A Geeky Viewpoint

Bryan Singer spoke with Fandango concerning the Original X-Men Cast (Sir Patrick Stewart, Sir Ian McKellan, Famke Janssen, James Marsden, Anna Paquin, and Hugh Jackman) and third movie of the original trilogy, X-Men: Last Stand.

"I like finishing things, I like finishing this particular iteration. I know X-Men 3 was quite rushed and I didn't complete it, and I felt a little like it was probably my responsibility to do that as a filmmaker, and I didn't."

When asked about the possibility of the Original cast reuniting Singer responded "I hope so,".

Entertainment Tonight caught up with Mark Ruffalo and Woody Harlson to discuss their upcoming film Now you See Me 2.    Of course questions about Mark's involvement with Thor: Ragnarok had to come up.

Check out the short video from ETOnline.com

Jeff Goldblum

The Wrap is reporting that Karl Urban and Jeff Goldblum have signed onto join the cast of Thor: Ragnarok.

Karl Urban the New Zealand actor has appeared as Bones McCoy in the Star Trek reboot movies and will appear in the up coming Pete's Dragon film from Disney.   He will play Skurge the executioner an Asgardian Villain.

Jeff Goldblum has appeared in the Jurassic Park trilogy of movies, Independence Day and its forthcoming Sequel will play Grandmaster an Elder of the Universe and equal to the Collector.

Kevin Feige added “The continuation of the epic Thor franchise will be powerful and unique, and with the additions of Cate, Jeff, Tessa, Karl, and Mark to the cast we have the makings of his most dangerous and heroic adventure yet,”

Directed by Taiki Waititi Thor: Ragnarok reunites Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Idris Elba, Anthony Hopkins, Mark Ruffalo with Cate Blanchett, Tessa Thompson, Karl Urban and Jeff Goldblum.

Natalie Portman will not be reprising her role as Jane Foster in the sequel.

Karl Urban

No word on Jamie Alexander, Zakary Levy, Ray Stevenson,  Tadanobu Asano, Kat Dennings or Stellan Skarsgard will reprise their roles.

Michael Keaton at the Birdman

So it seems that Michael Keaton only momentarily pulled his name out of the contention for the Vulture.

Several reports today suggest that Michael Keaton is in final negotiations to play the principal villain in next year's Spiderman: Homecoming.   Just under a month ago Michael Keaton and his representatives withdrew his name from consideration for the part principally over concerns on Money.   With Robert Downey Jr. also in negotiations Michael Keaton and his representatives believed it was impossible to bring both major contracts under the fold; however we have learned that creative finances have allowed the Sony / Marvel Studios film to get Robert Downey Jr. contract completed and make a reasonable offer to Michael Keaton.


The Vulture

Additional sources are suggesting The Tinkerer will be involved in the film.   While an actor has not be named according to sources the Tinkerer will be a business associate of the Vulture, who builds the Vulture's suit from stolen Chitari technology.

Tom Holland, Marisa Tomei, Robert Downey Jr, Zendaya, and Tony Revolori are all ready under contract for the Jon Watts film set to be released July 7, 2017.

In the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly Jennifer Lawrence was asked about her future in the X-Men universe.

“Fassbender and McAvoy and I were all talking,” she says, “Like, ‘Will you come back?’ ‘I dunno.’ ‘I’ll come back, if you come back.’ Fox should be terrified because the deal we made was like if one of us doesn’t come back, none of us are.”

Jennifer Lawrence spoke originally after X-Men: First Class suggesting that she would never do another X-men film beyond her contract and as recently as last year told MTV "The next one [X-Men: Apocalypse] is my last one."

Her stance has softened in the past year and recently she has suggested she would be open to return if her co-stars also return.

The interweb is in an uproar this morning when a site called Movie Creed posted that Blade, Ghost Rider and Moon Knight were all potential new limited series on Netflix. 

There has long been a rumor of a Blade series, last linked to American Crime show runner John Ridley, and rumored to be focused on Blade's Daughter Fallon Gray.

Ghost Rider, which had two big screen adaptations with Nicholas Cage in the lead role has an on and again off again revival, linked to Daredevil.

Moon Knight is another show that many fans have been calling for but Marvel TV studios has not found a home for.

Agent Carter is another show getting serious consideration for a limited series on Netflix.

