, Thor really is the central hero of the story… though his strength isn’t quite enough to result in a victory at the end. You can relive the devastation now on Disney+. Avengers: Endgame (2019) To catch up with all of the latest events in the God of Thunder’s life prior to Thor: Love And Thunder, all you need to do is turn on Disney+ and check out his journey battling depression and getting revenge against Thanos in Avengers: Endgame. Are There Any Trailers Or Teasers For Thor: Love And Thunder? At this stage in the game, it is definitely far too early to be talking about Thor: Love And Thunder teasers and trailers. While footage does exist, in all likelihood we won’t actually see anything publicly released for the feature until the months before its release (December 2021 is probably a safe bet to see a first look) We plan to continue keeping close track of Thor: Love And Thunder as it continues to make its way through the various stages of development, and will also routinely update this feature with the latest updates. To see all of the other films that are set to arrive from the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the next few years, be sure to check out our Read the full article

[superbatson]

frozen denver: a reaction post

yeah, i decided to watch the frozen boot in its entirety on a snow day. it seemed appropriate enough. 😜

act one

i really dig this narrator/troll guy. he’s kinda hot (but that’s probably bc he’s shirtless constantly with tattoos/body paint and biceps & abs for days... mm, yes)

i like the diversity aspect of having elsa & anna’s dad be black. only, for the show to be realistic, elsa & anna shouldn’t be so light-skinned. while it is possible to have mixed parents and come out as white-passing, it’s more likely/common for the kids’ skins to be at least somewhat dark/medium. both girls don’t look mixed at all.

ooh, the “monster” melody appears in the beginning? i love it! (with bonus foreshadowing, yes please!)

patti is a really good anna. she’s quite adorable, and her voice is a really good fit for the character.

these ice projects are fantastic, i especially love the ones on the objects elsa’s holding when she first appears

bringing the remaining cast of characters in for “first time in forever” is a very smart move. it really makes it feel like this song is more the opening number, despite what we’ve already seen/heard so far. now the real story can begin.

hans is reeeeeally awkward in the beginning, wow. he wasn’t like this in the original film. a little awkward/clumsy, yeah, but not any more than anna. he’s like ten times more awkward than anna now, but john as a cute smile, so i’ll give him that.

weaselton’s tango is kind of unnecessary, but still a fun little transition between scenes. kinda makes the show feel more like a movie, since that’s more something that you’d find in a movie than a broadway show.

even if i was never a huge fan of the original movie, “love is an open door” has definitely been my favorite song from this franchise ever since i saw it, and john & patti sound even better singing this song than kristen & santino. i love this performance.

i’ll admit, i watched this performance before when i initially downloaded the boot and gosh, the slightly adult-ish humor is great. anna’s hand sliding down han’s chest, hilarious! these lil dorks really don’t know how to flirt.

i love the dance break!!!! it’s so cute and fun! and very in-character.

best part of that number has to be how quickly-yet-gradually john’s curls begin to fall loose. they’re just everywhere by the end, and i love it!

oh god now they’re making out as they transition scenes... this is a family show!

i just noticed that when anna comes back out to officially meet/team up with kristoff, the strip of white in her hair has gotten bigger... i’m guessing the whiteness will continue to grow as the show goes on?

oh no i really like jelani’s voice too. what the heck, this cast is so talented?!?!

i love the production design for this show. it really makes you feel like you’re in a cold, snowy, frozen place. (but the same can be said for ghd, because that also did a really good job of setting the mood in terms of the weather of the show.)

this is now the second time anna’s been lifted up in the air (or, i guess, swept off her feet... *ba dum tss*) by a male character in the show... is there supposed to be a height joke there?

they really could have done a better job with how they incorporate olaf into the show, at least from a design standpoint. everything so far makes the show seem realistic, like it could be set in the real world - or, say, like a live-action movie. but olaf looking exactly like the animated movie? terrible. i get that he has a particular look to him, but disney, please change it going into broadway, thanks.

(i don’t even care if they give him black, button eyes that could make him look creepier. it’ll be realistic, and we all learned to love the hyper-realistic cgi characters of 2017′s beauty and the beast, right?)

greg is... alright as olaf. a little too much like a gad copycat to me. and while i understand how much the kids like “in summer” and it shows how adorable dumb olaf is as a character, is it really necessary in the broadway show? it’s just too much of a break from the main plot of the show.

oh, look, they fixed john’s hair, ha, that’s great. there’s just like a single curl falling on his forehead now.

ohh, yes, give me this assertive leader hans. i love this character growth. (bc i’m the weirdo who’s always loved hans, even when he ends up being evil. sue me.)

“let it go” is such an overrated song, but damn, does it make a good act one closer! (and that ice dress is gorgeous, ugh, best costume of the show so far.)

act two

oh no they kept the trading post guy. why

wait, he’s just talking to the audience. i guess this is a filler-type thing to give people some extra time in the bathroom or getting snacks/merch? eh, alright. glad more shows are doing that now, though i’ll always make sure i’m right back in my seat the second the curtain lifts again for act two.

he has a song too. yeah, this is all filler. let’s see if this song is better than “poor pirates”. (it probably won’t be, but who knows?)

answer: it’s not. it’s very lame and kind of annoying, really.

aw, i kind of liked anna in the practical winter gear. but i guess this second dress is even more notable (for her) from the movie, so it was kind of inevitable that they’d incorporate it, right?

kristoff getting excited over the castle made entirely of ice. i like this little addition to the script.

i’ve forgotten how good elsa’s part in this “first time in forever” reprise is. can i get a studio recording of that as a solo?

it makes sense that they’d do away with the snow monster thing that sends anna, kristoff, and olaf out, but i’m confused as to what actually did send them out. more snow? a big gust of wind? elsa separating herself with more ice walls? what???

another olaf song? really? is that necessary?

they kept the “i don’t have a skull, or bones” line. that’s, like, the only olaf line i like, so, good.

ohhh, yeah, the trolls are still there and they’re still kristoff’s parents. i’m suddenly remembering the line in the opening about the trolls raising some human kids...

