With today’s news of another reboot, I thought it was worth a reminder that Christopher Reeve was not the first to play the role on the big screen.
Tag: Superman (Page 4 of 5)
DC Premiere’s latest animated movie, “Superman/Batman: Public Enemies,” isn’t so much a movie as it is a really long episode of “Justice League of America.” Based on the six-issue limited series by Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness, “Public Enemies” finds the country in such a terrible state of distress that the people are willing to elect Lex Luthor as their new president. When Luthor begins enlisting superheroes to work for the government, Superman becomes suspicious of his ulterior motives. Using the impending arrival of a meteor from Krypton as a distraction, Luthor frames Superman for the murder of Metallo and places a $1 billion bounty on his head. Now, every villain from Silver Banshee to General Grodd is hot on his trail, and the only person willing to take his side is his good friend Batman. Unfortunately, the movie is so damn short at a mere 67 minutes that Batman is hardly given his time to shine. In fact, while he may share top billing with the Man of Steel, this is first and foremost a Superman movie. Not that Superman fans will complain, but for those hoping to see a little more from the Caped Crusader, prepare to be disappointed. The public enemies of this film aren’t the titular superheroes, it’s the suits in charge of putting together this half-assed adventure.
With the season drawing to a close, tonight’s episode put the finishing touches on all four major storylines, delivering one of the most well-rounded half-hours of “Entourage” in the process. Though Turtle’s story has been showing signs of wear lately (I blame Ms. I Only Wear Thongs), it looks like the writers plan to shake things up, because they’ve just placed his relationship with Jamie-Lynn on the backburner. Their last day together certainly started out sweet, with Turtle unveiling the ultimate lunch made up of Jamie’s favorite dishes, but it soon turned into a bout of jealously when she discovered that Turtle’s new admirer had friended him on Facebook. Though it’s a bit silly to think that Jamie-Lynn could even be jealous of Turtle, his decision to delete her from his friends list was the right thing to do. Unfortunately, that was merely the calm before the storm, as Jamie eventually tells Turtle that he can see other people while she’s gone. Of course, she didn’t actually break up with him, which makes me think that she’s really just testing him to see if he can stay loyal. And by the look of next week’s season finale, that may be harder said than done.
Eric, meanwhile, was given his first comedic storyline since the infamous Spooning the Guest Star incident a few years back, and I have to say that I really enjoyed the break from his more dramatic side. Usually, it would be Drama running around town worried about having contracted an STD from some random hook-up, but Kevin Connelly did a great job with the material – especially during the scene in the doctor’s office where he was forced to suffer through the long-winded background history interview. The fact that the girl hooked up with Drama only four months prior didn’t help his feelings on the matter, but what the hell was he thinking by not wearing a condom? Luckily, he escapes the situation disease-free, and as expected, swears off one-night stands and turns his attention back to wooing Sloan.
Of course, even though Drama wasn’t the subject of the STD scare, he still had his own share of weekly shenanigans to deal with – this time revolving around his “Melrose Place” audition. While chatting with David Faustino in the waiting area, he discovers that the director in charge of the pilot episode (“Entourage” creator Doug Ellin) is the same guy he flipped out in front of during his original audition for “Five Towns.” Though he’s ensured there’s no bad blood between them and that it’s his job to lose, Drama has a panic attack when he learns that Dean “Superman” Cain is also testing for the role. One trip to the hospital later, Lloyd calls to inform him that they’ve offered him another chance to audition, but Drama turns it down. That’s bad news for Lloyd, because Drama was his only real client.
The even worse news, however, is that Lloyd might be seeing Ari back in his life sooner than he would have liked. Already on his sixth replacement assistant (the last two of whom were fired over a cranberry muffin and a “Saved by the Bell” reference), Ari’s patience is wearing thin when he gets a surprise visit by Terrence offering him a deal to buy out his agency for $100 million. Suspicious of why Terrence would be coming to him first, but still not willing to pay the overinflated price, Ari does a little investigative work and discovers that he’s trying to dump the business before his wife files divorce. Using Terrence’s desperation to his advantage, Ari not only talks down the price, but in doing so, also becomes Lloyd’s boss once again. It’s great news for Ari and Babs, because the merger will transform them into the largest agency in town, but what will become of poor Lloyd?
You may not have heard it, but the movie world’s been shifting on its axis over the last few days. It might not be very pretty.
* Dick Cook, the Chairman of Disney who doesn’t get nearly the amount of press of CEO Bob Iger, resigned just before the start of Rosh Hashanah last Friday night. In the inevitable “did he fall or was he pushed?” argument, the “push” side seems to have the edge and the repercussions are significant, but not completely clear.