Season 1 Finale - Fear the Walking Dead Elizabeth Rodriguez

According to the Entertainment Weekly, Elizabeth Rodriguez (Fear the Walking Dead) is in talks for a minor role in the forthcoming sequel.

Rumors have suggested it is for the role of Sarah Kinney, the scientist who clones Wolverine into X-23.

The rumor mill is about to go into overdrive concerning issues within Warner Bros., DC Studios, and Justice League Helmer Zack Snyder.

Recently it has been reported that many Warner Bros. executives were humiliated by the caustic reviews of Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.   The movie scored a 27 (out of a possible 100) on Rottentomatoes.com, metacritic scored it a 51 (and people think they were being very generous) and audience reviews we generally middling.
At $166 M the movie did open to 7th largest domestic opening in history (has since dropped to 8th) before falling off the face of the box office cliff.  The film will earn slight less than 2x its opening weekend, currently at $326, where most tent-poles are in the 3x category or more.   Domestically it is on track to fourth highest grossing super-hero film of the year and possibly it might even slide into fifth.

Ben Affleck was elevated into a executive producer's role for Justice League Part One.
Seth Grahame-Smith leaves the directors chair for the Flash (2018) over creative differences.
A Harley Quinn stand alone movie is in the works with Margot Robbie producing.
Jason Wan, currently attached as director of Aquaman (2018) film has had to TWICE deny leaving the project.
Geoff Johns and Jon Berg were installed as co-runners of DC Studios (think Kevin Feige at Marvel Studios).

The final budget for Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice was not announced; however we know the film was substantially over its announced budget of $250 M.     Rumors from sources that should be in the know have suggested the production budget was closer to $300 M with another $150 M to $250 M in the films marketing campaign.   Just assuming the total budget was some where between $450 M and $500 M is not out of the question.    Considering the film returned just under $500 M to Warner Bros. when you assume standard returns for ticket sales suggest the film was very much in the barely broke even category, give or take.

Reports that Warner Bros. have placed a hard cap on production costs for Justice League: Part One at $200 M are unnerving in the industry.

What exactly is Ben Affleck new role as Executive Producer mean for the project has been debated across the web.   Here is what we know; Ben Affleck has an Oscar for screen writing and an Oscar for best picture to go along with his 67 other awards, Zack Snyder has a grand total of 3 minor awards and no Oscars.   Ben Affleck movies have a ROI of about 3 to 1, Zack Snyder's is roughly 1 to 1.   See where we are going with this?  
It's clear that after two less than stellar performances with DC products Warner Bros. is not happy with Zack Snyder and his wife Deborah Snyder who produces all of Zack's movies.    Warner Bros. has seen a lot of success in multiple genre of films with Ben Affleck and he is a professed comic book fan.
Executive Producer can mean lots of things, from someone who made the film possible to the actual boss on the project.   It could be a reward for his role in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice or Warner Bros. could have looked at his record and asked him to take the lead.
Reports indicate that Ben Affleck will have final say on the script, which has been penned by Chris Terrio who previously worked on Argo with Ben Affleck and assisted on Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice.   
Other reports suggest that Ben Affleck also has the ability to "strongly suggest" changes to filming direction for scenes and takes.   Early reports are indicating that Zack Snyder is not totally comfortable with this situation.

Seth Grahame-Smith who is mostly known as a writer, but was in the directors chair for the Flash (2018) stepped down citing, as usual, creative differences.   What's unusual about this situation is Seth Grahame-Smith is a first time director with a large background in writing (Dark Shadows, Lego Batman Movie) compared to a few others with half-a-dozen other movies under their belt.     No replacement has been named.

Word surfaced a Harley Quinn solo or female driven DC film was being considered with Margot Robbie producing, she also plays Harley Quinn and is assumed she will reprising her role as Harley Quinn.  

Finally the big news hit yesterday afternoon, Geoff Johns and Jon Berg were named co-runners of DC Studios.   They are in a similar situation as Kevin Feige who is President of Marvel Studios.  This is a new position in Warner Bros. and DC Studios, and several other sub-studios also had show-runners named and it is assumed more will be named in the future.
Geoff Johns will be in an interesting position, up until yesterday he was Chief Creative Officer at DC Comics, a producer with writing credit in DC TV universe and Co-Writing the upcoming untitled Batman movie with Ben Affleck.   Originally he as comic book writer for DC Comics.  
Jon Berg is a executive VP at Warner Bros. who has extensive history working with Ben Affleck on several movies including Argo, Gone Girl and the forthcoming Live by Night.