“fixer upper” also feels like a very unnecessary song??? i dunno, maybe i’m just sick of it from the movie. (or i just never liked it anyway)

the troll leader guy’s name is pabbie. just listing that here, for, uh, safe keeping...

watching the original movie again recently, i came to the realization that kristoff’s a very one-dimensional character with not a lot of growth or depth or anything like that. i’m still not completely sold on him as a character here, but i’ll admit, he has a lot more personality now. and this lullaby further helps to show that. good for you, frozen on broadway. you fixed something from the original film.

i just noticed that the troll guy’s - pabbie! - tail moves. not just with the motion of him walking, but it swings back and forth, more than i think it naturally would from the motion of walking. such a cool little detail!

it might be because i’ve listened to it several times before, but “monster” is definitely my favorite new song written for this show on broadway. it shows more of elsa’s fear about not controlling her powers and fear that others will fear her. it’s also just really catchy. kind of goes with “hope” in terms of super powerful and darn good broadway songs.

“if i die, would they be free?” yup, this song definitely goes hand-in-hand with “hope”. (though it’s a bit dark for a disney song...)

“she’s scared, so back off” SEE I TOLD YOU HANS IS A GOOD GUY #justiceforhans2k18

“why do you protect her?” “......for anna.” me:

.

(the only ships i care about for frozen are hans/anna and hans/elsa, sorry)

ohhh, john’s delivery of the “if only there was someone out there who loved you” line is good. i love how he smiles and laughs before saying it.

(i especially love how it’s really the same smile we saw before, that looked all cute, sweet, and innocent, but now it has a dark, evilness to it. eee, it’s great!)

(i’m a sucker for good villains, if you couldn’t already tell)

a third, sinister version of “hans of the southern isles”? yes please!

my prediction from earlier was right: patti’s wig is whiter now, to go with how more and more frozen anna’s becoming

HIS LIL EVIL LAUGH AHH YES

okay, two little flaws with the scene i’m watching (i had no comments on the “true love” song or anna’s conversastion with olaf) - hans should be  more sad/solemn when he says that anna’s dead, not just yelling it? i mean, he can be loud, but at least show some emotion. and isn’t elsa there to hear that anna’s supposedly dead? she should be there to hear the news so that she’s defeated enough that hans has the opportunity to kill her...

oh, these ensemble members in all white are supposed to represent the storm... that’s cool!

now, elsa’s finding out that anna’s “dead”... nevermind about my previous criticism, then

“may i kiss you?” “yes, you may!” oh, that’s cute

so hans gets punched and then just stumbles offstage - will we get any more closure with him in the next five minutes, or no?

ohh, i like this “love is an open door”/”true love” mashup

overall thoughts

i honestly can’t wait to download this album/stream it on spotify. it’s really good. as i have said and will continue to say, i didn’t like the original film, but dammit, this show has officially sold me on the franchise. i kind of love it.

i don’t know who i want to win now at the tony’s. i mean, frozen has freakin’ oscars, so if it loses, i’ll be fine, and if it wins, i won’t be surprised, but the actors? between this cast and spongebob, i just don’t know. one of the ladies here, more likely cassie, should definitely win for best actress. as for the men, well, obviously my preferences like with ethan for lead and gavin for supporting, but john and jelani are really good too. and it’s really a tie for song & lyrics, both shows are so good. even the frozen costumes are great, though spongebob’s are just a little more creative when it comes to the ensemble...

going back to the music, i also hope they keep some of the score pieces for the soundtrack. the score’s really good.

i also think everyone’s well-cast in each of their respective roles. no one seems out of place here. the show can only get better when it transitions to broadway.

[81scorp]

Constructive criticism: Transformers 2

(Originally posted as an editorial on Deviantart Apr 24, 2015. It has not been changed from how I originally wrote it.)

Before I go into Transformers 2 I want to talk about the X-Men and Spider-man movie that came out in the early 2000`s.

Spider-man and X-Men are in my opinion a good start. Not just to the whole "let`s try to make a serious comicbook superhero movie and not turn it into a big, campy, live-action saturday morning cartoon joke" genre, but to their own, respective movie franchises as well.

"What about The Crow and Blade?"

Yes, those were good, serious comicbook movies but they didnt start a big, new wave of good comicbook superhero movies, they were more of a prologue.As I was saying: X-men and Spider-man were a good start for their movie franchises. They weren`t perfect. The filmmakers were a little new to the universe and how to translate it into something more cinematic, but it worked well enough. In the sequels things worked a little better. The directors, writers and actors had gotten more familiar with the characters, the world they lived in and things seemed to work smoother. Not just in how close it was to the material they were adapting but in general. Then they screwed it up in the third movie.This is kinda how I feel about the first Transformers movie. The first one was a good start. It made sense how we in the beginning spent more time with the humans and didn`t get to the Autobots until a little later, and I liked most of the humor.

Though I think it would have been better without the scene where Bumblebee urinates on Agent Simmons. Just saying.

And in hindsight they could have dialed down the male gazing too. But unlike Spider-man and X-men, Transformers decided not to take what it had learned from it`s first experience and see if it could do better. No, instead Michael Bay and friends said: "Why wait for the third movie? Let`s screw it up now!" And so they did, and people still paid money to see it, myself included. Yes, I am ashamed. And yes, I know, the script was written during the writer`s strike and it`s possible that Michael Bay was involved in writing it but, come on! Even if you haven`t read books on script writing you can still see that the dumb decisions that they made were really dumb decisions!

