Asa Butterfield Is Probably Your New Spider-Man

According to the fine folks at Latino Review, Sony and Marvel are currently negotiating with young Asa Butterfield to take up the web-slinging mantle as the next Spider-Man.  The webhead is set to appear in a limited fashion in Captain America: Civil War, which is filming in Atlanta as you're reading this, so I suspect that we'll get an official press release any day now.  Spidey won't be alone, as the film will also feature the entire team of New Avengers as seen at the end of Age Of Ultron, along with Hawkeye, Agent 13, Ant-Man, Black Panther and whoever the hell Martin Freeman is playing.

There was a short list of young actors circulating a few weeks back and aside from Liam James, star of The Way Way Back, Butterfield was pretty much my top choice.  While Ender's Game was at best a mediocre adaptation of the book, Butterfield's work is top notch.  He adeptly portrayed Ender's peculiar mix of strategic genius, ruthless efficiency and emotional pathos, all of which will come in handy for playing nerdy-boy-genius-turned-superhero Peter Parker.  Mostly I'm just excited to have a Peter Parker that doesn't look like a 30 year old pretending to be in high school.

I've been meaning to rewatch Martin Scorcese's Hugo for months now, but despite a few long flights I still haven't gotten around to it.  Maybe this news will finally get me off my ass.

My Wife Is Pretty Pissed About This JEM AND THE HOLOGRAMS Trailer

I have only vague recollections of the original Jem And The Holograms cartoon.  My sister was just this side of too young for the show's prime demographic, but I remember some of my female childhood friends who loved that shit.

In retrospect, the actual premise sounds pretty cool!  Jerrica Benton is a badass record company exec by day and pink-haired rocker Jem by night, performing with her band The Holograms with the aid of Synergy, a special talking holographic computer that her father built for her before his death.  Synergy literally projects a hologram over Jerrica and her friends thanks to projectors in her earrings, allowing their alter egos to battle it out with rival band The Misfits and getting Jerrica/Jem entangled in a Clark Kent/Superman-esque love triangle with her purple-haired boyfriend Rio.  I make the superhero comparison because the premise so easily lends itself to a Marvel-style, globe-trotting girl power adventure.  Awesome!

So of course this live action adaptation is about a shy teenager who becomes a YouTube star.  Ugh.

Look, I have no real dog in this fight other than a general annoyance at cashing in on long dormant and slightly familiar intellectual property in the simplest and laziest way imaginable.  This movie clearly caters to the worst instincts of teenage America, the self-entitled desire for 15 minutes of Kardashian-level notoriety without having to actually work for it.  Animated Jerrica Benton is a savvy business woman and talented musician who cares for orphans and gets shit done.  Live action Jerrica Benton is all about shrugging off her "unremarkable life" in favor of fashion makeovers and signing autographs on Ryan Hanson's limbs.

My wife Jamie probably put it best: "This movie bears no resemblance to the source material.  It seem slapdash and unfatihful.  It's just no fun!  If we can have a Norse god with a magic hammer and an AI hero dude, why can't we have actual holograms?  The new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie might have sucked but at least it wasn't a story about four pet turtles and their owner who all go to school and run a pizza shop."

Not even the presence of a One Direction song was enough for this trailer to win her over.  That's saying something.

Podcast Episode 55: We Assemble For AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON

We're passing what feels like the halfway mark of the Marvel's grand cinematic plan and I'm happy to report that the state of the MCU is strong.

I'm a big fan of the first Avengers. It's one of those movies that my wife and I can pretty much watch at the drop of a hat, whether it be for 20 minutes for the full running time. It's light and it's fun and it's full of of these incredible moments of unbridled joy. I would caution you not to expect quite the same experience from Age Of Ultron, which isn't to say it's not an expertly crafted summer blockbuster or that it somehow lacks in entertainment value. It's just a different kind of beast. In a way, Ultron is a collection of contradictions; compared to the first Avengers, the latest entry is both darker and more exhilarating, more epic in scope yet also far more intimate in dealing with its characters. 

All your favorite Avengers are back and in fine form, but we’ve also got a host of new additions to the cast.  Elizabeth Olsen and Aaron Taylor-Johnson are fine as “the twins” Wanda and Pietro Maximoff (the accents are pretty hit-or-miss) but the real standouts are Paul Bettany, who absolutely kills it with only a few scenes as The Vision, and James Spader as the titular Ultron.  Spader is such a natural fit for Whedon’s trademark quippy dialogue that I can’t believe the pairing never occurred to me earlier.  It seems so obvious in retrospect.  