The DC movie slate is expected to change dramatically in the next few months, but it may take far more time than that for the public to know.  For example was the idea of a Harley Quinn movie before or after the leadership change.  Will it survive?

Time will tell.

There is a scene in X-Men: Apocalypse that sums up the movie in a very ironic way.   Scott Sommers / Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), Jean Gray (Sophie Turner), Kurt Wagner / Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit-McPhee), and Jubilation "Jubilee" Lee (Lana Condor) are exiting a movie Theater after watching Return of the Jedi while discussing whether or not third movies in a trilogy can be as good as others.   How Ironic.

Much like Return of the Jedi, fans will like this film, but it will be far from their favorite and many will have a dozen suggestions on how it could have been made better.

There are a number of solid story arcs through out the film and each character has a unique point of view.  Their stories are muffled by the sheer number of characters and constant action in the film.   X-Men: Apocalypse features a strong cast with a good mix of returning actors and new up and coming actors.    As an audience you never become fully attached to many of the characters on the screen.   Even though they have a unique story most story arcs and characters are not on the screen long enough for us to truly care about them as characters.

In X-Men: Evolution (2000), the animated television show, the central story arc of "Age of Apocalypse" spent 4 seasons  and 46 episodes leading up to the showdown with Apocalypse.   The same story arc in this movie is given just under two and half hours, it just doesn't work.   It is too involved of a story.   The first 40 minutes of the film is made up a series of very short scenes that jump from place to place to place to place at break neck speed that only Quicksilver could appreciate.   Those not versed in X-Men lore may find it difficult to keep up and lose interest in the secondary story arcs.    

There are six true tent-pole super-hero movies this year; Deadpool, Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, Captain America: Civil War, Suicide Squad, and Doctor Strange as well as X-Men: Apocalypse.   The other five, if just in the trailers, attempt to separate themselves from the pack by taking chances in creating new and different situations for their super-heroes.   You can argue how successful BvS: DoJ was but the other two so far this year were very successful.  X-Men: Apocalypse doesn't necessarily take chances, it is extremely formulaic, even though it is set in 1980's.   As an audience you kind of know what is coming next because that is what the blueprint says to do.

Marvel Studios (Disney/Buena Vista) has a clear advantage when it comes to VX/CGI.   X-Men: Apocalypse being released so close to Captain America: Civil War highlights the disadvantage most studios are faced with today.   The VX/CGI effects looked dated and incomplete in comparison to Captain America: Civil War.   The film felt more in line with X-Men: X-Men United (2003) than it does with X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014).

In a Hollywood Reporter story yesterday it was reported that Warner Bros. and DC entertainment were moving forward with a Movie centered upon the Women in DC Comics, including Harley Quinn, played my Margot Robbie in this summer Suicide Squad, Bat Girl and the Birds of Prey.

Margot Robbie would take on a role of producer and it is assumed her character would be the focal point of the movie.

DC Comics boosts a number of interesting female characters, both good and evil as it were, with Cat Woman, Super Girl, Poison Ivy, Black Canary, the Huntress, Lady Blackhawk, Katana, and the Man Hunter.  

There has been no official confirmation from either Warner Bros. or DC Studios on the potential project.

Bryan Singer and Simon Kinberg are making the rounds promoting X-Men; Apocalypse which is being released next week, took some time to answer some questions about other films in the X-Men universe.

When asked about the possibility of X-23 replacing Wolverine in future films by Fandango Bryan Singer responded.

"I have discussed that  with the studio, I actually initially pitched the X-Force and the female."

He later added.

"Anytime you throw all these characters together to hit a start date, it can make a lot of money, but it can also be a cluster$%#^. To me, it has to be done with a lot of care. These things can get overwhelming, and if a character doesn’t belong in a movie, don’t use him. If the tone can still maintain itself, I’m all for it. What I’m not for is throwing a bunch of characters together and hoping it works.” 

In another interview Simon Kinberg added:

I was a little shocked to hear that another Fantastic Four script is being looked at and or considered by 20th Century Fox.