Though in defense of Michael Bay, from what I`ve heard, he wanted to do a personal pet project after Tranformers, but was contractually obligated to do a sequel if it did well enough at the box office. Maybe he knew it was bad and screwed it up on purpose so he wouldn`t have to do more Transformers? That`s just wild speculations from me though. Let us, in my very subjective editorial, see where it went wrong and how it could have been fixed.

SPOILERS in disguise The Male gazing

They could have dialed it down or removed it completely.

Bumblebee

I get why he was mute and talked through soundclips in the first movie, because his voice thingy was damaged  and also so he could be a sympathetic character for the audience. But why didn`t he talk in this movie? His voice came back in the end of the first one. Heaven forbid he actually has any character developement. He could have talked, he just doesn`t have to talk that much. And he could still use soundclips sometimes when he feels it suits the situation. Like: when they`re about to enter a dangerous place he could use the "I´ve got a bad feeling about this" line from Starwars. And then there`s the scene where he cries like a sprinkler when Sam tells him he can`t follow him to college. Yes, I get it, they wanted to have some comedy, but they could have done that better. They could have done it like this: When Sam says to Bumblebee that he can`t come, his reaction could be "Oh... OK, I... I understand." But by the tone of his voice and body language we can tell that this saddens him. And when Sam goes away Bumblebee could play "All by myself" on his radio.

Giving Bumblebee such exaggerated, emotional reactions just makes me feel that Bay only thinks of the Transformers as silly, one dimensional, cartoon characters. Disney characters (in good Disney movies at least), The Transformers in the cartoon and the ponies in My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic have a little bit more depth than Bay`s Transformers.

Covering up the events that happened in the first movie

I can believe that such a thing could happen in the Men In Black universe where they can erase memories and stuff, but in this movie? Instead: the army`s official story to the public could be: "Yes, this battle did happen but now all the giant robots (both the good and the evil ones) have disappeared. We don`t know where yet, but we`re working on it."

Mikaela detailing the motorcycle

Yes, Megan Fox is a physically attractive woman, but that is pretty much it, and this scene is, besides pandering to horny teenage boys, also a big research failure from the filmmakers. That`s not how you detail a motorcycle, it is usually done with more protective clothing. So either:

A: have her detail a motorcycle the correct way, or

B: have her change the oil or look at the engine of a car.

Skids and Mudflap

Sigh... these guys. One stupid, racist caricature wasn`t enough, there had to be TWO. They already had Bumblebee with them on their journey so they only needed one of these guys, it would be less work for the animators and should also make it cheaper. Instead of being a stupid idiot he (since there is only one of them now in this hypothetical example) could be a competent warrior and the comedy could come from that he has gotten a few expressions and a few facts about earth wrong. For instance: when they get to the pyramids he could say: "So this is where Lenin is buried" (Lenin was mummified after his death after all). And here`s a funny exchange of words they could have in one scene:

Skids/Mudflap: Let`s kick some Donkey!

Sam or Mikaela: I think you mean "Ass".

Skids/Mudflap: Meh, Tomayto, Potahto. And instead of being illiterate: he couldn`t read the text because it was ancient cybertronian.

Arcee

There are female autobots in this movie. Not many though and they don`t have much screen time (About 39 seconds, less than a minute, out of the movie`s 2½ hours runningtime. And that includes scenes where they are in their motorbike forms doing nothing.) and one dies near the end. (If I`m not mistaken there were more than one in the beginning of the movie, but I don`t remember seeing the other female autobots in the rest of the movie and I don`t remember if

anything was mentioned about what happened to them.) Arcee appeared in eight episodes in the cartoon  BTW.Arcee should have had more screentime, and she didn`t have to die in the end. Personally I wouldn`t mind if it was she that joined Sam, Mikaela, Bumblebee and Leo on their journey to the pyramids instead of Skids/Mudflap.

Inconsistent laws of physics

A while ago I watched a video where some guy listed things he hated about this movie. One of them was a scene where a helicopter carries Optimus Prime`s lifeless body and drops it on the ground like a giant pile of scrapmetal. He felt that this was Bay being completely disrespectful to the character. Personally I thought Bay just wanted to bring in in a little realism. Prime was heavy and those wires couldn`t keep him up forever. However, earlier in the movie Sam is being thrown around by Decepticons and falls from heights that would have killed an ordinary human. If you`re gonna have realistic (or at least believable) laws of physics in your movie, keep them consistent.

The Big giant fight near the end between the humans and the Decepticons

It went on a bit too long. It could have been shorter and some of that time could have been given to Prime`s battle with the fallen, which was a little too short.

The immature humor

There are a bunch of things that I`d like to collect in one common category.

Sam`s mom running around high on campus: While I`m OK with the scene where she mentions that someone offered her brownies, the scene that comes after where she attacks/tries to get a piggyback ride from someone on the school`s lawn just felt like an unnecessary stretch of that gag. Lose it.

The dogs humping each other: Was not necessary in a 2½ hours long film that cost 200 million $ to make. Lose it.

Wheelie humping Mikaela`s leg: Instead he could have rubbed his head against her leg like a cat, and her reaction could have been flattered, yet weirded out. Or: she could be just weirded out. Or: just lose this joke completely.

Leo running out from the bathroom with his pants down: Instead he could run out (with his pants on) and shout:"I need your help! My friend just fainted in the bathroom!" (Yes, I know, the museum was closed so he`d very likely still get arrested, but still.)

Jetfire: I`m OK with him being old, but does he have to be a caricature? And I`d lose the parachute fart joke.

Devastator`s "balls": Lose it!

Robot heaven

The Autobots are not biological beings but they are sentient so I could buy this, but it was introduced very late in the movie. Instead: Sam doesn`t have a near death experience and the matrix doesn`t have to crumble to dust in his hands earlier in the movie. (Thus shortening the long running time by at least a few minutes.)

