It’s your weekly dose of Octogeek! Marvel news, DC news, Nintendo news, Star Wars news! Is there any news we don’t have? Yes. Yes there is but it ain’t news worth havin’ so I threw it away.
Nintendo NX
It’s no secret that Nintendo’s Wii U has failed to inspire console fans. Nintendo’s next step is to create something else which might capture our imaginations. The Nintendo NX. What is it? Well no one knows really. It’s speculated that it could be some sort of console/ portable hybrid. This Idea has been explored a bit with the Wii U but you needed to be relatively close to the console to play your game on the touch screen controller. A new report from Japanese analyst company Nomura Securities (keeping your gaming secure I guess) expects the console to be teased between March and May and then fully revealed by Nintendo at E3 in June. So before the summer is out we should have some idea what Mario and Luigi are up to and whether the NX could potentially compete with Microsoft and Sony. At least they’ve got a decent name for the thing this time.
Captain America: Civil War
Civil War is fast approaching and Chris Evan’s has been chatting to Cineplex to shed some light on the dynamic between the two sides of the conflict.
“There’s a great parallel that they draw between my character and Tony Stark. It’s something we can all relate to in terms of how we perceive our own society and culture, in terms of what is best for people. You can go right down to Democrat and Republican. Everyone has a different opinion of what’s best. […] You have this team of people who are destroying every city they go to, but they’re saving the world. So it’s a matter of, do we monitor these people or do we let them monitor themselves? […] The beautiful thing with Civil War is that no one’s right and no one’s wrong; it’s just your personal opinion”.
“We’re going to have a nice evolution where you have a guy like Cap, who grew up with structure – he was a soldier and he liked hierarchy, he liked the chain of command. Now, all of a sudden, you have a guy who used to love the system not so sure about trusting it. And a guy like Tony Stark, who used to buck the system and dance to the beat of his own drum all of a sudden thinking, maybe we need some order”.
Bad Santa 2
We already know that Bad Santa 2 is happening (hurrah!) but now we have a casting update. Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks has been cast as “Diane” a woman who runs a “charitable organisation” and some sort of love interest for Billy Bob Thornton’s “Willie”. Willie may not have much luck elsewhere but that Santa suit sure helps him with the ladies. Tony Cox and Brett Kelly are reprising their roles from the first film. Tony Cox is the Black (African American?) Little Person (Dwarf?) who plays Bad Santa’s (Father Christmas’?) no good Elf (Pixie?). Brett Kelly played the curly haired portly (overweight?) kid (child?). Obviously it’s been a while so that kid has grown a bit, he’s 22 now. Tony Cox has not grown as that isn’t how that works. Not at all.
Batman v Superman
If you thought that you were getting a Batman v Superman movie with Batman v Superman in some sort of battle between Demi-God and man’s ingenuity, sprinkled with the nefarious underpinnings of Lex Luthor in a delicious clash of ideologies and heroic misunderstandings then you were wrong.
The concept for Bats v Supes was an intriguing enough one for me. It seems though from the last trailer that there’s a lot more crammed into this film than previously thought. Wonder Woman is in there. Not in a ‘ hey guys I’ll see you next time’ kind of thing, not in a post credits tease but in something more than a cameo. Talking to Filmlink, Director Zack ‘Snack Attack’ Snyder opened up about Wonder Woman’s role in BvS.
“[it’s] a cameo…. no actually, it’s bigger than a cameo. She comes in and does something”.
Something so important, that they had to stick her in the trailer. I will obviously reserve all judgement until I see the film but I can’t help but think that adding other Justice League members to a movie about the battle of the century, kind of dilutes things. There’s that and the fact that I’m an ardent anti-feminist. All female super heroes should be marginalized and pushed to the side in favor of more male super heroes with bigger muscles. I also believe that all Star Wars toys featuring Rey should be melted to make more Chewbacca and Storm Trooper toys.