I just wish that, while Ultron does actually threaten to cause a global extinction level event, the action wasn't quite so contained.  With a title like Age Of Ultron, I was expecting, well, an age.  Something that redefines civilization, the kind of singular event that is spoken about in hushed tones from generation to generation, not just a week of individual battles where it feels like the villain is largely operating in the shadows.  I wanted Ultron to truly fuck up the world for a while, crashing communications networks or global finance or something.  Ultron drones descending upon major cities all across the globe.  Chaos on an epic fucking scale.  Granted this movie is certainly very globe-trotting, with major set pieces in Eastern Europe, Northern Africa, New York and South Korea, but each incident is pretty isolated and somewhat small scale.  The new status quo at the end also feels a bit too easy.  Sure, Hulk has sent himself into mysterious exile, but Thor has just gone back to Asgard while Hawkeye has retired to his family farm and Tony Stark has very politely and amicably gone into semi-retirement.  It basically feels like, while most everyone has left the Avengers, they can all come back whenever they get bored.  If you're gonna break up the band and replace them with the B-team, I'd like there to be some real dramatic obstacles to bringing everyone together again.

Since we’re dealing with a team of superheroes, it seemed only appropriate that I assemble a team of my own for this week’s podcast.  Believe it or not, our conversation actually went much, MUCH longer but, at Jamie's suggestion, I'm trying to keep the podcasts shorter than the running time of the movies we're talking about.  We tackle Joss Whedon’s propensity for killing beloved characters, the film’s tricky onscreen romance and even answer some listener questions!

As always, be sure to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes and/or on SoundCloud.

Next Week: We get classy and celebrate Orson Welles' 100th birthday with Citizen Kane!

Martin Freeman Enlists For CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR

Fans of the BBC's spectacular Sherlock series should be fairly ecstatic today, as both Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson have now officially joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  As Bart just pointed out to me on Facebook, they also played in the Tolkien sandbox together as Smaug and Bilbo, so I guess fans of The Hobbit trilogy would be pretty excited too if such fans existed. 

It's old news that Benedict Cumberbatch will be starring in Doctor Strange next year, but today Marvel announced that Martin Freeman has joined the cast of Captain America: Civil War in some unknown capacity.  I don't expect Freeman to have any super powers.  He's got government bureaucrat written all over his face.  I do expect him to play a good guy who's eventually revealed to be a bad guy.  Or perhaps a bad guy who eventually does the right thing and becomes a good guy.  Maybe he'll be a secret robot.  You never can tell when it comes to Marvel.

Expect this to fuel endless amounts of Holmes/Watson/Smaug/Bilbo/Strange/Other Dude slash fic on the Tumblrs.

UPDATED: I Feel Bad For That Leaked BATMAN v. SUPERMAN Trailer

Warner Bros has a big IMAX event scheduled for Monday night where they planned to unleash the first official teaser for Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.  Then the internet went and ruined everything.  That's kind of how the internet rolls.

Even if the footage hadn't been taken down, I wouldn't run it here because I have a long-standing hatred of leaked trailers, especially ones that consist of shaky phone camera footage with muffled audio that occasionally drifts out of focus.  This is a bad way for any movie to be introduced to the public, let alone something as grandiose as Batman v. Superman.  The fact that the entire trailer is made up of nighttime combat footage and overlapping voiceovers only exacerbates things.  To be honest, there isn't really a whole lot to see here, but it's a teaser trailer so that's fine.  This should really be about tone more than anything else.  And, unsurprisingly, that tone can be most accurately described here as "dour as shit."

What's worse, the trailer was leaked just hours after the official release of that newfangled Star Wars trailer, which was met with such overwhelming enthusiasm by the nerd community at large that anything released in its wake could only be considered a disappointment.  Even if this BvS trailer had been more remarkable, between the poor quality footage and the shadow of Skywalker looming large, the deck was simply stacked against it.  What's worse, because of their big IMAX event, Warners can't even utilize Marvel's clever strategy of countering the leak by immediately releasing a high quality official version.

UPDATED: Well I called that one wrong.  Warner's did end up releasing the official version online in advance of their IMAX event, which certainly makes sense.  Once it's out there, it's out there. You might as well make it look as good as possible.  See it embedded below.

Make no mistake about it.  This is a very big deal.  In a few weeks Marvel will release the money printing machine that is Age Of Ultron and before rounding the corner into the truly epic weirdness of Phase 3.  Meanwhile, DC is just starting to roll out their cinematic universe with nothing but the promising-yet-problematic Man Of Steel as a foundation.  Frankly, audiences have no idea what to expect going forward and Warners has a long road ahead of them convincing the world that they've got something that's both compelling as/uniquely different from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Right now their strongest indicator is probably Suicide Squad, which will certainly feel nothing like any other comic book movie to date, for better or for worse.

I'm probably a little more optimistic than most (I quite liked Man Of Steel!) but there's no way to overstate the value of a first impression and blurry iPhone footage is the polar opposite of what Warners was shooting for here.  The DCU is already on shaky ground when it comes to public opinion.  Here's hoping they can turn it all around.