-Transformers Dark of the Moon-

My brother rented it on DVD and I gave it a watch. Slightly better than Revenge of the fallen but still not that good. Giant robots was not enough to distract me from the movie`s Bay-isms. Can`t really come up with ideas of how I would have changed it except two things:

Bumblebee`s voice

Like I said, his voice was fixed so why keep the soundclip thing? In the scene where he says Goodbye to Sam he could have done it in his original voice since it was an important moment for at least one of them.

Sam clearly acting suspicious when the watch-decepticon takes over his body

Like when he summersaults over a table for comedic effect. Was that really necessary? He could have acted normally and, at most, only have a few facial tics.

And that`s my list.

[entergamingxp]

Announce Sora for Super Smash Bros.

December 7, 2019 2:30 PM EST

Anything can happen when it comes to who will join Super Smash Bros., but I feel now is the prime time to (finally) bring Sora into the fight.

We are less than a week away from The Game Awards (which is happening on December 12), and the announcement that a lot of people are expecting to see is who the next DLC fighter will be for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Last year at the show, we found out that Joker from Persona 5 would be making an appearance as the first character in the Fighters Pass, which came completely out of left field for fans. One year later, with four characters down, there is just one more fighter coming in the first wave of DLC, and I believe that it is finally time for Sora to jump into the ring.

To help clear the air: yes, Kingdom Hearts is my favorite game series of all time, and even though Kingdom Hearts III was not the package that everyone might have wanted, having literally anyone from the series in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is one of my biggest dreams in gaming. That being said, that isn’t the only reason as to why I think Sora will hopefully be announced.

While Kingdom Hearts is most often looked at as a PlayStation franchise with both Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II releasing exclusively on the PlayStation 2 back in the early 2000s, that really isn’t the case. The fact of the matter is that the series had several titles release exclusively on Nintendo platforms. It wasn’t until Kingdom Hearts 1.5 + 2.5 ReMIX and 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue on PS4 where there was a place to experience the entire series on one singular platform. Even though it took years to do so, the collections were recently announced for Xbox One and are releasing sometime next year.

While Kingdom Hearts III coming to Nintendo Switch would be a fever pitch to say the least, due to the device’s technical capabilities, it isn’t ridiculous to think that all the other titles could eventually wind up there. Sora coming to Smash would be a great marketing tool for the series to sell on Switch with having the original games on a Nintendo platform for the first time ever. Nintendo added Joker and Hero to help promote Persona 5 Scramble (before the game’s official reveal) and Dragon Quest XI S: Echoes of an Elusive Age, so it does make sense. This is just speculation, though: however, there is more hard evidence that Sora could be making his way to the iconic mascot fighting game, or at least I hope so.

Last week we learned that the next trailer for the upcoming Kingdom Hearts III DLC Re:MIND will be released sometime in December, and yesterday it leaked online. The Game Awards is known for releasing trailers for new and anticipated games. It is perfectly plausible that the trailer will show up during PlayStation’s State of Play on December 10, but my money is on the trailer showing up at The Game Awards. Even if it is shown during State of Play, that doesn’t necessarily mean Sora is out. Everyone is expecting the next Smash Bros. character announcement to happen at some point during the show, and every character added in the Fighters Pass so far has been third-party. It just all makes sense to me.

When it comes to the Smash community, whether it be casual or competitive, Sora is arguably one of the most wanted characters to come to Smash. The hashtag “#Sora4Smash” has been an ongoing trend on Twitter throughout this year alone. As early as Super Smash Bros. Brawl over a decade ago, Sora in Smash became a dream for many once the addition of Solid Snake from Metal Gear Solid was revealed. “If someone so iconic and unexpected for a game like Smash as Snake could make it in, who else could,” was a lot of fans’ mentality, but it wasn’t until the entry of Cloud from Final Fantasy VII in Smash 4 (Super Smash Bros. for Wii U/3DS) when fans truly thought that anything was possible.

The major discussion that Smash players have regarding Sora (or Kingdom Hearts as a whole) is what the specifics are when it comes to the ownership of the franchise. Being a collaboration between Disney and Square Enix, many believe that they are the sole reason why the franchise protagonist has yet to make the Smash Bros. roster.

The closest detailed information regarding the agreement that I found was a 2017 interview with Disney Interactive’s Vice President of Production (at the time), John Vignocchi, saying “A lot of people are confused about who exactly owns Kingdom Hearts, but it’s Disney – it’s developed in partnership with Square Enix.” So let’s put that discussion to rest: Disney owns the IP of Kingdom Hearts. However, there are also rumors that any use of the franchise outside of the series must be approved by series director Tetsuya Nomura, even if it’s Disney who wants to do it. Whether that is the case or not, either way it’s likely that Smash Bros.’ Masahiro Sakurai would have to not only get approval from Square Enix, but also from Disney to potentially get Sora into Smash, which is exactly what fans are worried about.

At the end of the day, Sora coming to Smash seems to be a complicated issue. With the upcoming Kingdom Hearts III DLC trailer releasing and The Game Awards having a history of announcing new fighters for the game, it looks like all the pieces are falling into place. I’ve waited for so long for this announcement to happen to the point that my light of optimism is starting to wear thin. Yes, there is a new wave of fighters coming once the current one is complete, but it has gotten to the point where it seems more possible than ever that Sora can be the next new challenger approaching.

December 7, 2019 2:30 PM EST

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2019/12/announce-sora-for-super-smash-bros/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=announce-sora-for-super-smash-bros

[travelersguidetodisney]

Everything You Need to Know About Disney World’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge

Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge is probably the most anticipated opening of new attractions in both Disney World and Disneyland in decades. Though Galaxy's Edge in Disneyland has already opened, it will be revealed to the public at Disney World on August 29. With this very exciting grand opening comes a lot of information to the point it becomes overwhelming! Here is everything you need to know about Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge!