Okay shocked is not the correct term as per the contact 20th Century Fox has to have another film in production in the near future (dates vary by source from 2017 to 2019) or the IP is turned over to Marvel Enterprises.

But why now?
The last film was a total flop, IF 20th Century Fox thinks they can make more money selling the IP back to Marvel getting something moving will actually force Marvel to move forward rather than sit back and wait.   It is a typical business position to attempt to force you partner to move first.  

What's the IP Worth?
That is an interesting question, while I don't have an exact amount I'd guess somewhere between $250 Million and $500 Million right now to Marvel.    No one else would pay that amount but Marvel might under the right circumstances.

Why is it worth so much to Marvel Studios?
One word - Villains. 
Marvel Studios now controls the IP for many Super-Heroes, the story on Villians is another story.   Most of the space based Villains belong to the Fantastic Four IP, including the likes to Galactus and Doctor Doom.   Many of the street level villains belong to the Spider-Man IP and X-Men has a long list of villains in their IP.

When could we see public activity?
I would be shocked if third parties haven't acted as go between at a minimum in this situation so far, but direct talks might not be out of the question either.  

So what is this new script you are talking about?
I don't know when this script was originally written or how official it is and there is lots of issue with its validity in the first place.   It could simply be a interweb rumor/hoax (not that it would be a first) nor the even the first I liked.   None the less.  

The potentially new script is a soft reboot of the 2005/2007 films as opposed to a hard reboot like the 2015 film.    Being a soft reboot it is not an origin story, the Fantastic Four have their powers to begin with.   It also means that events in the first two film kind of happened.   They may not focus on them, but there is no denying what did happen.   In the same family as the soft reboot with Incredible Hulk (2008) to Hulk (2003).

My feelings?
I this point I have to think this is more of a ploy to increase the value of the IP and force Marvel's hand than to actually make another movie.   I thought that before and we got Fantastic Four 2015, so I guess anything is possible.
     

X-Men: Apocalypse opens on May 27, lets take a quick look at expectations in the Box Office.

It needs to be noted the film opens on Memorial Day Weekend, a four day weekend which makes predications a bit fickle as it generally messes with comparable films.

Comparable films open between $86 M and $121 M with an average of $97 M for the three day weekends and $115 for a four day weekend.

The film is opening against Disney's Alice Through the Looking Glass starring Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter which is not a direct competitor but very close competitor when it comes to market share.

The film had solid hype and was well received in the early stages of production however concerns on the look of Apocalypse seem to stall the hype machine for extended periods of time.    Initial reviews where pretty negative, on May 5 the first wave of reviews on rottentomatoes.com put the film at 38 and metacritic at 44.   However subsequent reviews have been much better on May 14th the score on rottentomates.com had increased to 58 and metacritic to 51, which is a fairly substantial jump for both considering the number of reviews.  
What is more interesting is the current scoring of audience reviews, the film is actually the highest rated film in the Franchise.   Yes it is early, but the film is tracking about 5% higher in early fan reviews than it predecessors at this same juncture.

An interesting side note, the length of the film has changed.   On May 1st the film was listed as 2 hours 16 Minutes, in the past few days many sites now list the movie as 2 hours 24 minutes.   It leaves the question on whether all reviewers saw the same cut of the film.

X-Men franchise saw new life with the release of Deadpool earlier this year.   The irreverent R-Rated film set a new standard with $132.4M opening weekend.    Many of suggested a potential Deadpool bump similar to the Avengers bump that all the Marvel films saw.

Four day Memorial day Weekends generate between $215M and $320 M dollars when adjusted for inflation.   Two tent poles released on the same Memorial Day Weekend the numbers are from $275 to $320 M.   If we assume the standard 70% for the tent poles this gives us a $192 M to $225 M for the films.   That in theory suggests $115 M to $135 M on the four day for X-Men on the four day and $93 to $109 M on the three day.

However I think competition on opening weekend and potential holdovers push the numbers down domestically.  

$87 M Opening Weekend ($110M Four Day)
$217 M Domestic Total
$570 M International Total
$787 M World Wide.

In news broke by the Hollywood Reporter, Michael B. Jordan is in talks with Marvel Studios to join the cast of Black Panther.

Black Panther directed by Ryan Coogler from a screen play by Joe Robert cole would reunite Michael B. Jordan and Coogler again, previously they worked together on Creed (2015) and Fruitvale  Station (2013).