Photo credit to Redditor Thomassaurus

You (Probably) Don't Need To Sit Through The Credits Of AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON

If nothing else, the Marvel films will be remembered for instilling in audiences a compulsive need to stay through all of the credits of most any blockbuster franchise film with the expectation that they'll be treated to a short post-credit stinger scene.  I actually kind of love this side effect, as the industry-saturated audiences of Los Angeles typically stick around as a sign of respect for the many crew members who work on any given film.  I can't help but wonder how long this phenomenon will persist, as more often than not the credits simply roll to black and whoever's still in the theater lets out a groan and feels like a sucker.

Director Joss Whedon seems to recognize the danger of disappointment, which is why he recently told Entertainment Weekly that there will be nothing at the end of the credits for Avengers: Age Of Ultron.  Kevin Feige pointed out that there will be the expected mid-credits tag, but according to Whedon, they just couldn't come up with anything that lived up to the legacy of the first Avengers's infamous schwarma scene.  And really, what could?  Tip of the hat for not attempting to bottle lightning twice.

Now it's worth noting that the schwarma scene wasn't actually filmed until after the LA premiere, so if you had asked Whedon about a post-credit stinger at this point before the first film, he would have told you the exact same thing.  I find it hard to believe that Whedon would specifically tell people not to stick around just to fuck with fans, but it doesn't preclude him (or the Russos for that matter) getting the band back together at the eleventh hour if inspiration strikes.  In other words, yeah I'll probably stick around but there probably won't be anything after all.

Also, feel free to start speculating as to what future Marvel film the mid-credit scene will set up.  Ant-Man is next on the docket but Captain America: Civil War will have already started filming.  Then again, I wouldn't be surprised if Black Panther or Captain Marvel made an appearance...

The Human-Sized ANT-MAN Trailer Has Arrived

I host pub trivia on Tuesday nights, which means I usually don't catch up with Marvel's Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. until Wednesdays.  Normally this does not present a huge problem, but now that the show has been temporarily supplanted by Agent Carter, well, I'm just itching to get home and catch up with my DVR.  Last night's two hour premiere also featured our first look at the teaser for Ant-Man, Marvel's first post-Ultron movie, (which is technically going to be the last film of Phase 2).

I like it!  It's a bit more serious than I was expecting, but I don't expect that's super-representative of the final film's overall tone.  Perhaps Disney's marketing department feels they really need to sell us on the concept of Paul Rudd: Hunky Super Hero?  I dunno.  But the suit looks good and the few shots of him riding insects are kind of great.  Not too silly but not grotesque either.  I'm glad the ants don't look like monsters.

What I really love is the suggestion that Hank Pym has become an old man puttering around in a private, underground lab while his company is seemingly run by his daughter and an unsavory successor.  It feels like a nice spin on the Tony Stark model, like what Howard Stark might have become had he not been killed by the Winter Soldier.  I also like the emotional subtext here: a possibly disgraced Pym trying to win back the respect of his adult daughter and while Scott Lang does the same with his younger one.  Sounds meaty and dramatic to me.

Do I miss the presence of Edgar Wright?  Sure.  But I have a lot of faith in Peyton Reed and from what I can see here, he's made the best of a very bad situation.  Still, isn't this supposed to be a funny heist movie?  Why so serious?

Oscar Isaac Is Your New Apocalypse

Right around this time last year, Oscar Isaac was totally blowing my mind as the titular character of the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis.  I'd enjoyed his work in movies like Drive and the sweet but under-seen 10 Years, but it was his turn as the talented yet mopey folk musician that truly won me over and convinced me that this guy is destined to be a perennial Oscar contender for at least the next decade.

In the meantime, Isaac has been a hot commodity for every major film franchise under the sun.  He recently finished shooting a leading and possibly roguish, Han Solo-esque role in Star Wars: The Force Awakens and he's been on Marvel's short list to play Doctor Strange for ages now.  But instead Isaac has planted his flag over at Fox, signing on to play Apocalypse in Bryan Singer's next X-Men film.  Solely from a logistical standpoint, this makes a lot of sense: the guy's gonna be pretty busy in a galaxy far, far away for the next few years, so taking the lead role in another major franchise would likely burn Isaac out and prevent him from shooting the kind of adult, artistic films that he truly loves.*  By playing a one-time villain in a very isolated series, Isaac gets to collect a comic book paycheck and still keep the door open to appear in either the Marvel or DC cinematic universes somewhere down the road.

I will say I was expecting Singer to go with someone with a more imposing physical presence (Tom Hardy's name was bandied about quite a bit) but, based on the picture above, I expect that the character will eventually be realized with the aid of quite a bit of motion capture.  I'm also curious to see just how far they go with Apocalypse's giant purple cheek-lips, as it's one of the few facial features that distinguishes him from Darkseid and Thanos, both of whom will also be getting some serious screen time in the next couple of years, inevitably leading to some poor kid getting the wrong action figure for a future Christmas.


*I talked to Isaac for a few minutes following a Llewyn Davis screening and he was both polite and gracious as I asked him to recommend some titles for my movie-a-day project.  He offered up some rather obscure Russian art films that I eventually tracked down but did not get a chance to watch before my year was up.