Here's Some Basic Information

Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge takes place in a village called Black Spire Outpost on the planet Batuu. The outpost is a pit stop for intergalactic personal of all types: traders, smugglers, adventurers, etc. It takes up an entirety of 14 acres at Disney's Hollywood Studios--there's a great view of the construction from Slinky Dog Dash in Toy Story Land! The Resistance also has a presence in Black Spire Outpost; they have taken refuge in an abandoned fortress on the edge of the land. You may even see some of your Star Wars favorites, like Rey, Finn, Poe, and BB8, get into run-ins with the First Order! There are two entrances into Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge. And according to D23, John Williams has even composed special music for the park. On top of that, at least 5,000 people have worked incredibly hard to make Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge a reality and for that, I, a Star Wars nerd, am eternally grateful. 

Rides and Attractions

As a huge fan of Star Tours in Hollywood Studios, I've been super excited for the new rides in Galaxy's Edge. I got even more pumped after visiting Pandora: The World of Avatar seeing the technological advancement in Flight of Passage--which is an AMAZING ride, by the way. There are two new attractions in Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge. First, which is already open in Disneyland's Galaxy's Edge, is the Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run. Groups of six will be placed into the cockpit of the "fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy," taking on roles as pilots, gunners, and engineers. Riders must be at least 38 inches tall. The ride vehicle will be tilting and jerking along to mimic the movements appearing on a curved screen. The whole plot of the attraction puts you in the middle of a Star Wars movie. Chewbacca is in Black Spire Outpost in search for supplies to aid the Resistance. He lends the Millennium Falcon to infamous pirate Hondo Ohnaka, who turns to you to help on smuggling runs. Entering Ohnaka Transport Solutions, you can overhear conversations that show that the daily workplace is in chaotic shambles. Already in Disneyland the queue of Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run has received international acclaim. You will see some cool visual effects as you walk through Ohnaka Transport Solutions. Hondo is one of the most advanced animatronic created by Disney, only to be surpassed by the Shaman of the Songs in River Journey in Pandora. After Hondo explains your mission, you will step into the Millennium Falcon. You'll be issued a colored boarding pass so you can roam this amazing queue before your ride. You'll be walking through a complete replica of the Millennium Falcon that you'll only see in the Star Wars franchise. You'll come across the famous chest set, where Han and Leia first kissed. It is truly the heaven of Star Wars nerds! Now, when you're actually in the ride, there is no requirement to operate the controls you are given. But, there's a catch: you won't earn as many galactic points. You must score two coaxium containers (which help fuel the ship and this is pretty easy to do) and keep the ship in good shape, then you'll gain more galactic points and have a higher score. Though the ride has gotten generally positive reviews, a good majority of the public agree that being a pilot is a better experience. It's a ride that will pull between two and three hour wait times, so it is definitely an attraction you should fast pass. Or, if that's not an option, open the park and run to Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge. Luckily, Toy Story Land is still new enough, some crowds may be drawn to that instead. However, it is probably unlikely that it would make much of a dent in the Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run wait time. 

The second attraction, which has yet to open at Galaxy's Edge in Disneyland, is called Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. According to D23, is "one of the most advanced and immersive experiences ever undertaken by Walt Disney imagineers." It is repeatedly emphasized how technologically advanced this attraction will be and how it will not just be a ride, but a cinematic experience. It includes walk-through sections and elements of a trackless dark ride, with a utilization of projections. It is rumored to include elements from Shanghai's incredibly popular rendition of Pirates of the Caribbean and Disneyland Hong Kong's Mystic Manor. Riders will be taken on life-size starship near a Star Destroyer where they must defeat Kylo Ren. You'll be riding in an eight-person vehicle known as the First Order Fleet Transport, which will be hijacked. You'll be in a Star Destroyer hanger bay when a rescue message does not go as planned. There will even be appearances by some of your favorite Star Wars characters. Rise of the Resistance will open at Disney's Hollywood Studios on December 5, 2019 and in Disneyland on January 12, 2020. It seems like Rise of the Resistance will have the same effect as Flight of Passage, changing the game of rides as we know it. It undergoes new technology that has never before been seen in attractions and, thus, will pull wait times even longer than Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run. It is incredibly unlikely that you'll be able to get fast passes for both of these rides, so I recommend getting a one for Rise of the Resistance and then opening the park Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run. It seems like Smuggler's Run is a fun, new ride, while Rise of the Resistance is a life-changing ride that has technology seen nowhere else in the world. 

Dining

Unfortunately, there is no sit-down table service yet. However, I hope one will be built in the new Star Wars hotel near Hollywood Studios (rumored name: Galactic Journeys: A Star Wars Adventure). There will be Oga's Cantina, which will be serving alcoholic beverages and other drinks, including the iconic blue milk. There is really only standing room at Oga's Cantina, kind of mirroring Andy's Lunchbox in Toy Story Land. There will even be a DJ, Oga! Publicized as a "watering hole," Oga's Cantina is basically a themed bar, a nice place for parents to relax and have some drinks as their kids go stand in the four hour long line for Rise of the Resistance. However, just because it is a bar does not mean it will be easy to get into. You see, Oga's Cantina is a replica of Mos Eisley Cantina in Star Wars: A New Hope. It is arguably the attraction with the longest line at Disneyland's Galaxy's Edge. Reviews consistently praise the incredible theming, however, it does not give the complete Mos Eisley vibe since all of the patrons are just Disney tourists, not smugglers, storm troopers, or Jedi Knights. 