As if to prove how forward thinking and progressive and pro women he is, Snyder had plenty more to say on Wonder Woman
“We haven’t had a female superhero of that magnitude, and it’s an amazing opportunity for the world to get behind an amazing, powerful female character.” […] I’m happy that we have the opportunity to do that. Half of my movies have female leads…maybe that’s because I have so many strong women in my life.”
Maybe if you find women so brilliant, you should go marry one huh?
“I’m not in the least surprised by a strong female superhero. I’m shocked that it hasn’t happened sooner. By the way, I highly recommend Jill Lepore’s book, The Secret History Of Wonder Woman, if you haven’t read it. It’s amazing, and truly epic”.
He’s read the comics! He knows his stuff! Aaaaaaaand it’s one written by a woman! You really know how to butter the female fan base up Zack. How about that Gal Gadot? Can she truly carry off the part of Wonder Woman?
“The thing with Gal is that she’s strong, she’s beautiful, (careful now Zack, don’t patronize her, you were doing well, maybe call her handsome next time) and she’s a kind person, which is interesting, but fierce at the same time. It’s that combination of being fierce but kind at the same time that we were looking for. She can get serious, but she’s amazingly fun to be around. And by the way, she really held her own with Ben [Affleck] in the screen test. “
Ben’s a dude so you know she’s doing well there.
“Ben was like, ‘whoa, that girl is something else!’ That was a good sign, because Ben is very tough in the scene, and he’s big and commanding. Anytime that you’re doing a test like that and you’re looking at the other person, you’re thinking, ‘okay, that’s good stuff’”.
After all that I think I’m sold now, I take back what I said. I think it should be Batman v Superman v Wonder Woman. Notice how I didn’t put Wonder Woman first just because she’s a lady? I put the names alphabetically because everyone know the alphabet can’t be sexist.
Star Wars: Han Solo Origins
One of the scheduled Star Wars movies that has been slotted for future release (May 2018) is one concerning Han Solo. A younger Han Solo. It’s very early days yet but screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan has spoken a little on what we can expect.
“It will not be here’s where he was born and this is how he was raised. I think what it will be is, what was he like 10 years earlier? Maybe a little earlier, you’ll get a glimpse. […] Kurosawa (Seven Samurai) once said the heroes are the ones that are still changing and the villains are locked and petrified into what they are. And Harrison embodies in Force Awakens someone who is still not settled on who he is.”
The film is being directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller of Jump Street and LEGO MOVIE fame.
Tales from the Crypt
This is potentially great news even so far as the fact that it gives me an excuse to slap a picture of the crypt keeper on here. Look at him, he’s just great. So great. As part of a 2 hour block of Horror programming that TNT in the states is having, they are going to revive Tales from the Crypt with the help of M. Night Shyamalan. Say what you will about Shamalama-ding-dong (is that racist? I’m not sure. Note to self, google racism and remove statement as applicable) but he certainly knows his twists. Perfect for the short story nature of Tales from the Crypt. It’ll probably be hit and miss but then again it always was. It launches in the autumn in America so we’ll get it at some point after that.
Avengers: Infinity War
Joe Russo has been chatting about Avengers: Infinity War at New Orleans Wizard World brings us some more info on Avengers: Infinity War. Co-Director Joe Russo had some interesting information regarding whether or not the full Marvel universe would be taking part. Up until now the Guardians of the Galaxy have been kept separate from the Earth based adventures of the Avengers.
“We will say this: people will not be disappointed in the amount of characters in the movie”, he said. “The concept of Infinity War is that the Marvel universe unites to battle the greatest threat to the world and universe that you’ve ever seen, and we’re going to honour that concept”. […] We’re just going to approach the cosmic side with the same fervour that we did the earthbound work we’ve been doing. We also are going to work really hard to bring a psychological realism. We obviously can’t bring a naturalism to it because it doesn’t really exist outside of science fiction, but we can bring that psychological realism to it, to the characters, and that’s going to be our focus”.
It looks like there’ll be no Guardians/Avengers crossover until then which is probably for the best. Avengers: Infinity War – Part 1 is out May 4th 2018 which is quite the wait and Part 2 will be with us on May 3rd 2019.
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