Podcast Episode 39: Floating In ROSEWATER With The BIG HERO 6

This week's episode of the podcast tackles two very different movies aimed at two very different audiences.  But that's how we roll here at Daley Screening.  We take all comers.

Jon Stewart's Rosewater is an admirable freshman effort, depicting the story of Newsweek journalist Maziar Bahari who was imprisoned by Iranian authorities and held in solitary confinement for 118 days.  Gael Garcia Bernal anchors the film with a lovely performance as Bahari.  Bernal not only conveys the anguish of Bahari's psychological torment, but also finds remarkable moments of levity and solace.  Stewart deserves credit for demonstrating the humanity of everyone involved, including Bahari's eponymous tormentor.  It would be easy to portray Rosewater and his superiors as paranoid, mustache-twirling dolts, but instead the audience walks away realizing that, from their perspective, the Iranian authorities were simply responding to a reasonably credible threat in the only way they knew how.  As Bahari tells Daily Show correspondent Jason Jones (who plays himself), America and Iran have more in common than most people realize or admit.  The film perhaps overreaches in a few of Stewart's more stylistic choices, but in the end it's a minor quibble.  It's a strong showing for Stewart's first film, even if it doesn't quite deserve some of the breathless adulation I heard coming out of Telluride.

Disney's Big Hero 6, adapted from an obscure Marvel title, is an absolute joy for both children and the grownups who take them to the theater.  We decided to go to a matinee screening with a friend and her kids (one of whom had never been to a movie theater before!) and everyone walked away smiling.  The story is just a little slighter than I would have liked and there are a few key moments where the movie really spells things out for the younger audience in a way that's almost eye-rollingly obvious for adults.  If you've seen a movie before, then you can basically see how the entire plot is going to play out after about 20 minutes, but I guess that's what separates Disney Animation from Pixar at this point.  Pixar doesn't talk down to its audience, ever.  But even if Big Hero 6 is lean on story, it's BIG on characters.  Baymax, the giant inflatable nurse robot, is equal parts sweet and hilarious.  He also sets a new standard for fist bumps.  But each of the supporting characters is totally awesome in their own distinct ways.  There's someone here for everyone to love, whether it be girly-girl Honey Lemon, hard-nosed speed demon Go Go Tomago, fastidious Wasabi or the overly enthusiastic Fred, who was MY FAVORITE.

Jenna and Jamie return to talk about all this plus casting developments for Suicide Squad, James Bond and Captain America, as well as Universal's misguided decision to reforge their classic monsters as modern day action adventures and the honest potential of the upcoming Rocky spinoff.

Next week: The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1

Podcast Episode 37: BIRDMAN Or The Virtue Of Artistic Douchery

First things first: Birdman is a film whose technical beauty is irrefutable.  The cinematic prowess on display by director Alejandro Inarritu is nothing short of breathtaking and his "all-in-one-shot" aesthetic not only creates a tremendous sense of tension and momentum, but it recreates the breathless frenzy of being backstage at a major theatrical production with deft perfection.  On top of that, you've got some great work from stars the likes of Edward Norton, Zach Galifianakis, Amy Ryan, Naomi Watts and the single greatest performance from Michael Keaton in a decade.  With all those things working in its favor, Birdman is an easy film to praise.

But I don't think it's an easy film to love.  Actors will love it.  Theater people will love it.  And having been both of those things in my life, I'm probably a little more forgiving of the movie than many.  But I suspect most of middle America is going to have more than a bit of trouble identifying with any of these characters.  I'd hardly blame you for walking out of the theater hating all actors, or at the very least feeling like you just spent two hours watching an indulgent circle-jerk about artists doing "important work."  After all, this is a movie in which the protagonist stalks around the theater treating his self-scripted, self-directed attempt to remain socially relevant like it was a matter of actual life or death while completely ignoring pain and injury of a fellow actor who had a stage light fall on his head during rehearsals for seemingly no other reason than "he was a terrible actor."

Then again, it's also a movie in which my favorite Batman screeches like a bird and levitates in his tighty whities.  Suffice it to say, I'm more than a little conflicted.

Bart and I discuss all things Birdman with my wife Jamie and his girlfriend Jenna Gabriel.  We also address Marvel's finalized Phase 3 slate, whether or not Gotham is actually a sneaky comedy, and the disheartening first look at Terminator Genisys.

Next Week: We take to the stars with Chris Nolan's Interstellar.

Podcast Episode 36: JOHN WICK And The Dubious Merits Of Puppy Murder

That puppy sure is cute, ain't he?

Don't get attached.

John Wick is not a movie for everybody.  Specifically, it is not a movie for lovers of dogs.  It is, however, a movie for lovers of well choreographed action scenes, pulpy crime stories and Keanu Reeves being Keanu Reeves.  I fucking loved this movie.  Bart was fairly unimpressed.  Jamie almost walked out of the theater in a rage.