If you want to stop at a place with more substantial food to get a bite to eat, then there's Docking Bay 7 Food and Cargo. It is a quick-service restaurant that offers indoor and outdoor seating. There are also alcoholic beverages with Star Wars themed meals. And since it's cuisine is diverse in order to stay on brand and may not appeal to a younger audience, there is also a children's menu. Little kids probably don't want to eat something called "Ithorian Garden Loaf." There's also Ronto Roasters, a meat stand that serves a popular and delicious Ronto Wrap (which also comes in a breakfast version, which is handy for many people will be opening Hollywood Studios and Disneyland to get to Galaxy's Edge). Then there's a Milk Stand, which serves the iconic blue and green milk. This food option serves nice refreshing drinks along with a couple signature snacks. So both of the milks are plant-based. The blue milk lacks a creamy texture that seems to throw a lot of customers off. And since it is made out of coconut and rice milk, it has a sweet taste. Though yummy, it may sit in your stomach during a hot summer's day. The green milk, however, has a more fruity and refreshing taste. Some say it tastes too herbal and some say it is nice and refreshing. Personally, neither options sound too appealing to me, particularly because its not water-based and it seems like it might sit in my stomach. Personally, if you want a refreshing drink that is not ice tea or a cold bottle of water, I recommend Lefou's Brew at Gaston's Tavern in New Fantasyland at Magic Kingdom. It is frozen apple juice with some toasted marshmallow, topped with a passion-fruit foam. It is incredibly refreshing and extremely delicious. I purchase this drink every time I go to Magic Kingdom and it never fails to give me another bolt of energy. Sorry about that sidetrack--let's get back to dining. The last option is Kat Saka's Kettle, known for serving Outpost Mix. The name of this dining service pretty much gives its purpose away--it is a glorified popcorn stand. 

Now, It Wouldn't Be Disney Without Gift Shops!

Of course, Disney couldn't create Galaxy's Edge without a couple of gift shops. A lot of these shops where inspired by those in Morocco, where many of that Tatooine scenes were filmed. One of the things I'm most excited about for Galaxy's Edge is Savi's Workshop: Hand-built Lightsabers. For $200, you can construct your very own lightsaber, similar to the props used in the actual movies! Now, this is a lot of money for a souvenir at Disney World. But for someone who mainly just buys pins and is a huge Star Wars nerds, it is investment that is appealing. And though you are paying for a high-end lightsaber, you're also paying for the experience. There have been overall positive reviews about the show components of Savi's Workshop and it is a 25 minute experience. If you want to do this, you'll have to make a reservation slot because the attraction is incredibly popular. Keep this in mind: the room itself where you construct your lightsaber is incredibly small, making it a slow and long wait-time. And with such scarcity in time slots, you'll probably want to make your reservation as much in advanced as you can. It also seems like a first-come first-serve system--so if you aren't into the rides, you might want to open up the park with this. I'm going to avoid any spoilers, since the reviews say it is a cool attraction. At the end of the day, I'd be thrilled to do it if the opportunity presents itself, but I won't be beating myself up about if I miss it--I could always use that extra $200 on pins anyway. ​There's also Dok-Ondar's Den of Antiquities. This is Galaxy's Edge main gift shop, however, it is unique in many ways. It is not only a shop, but a museum of Star Wars and excellent Disney theming. Overall, you should visit Dok-Ondar’s Den of Antiquities even if you have no intention of buying souvenirs--it is THAT cool. There is also Droid Depot, a place where you can build your very own droid. Costing $99 it is a 15 minute experience that is similar to Savi's Workshop. The droids even beep and are life-like! Reviews don't rank Droid Depot as highly as Savi's Workshop, but that doesn't mean it's not a cool experience. In my opinion, I would rather pay an extra $100 to have a well-reviewed experience and get a lightsaber. Those are the three main shopping experiences in Galaxy's Edge. After that, there is Creature Stall (a place with rare animals from the Star Wars universe), Black Spire Outfitters (a clothing store), First Order Cargo (a place with First Order merchandise), Resistance Supply (a place with Resistance merchandise), The Jewels of Bith (a place for accessories), Toydarian Toymaker (a place for toys). Overall, I am really excited for Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge! I have really high expectations, particularly for Rise of the Resistance--an attraction I'll definitely be fast passing. What are you most excited about?

[rinabrunoblog]

Disney Finally Owns 21st Century Fox

Since December 2017, the public has been waiting to see whether Disney will officially acquire 21st Century Fox, a company that brought us Alien, Simpsons, and The X-Files, just to drop a few names. Well, a little over a year later, $71.3 billion merger is complete and Disney has yet again enlarged itself with another big company as it did with Pixar, Marvel and Lucas Film.

And of course, people now wonder what will happen to some of the contents that Fox has been creating for years. Basically, Disney now owns the rights to X-Men, Fantastic Four and Deadpool characters which makes you wonder will it unite the Marvel franchises and add them to one of the Feige’s phases. This merger will definitely boost the streaming service Disney+ that is planned to start later this year. With strong franchises under its wings, Disney’s streaming service will definitely attract subscriptions and turn into a serious competition to Amazon and Netflix.

But that is not all. By acquiring 21st Century Fox, Disney will be able to obtain valuable information on consumers and their viewing habits. This will give the company a clearer picture of the advertising of its products, as well as what kind of products to create for TV, theatre and streaming viewers. Basically, already rich Disney will increase its wealth, but also the control over the movies and TV shows that are being produced from start to end.

While this is a good sign that X-Men will finally make an appearance in the Avengers, Fox employees may not be so inclined to be joyous. Most likely, thousands of employees from Fox will get fired due to duplication in Fox and Disney staff. On Wednesday, Disney CEO Bob Iger sent a memo to all employees, old and new.

“I wish I could tell you that the hardest part is behind us, that closing the deal was the finish line rather than just the next milestone. What lies ahead is the challenging work of uniting our businesses to create a dynamic global entertainment company with the content, the platforms, and the reach to deliver industry-defining experiences that will engage consumers around the world for generations to come,” said the memo. “Our integration process will be an evolution, with some businesses impacted more than others. We’ve made many critical decisions already, but some areas still require further evaluation. We may not have answers to all of your questions at this moment but we understand how vital information is, and we’re committed to moving as quickly as possible to provide clarity regarding how your role may be impacted.”

