Comic-Con Edition!

Note: This post did not run last Monday due to technical snafus. Those responsible have been sacked. 

 

There was a little shindig in San Diego last weekend, and you might’ve heard a few things from it.

Okay, you heard a lot from it. Here’s a rundown of what I heard, and it won’t include everything, because nobody could possibly contain the hugeness of SDCC in one column without boring the crap out of you. So consider this the highlights reel.

• Captain Marvel is set in the 1990s, an interesting choice as long as I don’t think about that being 27 years ago. It’s set before Iron Man, she’ll face the Skrulls, and Nick Fury will have two eyes. Note: First Marvel movie with a female lead. Seriously, it’s just embarrassing that it took this long. (Black Widow anyone??)

• We didn’t get a new Black Panther trailer (unless I missed it), but we did get a nifty poster and they showed exclusive footage I don’t have. io9 gives us a shot-by-shot recap, however. Can we get this movie already?

• Speaking of things we didn’t get, Infinity War footage was shown at D23 and at Comic-Con and they must be strip-searching the attendees, because it’s not online yet.

• Also from Marvel: Ant-Man and the Wasp is the sequel, so apparently they’ll let women do something except stomp their feet and pout this time. Michelle Pfeiffer will play Janet Van Dyne, which makes me happy, and Laurence Fishburne is Bill Foster.

• Speaking of sequels, Wonder Woman is getting one, surprising absolutely no one since it’s on track to be the highest-grossing movie of the summer and is already the third-biggest Warner Bros. movie of all time.* She’ll face off against the Soviet Union in the 1980s, and somehow Chris Pine is involved, which is quite a trick if you watched the first one. They didn’t sign director Patty Jenkins to more than one film, but they’re reportedly working with her, and if they know what’s good for them, they’ll back up a Brinks truck to keep her. Give Wonder Woman to Zack Snyder and we will riot.

Note: Wonder Woman is also the second-highest gross of the year, after Beauty and the Beast - also a female protagonist. As ridiculous as it seems, we still need to wave these flags around to convince Hollywood that yes, women-centered movies and even *gasp* women-directed movies make money. DUH.

• The Verge details why making the upcoming Flash movie as “Flashpoint” is probably a terrible idea.

• Speaking of bad ideas, we’re getting not one but two sequels to Suicide Squad, even though no one liked it. We get one direct sequel, and one focusing on manic-pixie Harley Quinn and Jared Leto’s Joker, because that sounds like fun. That’s not including Gotham City Sirens.

• And they’re going to let Todd McFarlane make another Spawn movie. For reasons.

• Was Decker a replicant in Blade Runner? Harrison Ford answers the question! Tee hee. Also: Have a brief history of everything that happened between the two movies. Or you could just go watch the new one and hope Ridley Scott has figured out how to make it right the first time… oooh, am I in trouble now? Sorry, I chalk Blade Runner up as overrated and problematic on many levels, though I will maintain an open mind as I approach the new one. *ducks rotten tomatoes*

• Reality collides with fantasy as U.S. Sen. John Lewis led a march through Comic-Con following his panel about his Eisner-winning autobiographical graphic novels, titled March. According to news reports, he encouraged young people (including the students in the front row) to remain optimistic and fight for change.

• DC is giving Batgirl to Joss Whedon, though no word yet on whether she’ll be Barbara or Betty or someone else. Meanwhile, that weird pre-Superman Krypton series gets more details.

• Buried in all the movie hoopla, there was actually some stuff about comics. Such as the Eisner Awards, with top honors to Black Hammer, The Vision and Saga. Here’s the full list.

• Here, have the cosplay.

 

Trailer Park:

• Thor: Ragnarok shows us a bit more than Thor facing down our pal the Hulk in a fighting ring for some reason, and proves that every major enemy of Thor’s will wear silly headgear. Hulk talks, Cate Blanchett and Jeff Goldblum chew the scenery, fun will be had.

• Another Justice League trailer heavily features Wonder Woman, because DC isn’t entirely populated with idiots. It’s interesting and action-y with little snippets from each of the team members besides Bats and Diana, though the barely-seen villain is boring as hell. “This world will fall” - oh, again? I kind of miss the days when Lex Luthor was planning a nuclear land scam - at least it was creative. When it says “Superman was a beacon to the world… he made [people] see the best parts of themselves,” I had to yell, “Not the way you idiots wrote him!” Yes, I’m still bitter. Here, have a poster.