We recorded this podcast last Sunday, but due to an overwhelmingly busy schedule I wasn't able to finish editing the thing until late Thursday night.  As a result, much of our attempt to parse the first trailer for Avengers: Age Of Ultron was rendered moot a few days after recording when Marvel announced their full Phase 3 slate and the upcoming Infinity War storyline.  I suppose this kind of thing comes with the territory.

That being said, it is gratifying that a number of our speculations were confirmed on stage at the El Capitan Theater, particularly the announcement of Chadwick Boseman as Black Panther.  Rest assured we cover a lot of this material in the next episode of the podcast, which we recorded last night.  With any luck, I'll have it published before Paramount abruptly shelves their Terminator remake, thus negating another major portion of our recording.

Next Week: We take to the skies with Michael Keaton in Birdman!

Marvel Says "Fuck It," Releases AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON Trailer A Week Early

This is why I love Marvel.

On Tuesday they announced that the first trailer for Avengers: Age Of Ultron would premiere during next week's episode of Agents Of SHIELD.  Then on Wednesday, a low res copy leaked on Vimeo and started getting passed around the internet by assholes with no sense of propriety or patience.  Most studios would have started throwing down cease and desist orders in an attempt to get every copy of the trailer pulled offline, but Marvel is smart enough to know when the genie is out of the bottle.  So, after a cheeky tweet blaming Hydra for the leak, they leaned into the skid and simply released an HD version of the trailer themselves, thus undercutting the shithead leakers and once again commandeering the superhero movie conversation everywhere.  What's that DC?  You finally figured out a game plan?  That's adorable.

Check this shit out:

DAMN.

The first film fairly reveled in the pure joy of seeing all the heroes finally come together for the first time, and while I'm sure there will still be plenty of humor and fun in this second outing (it is Joss Whedon after all) it's also clear that Earth's Mightiest Heroes are going to end up in some pretty dark places.  That Hulkbuster armor has me virtually vibrating with excitement and James Spader sounds appropriately menacing as the big bad.  

Plus there's still nary a sign of The Vision!  He's the character I'm easily most excited to see, as I'm incredibly curious to see exactly how his creation and his relationship with Stark and Ultron will play out.  I also appreciate the small tastes we're getting of Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, particularly the sort of vapor-trail approach to the latter which easily differentiates him from Fox's iteration of the same character in Singer's X-Men films.

And that creepy-as-fuck Pinocchio song?  As my wife said upon watching it for the first time (and then once again immediately afterwards), that's just so Joss it hurts.

These next six months are going to be unbearable.

Podcast Episode 35: Behold The FURY Of Marvel vs DC!

Last week was a doozy in terms of superhero movie news, with Marvel announcing that Robert Downey Jr. will be appearing in Captain America 3 to kick off their infamous Civil War story while DC finally announced their full slate of films through the end of the decade.  Along with the expected individual entries for characters like Wonder Woman, Aquaman and Green Lantern, WB also revealed the casting of Ezra Miller as The Flash, two Justice League movies filmed back-to-back, (but released two years apart) and a Suicide Squad movie to be helmed by David Ayer.  Due to a number of factors I didn't get a chance to write about any of this last week, so Bart and I decided to tackle all of these topics plus a few tangents (Might Will Smith actually play a DC villain?  Who's a better director, Zack Snyder or Joss Whedon?) in Episode 35 of the podcast.  As a result, this week's episode is a wee bit long and somewhat lopsided, but I think the conversation flows naturally so I didn't want to trim sections of it wholesale.

Eventually we get to talking about David Ayer's current film Fury, in which Brad Pitt plays a World War II tank commander fighting deep inside Germany at the tail end of the war.  Despite Pitt's star power, it's really an ensemble film and I think the work of Logan Lerman, Michael Pena, Jon Bernthal and yes even Shia LaBeouf really elevates the proceedings, as each character is extremely compelling in their own particular way.  There's also plenty of smartly staged tank combat, a style of warfare that seems well suited for cinema and yet feels largely underutilized by Hollywood.  But the action scenes, while intense, serve almost like release valves for the ratcheting tension that accumulates in the time between battles.  It's here where we see the true psychological horrors of war, which feel just as devastating as the physical toll wreaked upon the American GIs.

Suicide Squad was easily the most surprising title on DC's docket, but it's little wonder that the announcement was made just days before Fury hit theaters.  It's only too easy to connect the dots between this war film depicting some not-so-nice men on a mission and a movie in which comic book villains are enlisted by the government to go on suicide missions for the promise of amnesty if they somehow manage to survive.  In fact, it almost feels like Jon Bernthal's whole performance in Fury is an audition for that Suicide Squad.  We should be so lucky.  Still, with names like Will Smith, Tom Hardy, Ryan Gosling and Margot Robbie all circling the film it seems all but certain that DC's first follow-up to Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice is not going to tread lightly.