Chadwick Boseman is set to reprise his role as T'Challa/Black Panther for Marvel Studios with Lupita Nyong'o also in negotions to play T'Challa love interest in the film.   Andy Serkis has long been rumored to play Ulysses Klaue/Klaw reprising his role for 2015 Avengers: Age of Ultron.

Michael B. Jordan played Johnny Storm in the 2015 Fantastic Four film released by 20th Century Fox.   He is the second Human Torch to make a move to Marvel Studios from 20th Century Fox.  Chris Evans starring in the 2005 and 2007 Fantastic Four films before becoming Steve Rogers / Captain America.

As an interesting side note Black Panther and The Human Torch (Johnny Storm) are more like enemies than friends in the comics for extended period of time.     This would be an interesting way to merge the multiverse.

All kidding aside there are several parts Michael B. Jordan could be considered for; White Wolf, Death Tiger and American Panther come to mind.

SuperGirl is moving to the CW, Agent Carter has been cancelled, Marvel's Most Wanted didn't get picked up, and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was picked up early as the CW renews Arrow, Flash and DC Legends of Tomorrow.

CBS
The audience for CBS skews older than any other TV station is America.   The average age of the typical viewer is a tad under 60.   CBS green light Supergirl last year in hopes of drawing a younger audience.   In a compromise Supergirl was actually a crime procedural show with a Comic Book character lead.   You know what they say about compromises?
SuperGirl actually was the most watched new Drama on TV; however its viewership numbers never came close to matching the existing dramas on CBS.   While the Audience skewed younger for SuperGirl, the older audience turned off their TVs. 
CBS renewed SuperGirl however it moved the show to its sister station the CW.   The expectations is the SuperGirl will continue to draw similar audience numbers and free up a valuable time slot on CBS for a show that more matches the demographics of its audience.

CW
Arrow, and the Flash were renewed fairly early this season leaving the question of whether or not DC Legends of Tomorrow would be renewed.     It was renewed as well about a week or two ago.   With SuperGirl transitioning from CBS to CW there are four DC Comic products on CW this coming season, too many, too early to tell.

NBC
With Heroes Reborn cancelled and little else that qualifies as Sci-Fi/Comic Book/ Fantasy on the channel not much to discuss.   At some point an in depth look at SyFy Channel's shows may be do, but this is not that time.

ABC
In a minor shock ABC cancelled Agent Carter and decided against picking up Marvel's Most Wanted, while renewing Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. fairly early.
Agent Carter had low ratings which normally is an easy indicator on the forthcoming cancellation of TV Show; however the show had a female lead (Haley Atwell) which is unusual in its own right, but also had a female show runners (Tara Butters) which is so unusual these days that it is one of a small handful of shows that have both.   ABC has been attempting to promote itself is very diverse and suddenly the show that qualifies as being diverse is on the cutting block.   It was obviously not enough to change the shows fate.
The rumors over the past week indicated that Marvel's Most Wanted was not going to be picked up.   Initially I was caught off guard as this was a show that ABC had pushed for.  The show starring Adrianne Palicki and Nick Blood (reprising their roles form Agents of S.H.E.I.L.D.) had the two ex-spies/agents working against another global conspiracy with a slightly darker point of view that Agents of S.H.E.I.L.D. It will be interesting to hear what happened and why a promising project failed since the pilot was green lighted.

ABC still has thee additional Marvel shows in development but little is known for sure on these three projects.

On Freeform (formerly ABC Family) Cloak & Dagger is in production for a January debut.

Even though Agent Carter was cancelled by ABC yesterday it is very likely that a third (and potentially more) will be filmed and aired on a streaming service.    Netflix is rumored to have approached ABC and Marvel Studios as far back as January on taking over the show.    Season 1 of Agent Carter airs on Amazon Prime under an exclusive agreement between Amazon and Marvel.    Daredevil, Jessica Jones, and three additional Marvel TV shows air on Netflix.

It is assumed that Adrianne Palicki and Nick Blood will be returning to Agents of S.H.E.I.L.D. as both were highly like by the viewers.  

Marvel Studios
There three additional projects in production.  Hellfire Club and Legion are X-Men universe projects that will air on Fox and FX in the 2017 time frame.    Empire of the Dead is a limited edition comic being developed into a TV series by AMC.