The short version seems to be that Cook and Iger simply had different views on too many issues and that the movie side of Disney, Pixar aside, hasn’t been doing quite as well lately as some would like. Cook was, however, apparently rather well liked by such superstars as Steven Spielberg and Johnny Depp, and that might have an impact on such issues as whether not they’ll be a fourth “Pirates” movie. Marc Graser of Variety has more — including the tantalizing suggestion that the job might be Pixar head John Lasseter’s to turn down. Of course, Nikki Finke has yet more of the seemingly endless lowdown.
* Speaking of Disney and its famous recent acquisition, there’s a second lawsuit similar to the one that wrapped a while back regarding the rights to Superman — or not. Let’s just say it’s from the same lawyer and this time the target is Time Warner/DC Comics competitor, the newly Disnified Marvel Entertainment. As described by Nikki Finke, who picked up the story from the comics site Bleeding Cool, this time the creator in question is the late, great Jack Kirby, one of the most respected figures in all of comicsdom and the co-creator with Stan Lee of many of Marvel’s best known characters including the Fantastic Four and the Mighty Thor. (He also co-created Captain America with Joe Simon just months before America’s entry into World War II.) There’s a long history on the whole issue of Kirby’s role in creating these comics in relation to Stan Lee, and there are a number of issues here. Like anything legal, it gets pretty thorny and there’s some pretty “lively” debate among the commenters at Deadline Hollywood.
* Perhaps most significant of all, reporter/blogger Anne Thompson has written a post that’s sent shockwaves through the online film world and probably the actual film world as well — though the news itself is known to those affected. She concisely entitled her post-festival piece “Toronto Wrap: Indie Bloodbath.” The villain here seems to be, at least partly, rising marketing costs — though I’d like someone to explain to me why they are rising as we’re coming out of a recession with a more or less jobless recovery. Nevertheless:
It costs too much money these days to make a dent, a mark, an impression that will create enough urgency in filmgoers to make them go out and see a movie. While Ted Mundorff insists that business is up at indie-branded Landmark Cinemas around the country, and Apparition’s Bob Berney is hopeful that exec changes at Cinemark and AMC will bring a new awareness to booking the right movies in the right locations, the indie market needs help.
With the exception of the high profile deal for a “A Single Man” last week, very little business got done in Toronto and struggling indie filmmakers are, rather than selling their films, paying to have their films released. Terms like “tectonic shift” are being bandied about. Via David Hudson/The Auteurs Daily, we have reaction from my personal movie Yoda, Roger Ebert and Vadim Rizov, who comments on Universal’s recent troubles and its ensuing spending freeze.
The irony is, of course, that all of this comes after a very successful movie summer. Another chapter, I suppose, in the ongoing realignment of all media, though the timing sure seems odd. Movies will survive, but it’s a most definitely a tough time for all but the most micro-budgeted of indies and the big budgeted productions of ordinary Hollywood, and life’s not exactly a feather-bed for them, either.
UPDATE: Also via The Auteur’s Daily, apparently there’s been some delayed Toronto-related action and some blood just got mopped off the floor. And a little more. Things are, I’m sure, still bad, but perhaps the mood might be a hair less apocalyptic for larger indies.
* You’ve probably heard it elsewhere by now, but Bryan Singer has been signed to do a “Battlestar Galactica” movie, though of course it’s still very preliminary. I hope it stays that way.
The show will apparently not be related to the recently wrapped, broadly acclaimed TV series, but will be a complete redo of some sort or another and original producer Glen Larson is involved. That Universal would want to do another reboot on such a recently and brilliantly rebooted property makes absolutely no sense to me at all and shows a real failure of imagination. Moreover, if the idea is to return to something more like the original, I have only one question: Why? One of the things that makes the new series so remarkable is how worthless its original was.
A few years back, I took a fresh look at the first few episodes after dismissing it in my younger geek years and, sorry, the show was three times as bad as I remembered. It was nothing more than a listless knock-off of “Star Wars” with an addition of some surprisingly blatant rightwing agitprop and all the poor characterization and infantile plotting that made seventies television that vast wasteland that it really was back then, with a few exceptions. There is nothing to be nostalgic for here and most modern viewers only know the new show in any case. Bryan Singer’s a smart guy and I just don’t get this.
* Speaking of Singer, his sometime writing partner Christopher McQuarrie (“The Usual Suspects”) has been signed to do the next Wolverine flick.
* In other superhero related news, we are back at the start of it all with some new litigation which returns some of the control of Superman to the estates of his creators, Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster. It may dramatically speed up, or slow down, production of upcoming Superman projects since the ruling goes into effect in 2013 and Warners might want to keep more money for itself by starting sooner rather than later. Regardless, as someone who remembers the “creators’ rights” movement in the comic book world of the late eighties and nineties, I have to think the good guys won here.
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