Next Week: Keanu Reeves enacts puppy-vengeance in John Wick!

Podcast Episode 34: JOHN RAMBO Is A Small Wonder

And thus concludes our Epic Rambo Rewatch.

The fourth entry, titled John Rambo or simply Rambo depending upon which version of the Blu-ray you're watching, is most notable for being the least Rambo of all the Rambo movies.  There aren't many hallmarks of this franchise but the most recognizable of them, namely a scene in which Rambo slowly takes out a group of enemies in an enclosed space one at a time as well as the presence of an on-the-nose power ballad over the closing credits, are conspicuously absent in this (perhaps) final go around.  It's therefore hard not to walk away from this movie feeling like Rambo/Stallone accidentally wandered into some semi-generic action film.  Julie Benz will try your patience as she spends most of the first half of the film blandly monologuing, although every time her dickhead fiance wanders into frame the potential for unintentional comedy skyrockets.  (I'm looking at you, awkwardly staged boat scene.)  And Stallone's desire to legitimately educate the audience about the plight of the Burmese people while simultaneously portraying the military as virtual caricatures of evil is so blunt that it's kind of astounding.  It's as if he's trying overly hard to justify the violence that Rambo will visit upon these bastards later on.  But stick around because the last 20 minutes is a glorious melee of CG blood and guts as Rambo rips throats, cuts off heads and shoots guys so severely that they simply explode into a completely liquid state.  It's awesome.

I'm really happy with the say this whole revisitation played out, as it gave me the chance to honestly re-evaulate the Rambo franchise for the first time in a decade.  I discovered that Rambo III was much better than it gets credit for, while First Blood Part II is kind of an overhyped snore.  I'm can't wait to dig into the next franchise on our docket, Terminator.

A note on this week's podcast: We spend a bunch of time talking about Marvel's plans for Avengers 3 and beyond, name the idea that most of the current Avengers may not actually appear in that film and the possibility of Sony, in a fit of desperation, finally allowing Spider-Man to play in the Avengers sandbox.  As I was posting this podcast last night the news broke concerning Robert Downey Jr's deal to appear in Captain America 3, signaling the beginning of Marvel's Civil War storyline.  I'll have more thoughts about this later, but I stand by everything we talked about in the podcast and I think our positions are pretty fairly validated by this latest development.

Also, fair warning: The section where we watch 80's sitcoms of our youth is a little uneven from an audio perspective.  The TV audio is a little quiet and our reactions are pretty loud.  Be glad that I edited that section down a bit, particularly the moment from the Small Wonder pilot where the son gropes his robot sister and says, "She even feels like a girl," which literally sent us screaming out of the room in horror.  It's a wonder we didn't break the microphones.



Next Week: Brad Pitt drives a tank in Fury and hopefully also The Terminator.

The Trailer For P.T. Anderson's INHERENT VICE Is The Greatest Thing You'll See Today

Last night, while I was watching the Patriots give a Monday Night Football performance worthy of a high school JV squad, the internet was freaking the fuck out over the first trailer for Paul Thomas Anderson's Inherent Vice.

That excitement is justified.

Anderson's last few movies (There Will Be Blood and The Master) are each genius level films in their own right, but they're also pretty dark and nihilistic so I understand why the majority of audiences didn't exactly find them accessible.  But this looks like a return to Anderson's more populist work, exhibiting not just a lighter touch but some sheer hilarity.  And the continuing collaboration between P.T. and Joaquin Phoenix makes me happier than words can express.  Phoenix's work in The Master is easily one of the most underrated performances in the last five years and if we're all very very lucky, Inherent Vice will pave the way for his entry into the Marvel Universe as Dr. Strange.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to spend the rest of the day watching and endless loop of Josh Brolin shouting for pancakes and Joaquin Phoenix falling down.

Podcast Episode 31: Drawing FIRST BLOOD In Our Epic Rambo Rewatch!

I've been hankering to revisit both of Stallone's most successful franchises, Rocky and Rambo, for quite some time.  I'm intimately familiar with his pugilistic masterpiece, but amazingly I've only seen each of the Rambo films a single time each.  Bart has only seen one film all the way through.  That situation is simply untenable.

Thus we've begun to reexamine this bloody series starting with First Blood, which I remember as being easily the best movie in the series.  When you think of Rambo, most people think of the character's second incarnation: a shirtless, headband clad uber-soldier cutting a swath of righteous destruction through an enemy jungle.  (Either that or you think of this scene from UHF or most of Hot Shots Part Deux.)  It's easy to forget that the first entry in the series is actually a harrowing nightmare of PTSD-fueled violence set in small town in Oregon, or that the film has quite a bit to say about society's mistreatment of military veterans.

But there's also a lot of Stallone being a total badass, so that's what audience chose to focus on.