Box Office Mojo has reported on some announced release date changes.

An untitled DC Movie was moved from 2020 June 19 back a month to July 24th.   The movie is expected to be Green Lantern feature film.

Talking to comingsoon.net Simon Kinberg revealed the next X-Men film will be set in the 1990's.  

In 1991 Marvel revisioned the X-men in to separate comic books, The Uncanny X-Men chronicled the storys of the X-Men lead by Storm while the X-Men [comic book] followed the blue team lead by Cyclops.   The new comics brought in new costumes and new story lines and were some of the most successful comic books in history financially.   The X-Men issue #1 sold an estimated 3 .5 million copies and marvel shipped nearly 8 million copies making I the largest selling single comic book of all time.

There is no indication on whether Simon Kinberg was referring to X-Men: New Mutants or the untitled X-Men 7 film rumored to be in pre-development.

It should be noted that 20th Century Fox has already booked time at the same Montreal Studio that Bryan Singer filmed X-Men: Days of Future Past and X-Men: Apocalypse.   Bryan Singer has recently noted he wanted a crack at the Dark Phoenix Saga.

It is believed that most of the reoccurring cast from second trilogy, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, and Nicholas Hoult, all signed 3 movie contracts which would be complete with X-Men: Apocalypse.  The cast from the original trilogy, Patrick Stewart, Ian McKellan, Hugh Jackman, Famke Janssen, Anna Paquin, Halle Berry, James Marsden and Rebecca Romijn signed individual contracts for each movie they have appeared in.

Hugh Jackman has indicated that he is retiring after one final outing as Wolverine in the untitled Wolverine Sequel currently filming.  

Ryan Reynolds character Deadpool, would be difficult to incorporate into a X-Men film according to Bryan Singer.   One would have to imagine it would be even more difficult set in the 1990's.

On mobile will update later

From Twitter

Sharon Stone was on The Late Late Show with James Cordon and made this comment about an upcoming project.

“I am going to do a Marvel movie. I’m just doing a wee part in a Marvel movie, upcoming, and I can’t tell, because you know, you have to sign confidentiality agreements. But I’m going to do a wee part in a Marvel movie now. That’s it.”

Rumors quickly began circulating that she was playing Janet van Dyne in the forthcoming Ant-Man and Wasp film.   The reasoning, the "wee part" in her statement. 

Rumors running around the web this afternoon is suggesting that Emily Carmichael has landed the coveted position as Director of the forthcoming Captain Marvel film.

Emily Carmichael is an indie director known for making shorts rather than feature length films but supposedly a film named Arrow caught Marvel's eye and is the reason for bringing her in for interviews.  

Emily Carmichael

A few weeks ago Jeff Sneider from the Wrap had this to say.

There was a rumour about an actress being up for it; an already existing rumour, that’s not new. I’ve definitely heard there’s some truth to that rumour, and that there’s a director with the same first name who has also been eyed. I don’t think that [an announcement] is too far off. If they can make it to Comic Con, they will.

Does that mean Emily Blunt will be Captain Marvel?

Courtesy SPE

The Batman Workout.

Warner Bros. has elevated Ben Affleck to Executive producer according to Movie Web.

It was somewhat humorously announced that Ben Affleck spent time in his bat-suit rewriting pages of the script for Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice during production.   Outside of the DCEU Ben Affleck has won two Academy Awards for screen writing Goodwill Hunting (with Matt Damon) and Best Picture for Argo (with Grant Heslov and George Clooney).

Several sites are wondering how much control Ben Affleck is being given, from becoming the equivalent to Kevin Feige with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, to just helping his ego.   Considering the work ben Affleck has done on other projects it seems more like over sight of the DCEU rather than helping his ego is in place.

Mostly Spoiler Free

I was sitting in my movie seat and after a great scene I took a quick look at my watch, I figured we had to be maybe an hour into the film, maybe 75 minutes, nope we were just under two hours. It is that kind of movie, a two and half hour movie that feels like it is 90 minutes long. Captain America: Civil War is a 2 hour and 26 minute long spectacle of a movie.

Many reviewers and audience members are suggesting it is the Avengers Sequel we deserved and I have to be honest while it is a good if not great movie it is not an Avengers movie, it is a Captain America movie and that is why it is good. It has a clear focus and even though many Avengers are in the movie it rarely deviates from Captain America perspective.

