Civil War and Martin Freeman - Marvel on the Move

It's been no secret that Marvel has fans ultra-hyped about Captain America Civil War which is set to release May 6, 2016.  The storyline has to do with registering superheroes . . . 

. . . Hmmm, sound familiar?  That's because if you saw X-Men, that was what Xavier and his crew were fighting Magneto about (except for them it was mutant registration).  But this would affect the X-Men as well.

With Iron Man on the side of hero registration and Captain America staunchly opposed, this could get preachy political if Marvel isn't careful.

But fans are largely optimistic and expectations are high.  People expect Captain America to be better since it has historically done better than most of the standalone Marvel movies.  We will be introduced to the Black Panther, have the added Scarlet Witch and Vision as characters, and there are even talks of Spider Man making an appearance.

Not enough new faces?  That's okay.  Marvel Announced yesterday that Martin Freeman (Sherlock & The Hobbit) is joining the cast of Civil War.  They have intentionally refused to name which character he will play (taking a page from Star Wars?) and leave us all with the question: hero or villain?  Maybe it will depend on which side you choose . . .

Mr. Holmes Trailer - Good Idea? or Leave on the Streets of London?

While I absolutely love almost everything Sherlock Holmes, there have undoubtedly been many liberties taken with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's most memorable character over the years.

That's why, when Miramax and Roadside Attraction production companies released the trailer for Mr. Holmes, I had to admit that I was skeptical.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJwgItmobFE

And for the record I still am.  Sir Ian McKellan is a fantastic actor, there's no doubt about that, and if anyone could portray an aging Holmes, I would have picked him for the job.  However, I am very skeptical about the script and the plot.

From the trailer it appears Holmes is in the beginning stages of Alzheimer's disease and is desperate to find out what happened in probably his only unsolved case.

Some of the movie looks true to form.  Doyle did have Holmes retire in Sussex and tend to bees, and Mrs. Hudson went with him as his housekeeper - he couldn't stand anyone else who did not know his habits.  However, some of this seems to be almost a Sherlock Holmes affront.  There are so many story scenarios in which you could take Sherlock Holmes.  My hope is that they take this one seriously.

Set to release on July 17th and directed by Bill Condon, I guess I will have to wait and see.  I will see it, simply for the fact that Holmes is one of my all-time favorite literary characters, but I remain skeptical.

Do you think the new Mr. Holmes movie looks good?  Let me know.

Celebration Panel Announces "Star Wars: Rogue One" Film

In case you missed it, Disney announced at the Star Wars Celebration that they will be starting a line of individual movies about Star Wars characters - taking a page from the Marvel franchise.  They announced that the first film would be entitled: Star Wars Anthology: Rogue One and showed a teaser trailer to excited audiences.

In case you're wondering where the trailers are, YouTube took them down - except for two:

The first is someone filming the trailer from their cell phone camera at the announcement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDursxEoUvI

The second is a very creative re-rendering of the trailer with LEGOs:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7p8aPxzbzJs

So is this really a good idea?

Should we have standalone Star Wars films about the characters we don't even know yet?  Perhaps they will have cameos by our favorites?  Let me know what you think in the comments.

Set to release in December of 2016, it will be directed by Gareth Edwards who also directed last year's Godzilla.   The only confirmed cast members are Felicity Jones and Ben Mendelsohn, neither of whom are in listed as starring in Star Wars: The Force Awakens.  Sam Claflin (known for his portrayal of Finnick Odair in The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and The Hunger Games: Mocking Jay Part 1) and Riz Ahmed (Four Lions and Centurion) are rumored to be cast but there are no parts listed by anyone's name.

Do we really want a Marvel version of Star Wars?  I'm not knocking having Star Wars come to theaters again, but I do not want another craptastic set of movies that was the prequels disaster (especially Episode II).

What do you think?

Avengers: Age of Ultron

This is what going to the movies is all about!  I hate to see Joss Whedon leave the Marvel Universe, but dang!  What a way to go out!  Avengers Age of Ultron outdid itself in the world of comic books!  There was an actual, fantastic story in this, along with more in-depth looks at some of the characters we only knew a very little about from the movies up to this point (i.e. Hawkeye and Black Widow).  We had two new characters in the forms of the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver and FINALLY we had Vision - one of my absolute favorite characters!  I laughed until I thought I would cry, I was surprised, I was angry, I was excited and I was left clamoring for more!  This is a movie that is worth every penny to see!  This is a movie I would take the whole family to (provided they are old enough for action movies and the PG-13 rating).

No movie is without fault, but lets get the few of these out of the way: Baron Strucker felt like a pointless character.  He was only there for a few minutes and while I love Thomas Kretchman as an actor, I would have loved to have seen more of him rather than just as a quick way to justify the beginning actions of the Twins.  The friends with whom I went to see the movie brought up a good point that at the end of Iron Man 3 we see Tony Stark blowing up his suits.  Now he's back and fighting with not only more awesome suits, like the Hulk Crusher, but also with robots.  What caused the change?  I try to avoid spoilers in these reviews because I want people to read them and then see the movie, so I will save my last one for later, but those are the big ones.

Ultimately, the movie is one of the best in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  The writing alone could have made the movie stand on it's own.  Personally, and I know that I will get flack for this statement from some of my friends, but I feel that the movie should at least be nominated for best original screenplay.  I came away considering how we deal with heroes in our perception today.  The characters felt more humanized and the beginning of the rift between the characters that will set up for Captain America: Civil War has begun.  Not to mention the fact that Whedon has the ability to take what appeared to be a meaningless conversation at the beginning of the film and turn it into one that is of utmost importance in calling the whole group to unite later.

I was worried about their portrayal of Vision, but not only was Paul Bettany the perfect voice of JARVIS, he did an outstanding job with the role.  He really was the Vision of the comics!  With such an outstanding cast, no one got lost among performances.  You could really see how well everyone had taken  to their roles now that they were used to acting in an ensemble cast.  The chemistry was really there!

When I left the theater, I could have turned right back around and watched it again.  It was that good!  Travel however far you need to in order to see this movie!  It's epic!