In our latest episode, Bart and I discuss Rambo's gritty origins, determine whether Brian Dennehy is a complete dick and ponder whether or not Rambo should have died in the end as originally intended.  We also chat about Matt Damon's imminent return to the Bourne franchise, speculate as to a future King Kong/Godzilla face off and discover Google's spectacularly unflattering celebrity profile pics.

Next Week: Rambo: First Blood Part II

Podcast Episode 25: The GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY Are Here To Save The Summer

To quote a certain blaster-toting raccoon, "Oh...YEAH."

This summer has been pretty fucking grim.  With the exception of 22 Jump Street, it's been a a steady stream of mediocre box office filler like Hercules or outright trainwrecks like Transformers: Age Of Extinction.  That's not to say that the summer's been a complete waste, but even the few bright spots like Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes, Snowpiercer and X-Men: Days Of Future Past have been largely dark and serious affairs - all three movies center around global apocalypse!  Where's the humor?  Where's the rollicking adventure?  WHERE'S THE GODDAMN FUN?

Turns out the fun lies with a sentient tree on the far side of the galaxy.

Marvel's Guardians Of The Galaxy, by far the company's biggest gamble to date, is an outright cinematic miracle.  On paper this, this movie simply should not exist.  Seriously, the very idea of a studio giving the Troma-raised James Gunn $170 million to make an outer space movie starring That Guy From Parks & Rec, a professional wrestler, a green-skinned assassin, a walking tree who only speaks three words and a smart-ass cyborg raccoon is absolutely preposterous.  The fact that it not only exists but has the same pound for pound entertainment value as The Avengers, a movie that needed five other films to set the stage before it could even happen, is mind boggling.

And yet, all these things are true.

Guardians Of The Galaxy finally sends the Marvel universe rocketing out into space and it's a fascinating place packed with oddball characters with whom you can't help but fall in love.  Sure, each character has their own particular set of quirks (Drax doesn't understand metaphors, Star-Lord is a font of 80's pop-culture references) that are essentially appealing on their own but it's the performances that truly elevate the material.  Chris Pratt cements himself as legit movie star (surely a relief to the Jurassic World producers) and Dave Bautista is an absolute joy on-screen, while Bradley Cooper brings a both acerbic wit and a wounded vulnerability to Rocket.  And for all the jokes about Vin Diesel playing a tree who only has one line, you'd be surprised just how much context and emotion can be conveyed solely in the phrase "I am Groot."  Special recognition should also be paid to Zoe Saldana and Karen Gillan as Gamora and Nebula, the daughters of Thanos.  Both characters are a tad clunky on the page, constantly tasked with delivering necessary exposition and explanation.  Yet each of these actresses just ooze so much charm and personality on screen that they're almost able to trick the audience into walking away thinking their characters are more substantial.  Still, they're each total badasses, and while their characters feel a bit thin I expect both will be much better served in their second outing.

This wonderfully endearing collection of misfits is what sets Guardians apart not just from the rest of 2014's summer movies, but all other Marvel movies as well.  The Avengers is probably the closest analog here, but even they are just a bunch of folks who fight together out of a sense of duty and honor.  They feel more like a group of friendly coworkers who do a job and then go home to their respective lives.  By the time the end credits roll, the Guardians are already so much more than that.  They're not just friends, they're family.  That's a dynamic that we haven't really seen in Marvel's previous films and it's so simple and affecting that I didn't even realize it was something I had been missing.

And that music!  THAT MUSIC!  Holy hell.  I really dig the score by Tyler Bates, particularly his main theme, but I defy you to walk out of this movie without humming any of the ridiculously catchy tunes that create the rich musical tapestry which seems happily omnipresent throughout the film's running time.  My only gripe is that Guardians didn't come out in June.  If it had, Peter Quill's Awesome Mix Volume 1 (available for download, naturally) would have absolutely been everyone's soundtrack of the summer.

Episode 25 of the podcast, featuring the return of my brother Tim, sees us breaking the film down character by character, along with lots of speculation as to how the Guardians might fit into Marvel's bigger picture heading into Phase 3.  Jamie reveals her own master plan for how Captain/Ms. Marvel should be woven into the MCU and, in light of Simon West's stated desire to see a space-based Con-Air 2, we all list off movies that deserve a crazy sequel set in outer space.  Also, I'm an idiot for not only saying there are five Infinity Stones (there are six) but also for referring to Yondu as Yondo through the entire podcast.  What can I say?  It was late and I still had to pack for an early flight.

Next Week: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, with special guests!

Edgar Wright's Next Movie Is Called BABY DRIVER. No, Seriously.

We were all very sad to see Edgar Wright depart Marvel's Ant-Man movie, but when Kevin Feige closes a door, Working Title opens another, more British door.

Deadline is reporting that Wright's next movie will be Baby Driver, a film that seems destined for a better title.  Apparently Wright has been working on the script for some time, whereas the title was slapped together haphazardly.  The project must be decently developed at this point because Wright's frequent producing partner Nira Park and the chaps over at Working Title have this thing on the fast track (to a better title).