As an aside I want to address the other aspect of the Avengers Sequel we deserve philosophy; The Age of Ultron was an overly broad and complex story line, whose 2 hour and 21 minutes were far too short to cover the whole story. Age of Ultron could have been 3 hours and 21 minutes and not had enough screen time to tell the entire story that Josh Whedon wanted to tell. Age of Ultron suffered from the under telling of the secondary stories. Yet Age of Ultron did setup the story of Captain America: Civil War, in a similar fashion to how the story of Iron Man 3 was born out the original Avengers film. Without Age of Ultron you could not have anywhere near as compelling of story in Captain America; Civil War.

Captain America: Civil War is a re-envisioning of the 2006/2007 Marvel Comics crossover storyline Civil War. The story centers on conflict between Steve Rogers/Captain America (Chris Evans) and Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr) on whether or not the Avengers Initiative should have Government Oversight or not. Tony Stark is in favor of Governmental Oversight and Steve Rogers is not.   The film looks at many of the other known MCU super heroes as they come to terms on what side of the equation they belong.

The Film makers, not only the directors of Joe and Anthony Russo, but the scriptwriters Christopher Marcus and Stephen McFeely have done an excellent job of giving everyone a believable reason to be in the film, no one is simply there because they are a Marvel character. Every character contributes to the story and some answers are given to others who are not in the story.

Everyone I think can agree that Chadwick Boseman brought T’Challa/Black Panther to life in a way that people will be excited to see his standalone film. Tom Hollland as Peter Parker/Spider-Man will either be hit or miss amongst the audience.
 The actor or character that I found that advanced themselves, for the lack of a better term, was Paul Rudd as Scott Lang as Ant-Man.

Marvel’s diehard fans will appreciate the nearly 2 dozen Easter Eggs or subtle references to comics and prior Marvel Films, not all of which are in the MCU. I suspect as the film get more playtime more Easter Eggs will be spotted.

While I think Captain America: Civil War is a good movie, it is not a great film.

Certain directors have the ability to frame a Comic Book fight between super heroes, Captain America: Civil War could easily have been Cold War Spy Thriller in terms of action. It is hard to explain but the action lacks that certain something that makes it Comic Book Super Hero film.

The Marvel Comic Book storyline is one of the best story lines over the years, AVX and Secret Wars being the others, the film is not as good as the comic book story line simply because you don’t have 12 cross over issues and dozens of other comics to tell these stories in.

I am a big fan of cinematography and soundtracks in films. I want moments that make you ow and ah and marvel at what on the screen. I don’t want to say this film lacked those moments, but those moments weren’t as good as past Marvel films.

Courtesy of Sy Fy

Courtesy of HBO

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

The Wrap is reporting Alden Ehrenreich has been cast as the young Han Solo.

Alden Ehrenreich recently played Hobie Doyle in the Coen Brothers comedy Hail, Caesar! opposite Josh Brolin and George Clooney.  

The upcoming film, currently titled Han Solo: A Star Wars Story, directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller is currently scheduled for release on May 25th 2018.

Current reports have Michael B. Jordan, (Creed, Fantastic Four) linked to the part of young Lando Calrissian and Joonas Suotamo playing the part of Chewbacca in the film.

• 2016 May 27 - X-Men: Apocalypse
• 2017 March 03 - Untitled Wolverine Sequel
• 2017 October 06 - Marvel Film
• 2018 January 12 - Marvel Film
• 2018 July 13 - Marvel Film

Films that have been announced but not given release dates:

• X-Men: New Mutants
• Gambit
• Deadpool 2
• X-Force

• Mystique - Stand Alone Film
• X-Men 7

Untitled Wolverine Sequel

Gambit

Deadpool 2

X-Force

X-Men: New Mutants

Hellfire (TV Series)

Legion (TV Series)

X-Men 7

Mystique 

What do I think the release schedule will look like?

• 2016 May 27 - X-Men: Apocalypse
• 2017 March 03 - Old Man Logan
• 2017 October 06 - Gambit
• 2018 January 12 - Deadpool 2
• 2018 August 10 - New Mutants
• 2019 May 24 - X-Men: The Dark Phoenix

Fantastic Four / Silver Surfer