Without a doubt, Disney has gotten some big franchises under its wing by acquiring Fox. Besides the already mentioned titles here, it got the rights to the original Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope from 1977. Also, Family Guy, American Dad, The Orville, Modern Family and Planet of the Apes belong to Disney now as well, but so does Titanic which means that the company can make Titanic 2 if it feels like it. Another James Cameron’s franchise now belongs to Disney, and that’s Avatar and the company is already working on a theme park. Since Disney now owns FX, American Horror Story also belongs to it and the franchise was already renewed for two more seasons.

Movie studios like 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight, networks like FX and National Geographic Channel also belong to Disney now, but not Fox TV network. And when it comes to that Fox’s 30 percent stake in Hulu, it belongs to Disney now too, which means that the company now has 60 percent in total since it already owned 30. When it comes to Fox animation studio Blue Sky Studios which created Ice Age, Disney said it will keep the company but how it will fit with Disney Animations and Pixar it’s still unclear.

There are thousands of titles which now belong to Disney and it remains to be seen what will the company do with them. Maybe we will finally get a real Alien movie with Xenomorphs and possibly Ripley, besides Ridley Scott’s prequels. We may even get more X-Files, but that is a farfetched wish. Whatever the future may bring, Disney now owns almost any big franchise you can name and only time will tell how much of it is good and how much of it bad for the viewers, movie industry, streaming services and all other interested parties in the entertainment business.

Disney Finally Owns 21st Century Fox syndicated from https://lucystrickland.wordpress.com/

[thedisneyfox-blog]

Groot takes over the Disney Parks this summer.

Three words, that's all it took;

"I am groot."

It was that single line (repeated over and over) from the first Guardians of the Galaxy film that captured the attention of audiences everywhere and became an iconic catchphrase overnight. The world fell in love with Groot as an aduly, but when baby Groot appeared.. he stole everyones hearts and solidified his mark as the breakaway character.

Luckily for all of us, the folks over at the Disney Parks took notice (thanks guys & gals) and there's a whole lot of Groot coming your way this summer at the Disneyland Resort and Walt Disney World.

Let's start off with California, and their "Summer of Heroes" campaign which kicks off May 27th.

The big deal with this is the reimagining of the "Twilight Zone Tower of Terror" attraction into Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout. The basics are this; The Tower of Terror is no more, its gone - along with all of it's theming. In it's place you'll find a fortress claimed by Taneleer Tivan, or as we remember him.. The Collector. His towering citadel holds the largest assemblage of fauna, relics and species from across the cosmos - and from the looks of this artwork released by Disney.. The Guardians have been procured as well.

Now the attraction won't officially open until May 27th, so there's still loads of info about this attraction that's being floated around. Obviously it will use some of the same effects as Tower of Terror did, especially the coordinated drops in the elevator shaft - and some early reports are saying there's spectacularly crafted animatronic you'll encounter. Is this true? We'll have to wait a few more days. What we could begin to guess is that with the addition of this attraction, we'll start to see more Marvel characters making a presence beyond the meet & greets. 

Speaking of meet & greets, that brings us to the next part of this article. Once the Summer of Heroes begins at Disney California Adventure, guests will be able to encounter Star-Lord and Gamora during the Awesome Dance Off and for the first time ever, attempt to selfie with adult Groot. That lovable hunk of treebark will make his debut in all his grandeur and honestly.. it's probably going to be one of the coolest things you'll ever see, and characters you'll ever meet.

Moving over to the east coast, Walt Disney World has also gotten in on the action by showing some love to the franchise. At Hollywood Studios there's a meet & greet already in place located inside One Man's Dream. It's there you'll find Baby Groot (from vol. 2) hanging out and interacting with Star-Lord. You read that right. Both characters have set up shop and appear together daily.

Now you can't have this amazing experience without walking away without a sweet souvenir, can you? Nope. Once again, the Disney Parks outdid themselves by offering this Baby Groot sipper cup. It has a removable lid, his arms move up and down when you walk, and it's pretty darn spectacular. This mug is currently only available at popcorn carts inside Hollywood Studios, and it's become a new "must have" item. 

So if you're looking to amplify your fix on all things Guardians this summer, and have a love affair with Groot.. head on over to the Disney Parks on either coast. Sure the Disneyland Resort may have a new attraction and an epic Meet & Greet lineup (Captain America, Spider-Man, Black Widow - just to name a few) but Walt Disney World has baby Groot - and for now, that's an absolute dream come true for most of us out there. 

[kcaruth]

Most Anticipated Films of 2017

Can you believe that we are already in the second month of 2017? What better time is there to talk about my most anticipated films for this year? I thought I would take a break from the rankings on this one and simply go through the films in the order of their release dates. Let’s get started!

The LEGO Batman Movie

2014′s The LEGO Movie was a surprising hit, and Batman was a big part of that success. As a result, he now gets to star in his own LEGO movie. Is it sad that this has a higher chance of being the better Batman movie than DC’s Batman flick at this point?

Logan

If Oscars could be awarded for trailers alone, Logan would be a front-runner with that Johnny Cash masterpiece. Logan has a very distinctive feel to it that is quite separate from the X-Men film universe, which might turn out to be a really good thing. Let’s be honest: Who is actually able to keep track of that all over the place timeline from the main films anyway? This Last of Us inspired solo film looks like it will do justice to the character of Wolverine and be a fitting sendoff for actor Hugh Jackman.

Beauty and the Beast

Beauty and the Beast was not one of my favorite Disney movies when I was growing up, but this live-action film looks gorgeous. Emma Watson, beautiful as always, is the perfect fit for Belle, and the voice acting for the servants sounds like it is going to be spot-on. The music sounds great too. All signs seem to point to Disney having another hit on its hands.