No word on whether or not Simon Pegg or Nick Frost will have any involvement but I kind of doubt it at this point.  The Cornetto Trilogy is brilliant and finished.  I suspect that all parties involved understand the value of moving on to explore new artistic avenues, although that doesn't preclude a reunion tour of sorts a few years down the line.  In fact, one seems almost inevitable, but only when Wright, pictured above contemplating a less dumb title, is good and ready.

There's also no word on the film's plot.  According to Mike Fleming at Deadline, "The project...is described as a collision of crime, action, music and sound."  I describe that sentence as a collision of words, punctuation and grammar.

Kind of like that title.

Podcast Episode 23: THE RAID 2: BERANDAL Is The GODFATHER II Of Action Movies

The Raid: Redemption is an incredibly tight little action flick, delivering a streamlined and compact story about a squad of cops forced to fight their way out of a tenement slum after a bust gone bad.  It's punctuated by loads of intense, brutal action sequences that propel the film forward at breakneck speed and will have you screaming at your television in horror and delight.  Its economy and intelligence make it easily one of the best action movies of the past ten years, and the idea of a sequel seems instantly foolish.

And then The Raid 2: Berandal happened.

Holy.  Fucking.  Shit.

The Raid 2 isn't an great action movie.  It's just a straight up incredible film.  End of line.  The fact that it also contains some of the most astounding action scenes I've ever witnessed almost feels like icing on the cake as opposed to the meat of the dish.  Director Gareth Evans (not to be confused with Godzilla director Gareth Edwards) performs numerous feats of what Bart refers to as "camera magic" here, managing to shoot from seemingly impossible positions and giving the audience a sense of immersion during combat without depending solely on the use of quick cuts and shaky cam.  And when he's not shooting action, the shot composition is still captivating, giving way to scope and beauty that feels all too rare in today's cinema regardless of genre.

Everything in The Raid 2 is cranked up to eleven.  As opposed to a simple premise in a single location spanning an afternoon, we've got an intricate crimeland drama that bounces all over Jakarta and unfolds over years.  Rama, our hero and the only element tying the two films together, undergoes a dark and serious evolution, transforming from idealistic rookie cop to tortured and weary undercover operative.  You could argue that the fights in The Raid start to feel repetitive after a while.  (You'd be wrong, but you can argue it.)  The Raid 2 offers a wide variety of violence.  There are executions, betrayals, subway attacks, prison riots and a full-on brawl in a single toilet stall.  You like car chases?  Oh mama, does The Raid 2 have a car chase for you.  You've got a wild-haired hitman who takes on a night club full of attackers.  You've got a goon who kills guys with a baseball bat and a ball.  You've got a hot deaf lady whose weapon of choice is a pair of hammers.  And through it all you've got star Iko Uwais performing inhuman feats of strength and agility.  Most importantly, all this insane action works in service of a smart and expertly told organized crime story that ranks right up there with all your American favorites of the genre.  It's The Godfather meets The Departed, but overflowing with more blood and brutality than both of those films combined.

Bart and I saw a double feature of both Raid films over the weekend and we chat about each film in Episode 23 of the podcast while also expressing cautious optimism over a proposed set of Universal Monster remakes under the banner of a shared universe.  We also speculate on what we can expect to hear from Marvel at San Diego Comic Con as they begin to roll out Phase 3 and introduce a whole new set of increasingly weird heroes.

If all the stars align, next week's podcast will cover both Luc Besson's female-centric actioner Lucy as well as Brett Ratner's hopefully hilarious Hercules, starring Dwayne Johnson with a lion for a hat.

Behold ULTRON, The Avengers' Latest Nemesis!

Guardians Of The Galaxy hits theaters in just over two weeks, and after that it's a loooooooong wait until Marvel returns with Avengers: Age Of Ultron.  Today we get our first look at the eponymous villain courtesy of this upcoming Entertainment Weekly cover.  We can also see Ultron's army of drones, the latest incarnation of the Iron Man armor and Captain America's newly modified costume.  EW also managed the feed this image into their Obvious Pun Generator, giving us the weird Mr. Roboto joke shoved off into the corner.

If you click over to the article you'll also get some extremely mild spoilers as to Ultron's origins and character motivations, but it's all basic first act stuff.  (UPDATE: There are also 8 photos, including a look at Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver plus the Avengers partying after a hard day's work!  I should have noticed it earlier, but EW's layout is nonsensical at best.)  Ultron's character design sticks pretty close to the comics, so new real surprises there.  All we need now is to hear James Spader's dulcet tones emanating from his mechanical maw.  By my count, this leaves Paul Bettany's The Vision as the only major known character yet to be revealed.  Hopefully they stick with his super colorful getup which, in case you're unfamiliar, looks like this:

Expect Marvel to unleash the first footage of the film at next week's San Diego Comic Con.  If they're feeling  particularly magnanimous, the rest of us might get to see it too.