• Stranger Things season 2 trailer is geektastic and nicely creepy, though I can’t really judge how it compares since I still haven’t seen the first season. Yeah, yeah, I know. CultureGeek Jr. is really on me about it…

• Sigourney Weaver gets to be the bad guy in Defenders, which reminds me that I have a second season of Daredevil to catch up (though I understand I can skip Iron Fist, and P.S. he’s getting a new showrunner plus Misty Knight, who is never not awesome.) With bonus Scott Glenn! P.S. I love Jessica Jones, and love that they don’t seem to be blunting her at all the way they did in the comics.

• I have been instructed that I am required to watch Westworld, which is a problem since it is an HBO show and I am just a poor working blogger who can’t afford to fork over $40 a season. However, big fans of the show should enjoy this funky-awesome creepy-cheerful trailer for Season 2.

• Star Trek! Star Trek! Star Trek! Since Star Trek Discovery is in the Prime universe, I can actually dare to hope this one is for real even if this new trailer seems a little grimdark for the Trek world. They’re certainly not skimping on the production values, and so far I’m not hating anyone. I still can’t figure out who’s the captain and who’s the main character, since those are apparently no longer the same person, and Burnham is actually Spock’s adoptive sister? (That guy has a lot of relatives…) I’m sincerely hoping more of an ensemble feel develops, since I think Trek works best when it doesn’t lock itself into the same three characters’ arcs. I subscribed to CBS Go for this damn thing (kicking and screaming), so it had better not suck. Panel writeup here.

• Steven Spielberg paints an unusually grim future of an overcrowded Earth where everyone escapes from reality into VR videogames as an ode to the ‘80s in Ready Player One. Or something. I think. It’s a nifty premise, if a little disturbing - shades of Talos IV, if you are nerdy enough to get my reference.

• The trailer for Supergirl Season 3 looks a touch darker, with Supergirl apparently thinking of giving up her secret identity (and have we finally spied Lex, albeit with hair?) We only get 10 seconds of Alex, but she is so awesome in it, I can’t complain.

• Someone said that the new Walking Dead trailer shows war is coming to the apocalypse. Have they been watching for the past seven seasons? I admit I gave up on it last season, but I suppose I will watch the premiere and see if story returns to my favorite zombie future, or whether it’s still mired in torture porn as horror. I would like to be scared or fascinated again - I’ll take either over “pissed off.” Please? Meanwhile, Robert Kirkman will eventually end the comic book, but hasn’t set a date yet, so get a grip, everybody. io9’s report on the Walking Dead panel is amusing, however:  for example, Andrew Lincoln doesn’t get why everyone makes fun of the way he says “Carl.” Frankly, me either, Andrew - you’re doing pretty damn well for a Brit playing a southern-fried deputy.

• Maybe it’s Bryan Singer nostalgia, but I am unreasonably interested in The Gifted. It looks like it might have returned the X-Men to their initial foundations as allegory for civil rights, with some characters I actually wouldn’t mind following. Can it be sustained through a series as opposed to a film? We shall see…

• I admit, I was not entirely sold on the idea of Bright, a weird pastiche of Alien Nation with the premise of damn near every urban fantasy of the last ten years. I am also a little put off by the opening of this new trailer, in which Will Smith dispatches a fairy with a broom and someone uses the word “nuke-u-lar.” However, it looks like high production values, a touch of grit and Netflix’s now-trademark intensity. I am intrigued enough to give it a try.

Less interesting to me, but you may want to hear from them:

• Marvel’s Inhumans

• Kingsman: Golden Circle

• The Orville (please no)

• Pacific Rim: Uprising (teaser, with bonus plot holes this time!)

 

* I always have to put an asterisk after these records, because movie ticket prices rise at an exponential rate and it’s disingenuous at best to compare Wonder Woman with Harry Potter or Dark Knight since tickets cost more now. But whatever - movie execs pay attention to these things, and it means we get more Wonder Woman.