The Circle

Let’s follow up Beauty and the Beast with another Emma Watson film, The Circle. Based on Dave Eggers’ 2013 novel of the same name, The Circle imagines what the world would be like if a powerful and influential technology company like Google took control and created a surveillance society, leaving no room for privacy in the digital age. The book was written well enough that it was hard to put down, so I hope the film is just as good, if not better.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

The first Guardians of the Galaxy film was an overwhelming success for Marvel. With C-list characters that casual fans had never even heard of, the first Guardians paved the way for other characters like Ant-Man to have their own films. The chemistry between the actors looks even better than before, and the Soul Stone might make an appearance and be the connecting tissue between the Guardians and the Avengers. I doubt this Guardians sequel will buck the trend of Marvel’s less than memorable villains, but it should be a hilarious, entertaining ride with another stellar soundtrack nonetheless.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales

In the fifth film of the series, Johnny Depp’s Captain Jack Sparrow searches for the trident of Poseidon while Javier Bardem’s Captain Salazar hunts him down. Geoffrey Rush’s Captain Barbossa will also turn up again, and Orlando Bloom’s Will Turner will make his return after being absent from the fourth installment. Who knows? Kiera Knightley’s Elizabeth Swan may also make a surprise appearance. I will be the first to admit that I was not a fan of On Stranger Tides. It was so forgettable that the only details I remember were mermaids were in it and Penelope Cruz was a new addition to the cast. I wish the series would go back to what made it so enjoyable in the first film, but the trailer for Dead Men Tell No Tales indicates that it would prefer to spiral further into mysticism and supernatural ghost crews. To be honest, I am only anticipating this film because of three reasons: (1) I want to see if it turns out to be any better than On Stranger Tides, (2) I miss the character of Captain Jack Sparrow, and (3) I am interested to see how Will Turner is doing in his stint as captain of the Flying Dutchman.

Wonder Woman

DC desperately needs this film to do well. Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and Suicide Squad were both a mess. Wonder Woman gives DC the opportunity to scale things down a bit and focus on one single superhero. With Patty Jenkins at the helm as director, I am optimistic that Wonder Woman can follow in the footsteps of the first Captain America movie and turn out to be a fun blockbuster film with World War I as its setting. Now who else has Wonder Woman’s theme stuck in their head?

Spider-Man: Homecoming

One qualm before we move ahead: the above scene is a ripoff of the train scene in Spider-Man 2. Now that we have gotten that out of the way, it is nice to see Marvel gain control of Spider-Man again. Was I asking for yet another reboot of the classic comic book hero? No. Personally, I liked Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone in the last series. There is no hiding the Amazing Spider-Man movies’ flaws, but they had their tremendously well executed moments too, most memorably this spoiler. However, this new reboot already has some good things going for it. Tom Holland killed it in Captain America: Civil War, and it is going to be great to see Robert Downey, Jr. come in as Tony Stark/ Iron Man as Peter Parker’s mentor. Let’s just hope that Michael Keaton’s Vulture is not Electro-level goofy as a villain.

Dunkirk

Slap Christopher Nolan’s name on a film, and tons of people are going to wait in line to see it. Nolan is the kind of director that can make the audience feel immersed in the world, and Dunkirk looks to be no different. The cinematography should be amazing, and Hans Zimmer should bring an epic score to the film. The fact that filming took place at the same location as the real historical evacuation during World War II only adds to the excitement for this war thriller.

Kingsman: The Golden Circle

Matthew Vaughn′s Kingsman: The Secret Service was one of my favorite films of 2015. The action was thrilling, the humor was hilarious, the soundtrack was amazing, and the acting was excellent but over the top when it needed to be to fit the film’s tone. Did I want a sequel? No, but I won’t be complaining so long as it does not tarnish the first film.

Blade Runner 2049

I did not see the original Blade Runner until my sophomore year of college. I did not come away loving it, but I appreciated it for what it was, especially for its notable moments like Roy Batty’s “Tears in Rain” monologue. Yet again, I have to ask: Did I want a sequel? No, but Denis Villeneuve, the masterful director of Prisoners, Sicario, and Arrival, has been turning everything he touches into gold lately. Plus, Roger Deakins is handling cinematography responsibilities, Harrison Ford is returning, and Johann Johannsson is teaming up with Villeneuve once again to compose the score.

Thor: Ragnarok

Thor’s films can be utterly dull at some points, but the addition of the Hulk and Doctor Strange should add a much needed kick to Thor’s third solo film.

Justice League

DC has been rushing toward this film, and its track record so far does not leave much room for optimism. Fans can only hope that Zack Snyder can pull it all together and do justice to the comic book characters we grew up loving. I am most interested to see how he will introduce franchise newbies Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg.

Star Wars: Episode VIII — The Last Jedi

You didn’t think I would finish this list without mentioning Star Wars, did you? Disney and Lucasfilm recently revealed the title for Episode VIII: The Last Jedi. That sent off a wave of speculation. Why is the font red instead of the traditional yellow? Who is the last Jedi? Is it Luke? Will Luke die leaving Rey to be the last Jedi? Jedi can be singular or plural, so does that mean they will both survive? After the somewhat disappointing Rogue One, I am just ready to return to the main episodic storyline where we last left our beloved characters. Both the Resistance and the First Order will be scrambling, with Hosnian Prime decimated and Starkiller Base destroyed. Poe and Finn will probably go off on a mission together while Luke trains Rey, paralleling Snoke’s training of Kylo Ren. Hopefully, we will learn more about the mysterious Snoke and get to see some of the other Knights of Ren. I also hope we will get to see Luke in action as a central character of the film after we only got to see him for the last minute of The Force Awakens, and I have to wonder how they will handle Leia after the saddening, unexpected passing of Carrie Fisher. Tears will undoubtedly be shed when she first appears in the film. In the end, I trust that Disney and Lucasfilm will handle the character with respect for Fisher’s legacy. These 300-odd days will fly by before we know it, and we will all be back in that galaxy far, far away once again.