Showing posts with label Joss Whedon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Joss Whedon. Show all posts
Seinfeld: The Vampire ...
TV Enjoy this old SNL Seinfeld parody from 1988 which turned up on their feed at the weekend back when Sarah Michelle Gellar hosted. The audience sound like they're in a coma, but it's pitch perfect. The vampire appliances look like they were created by the same team as Buffy and Angel.
"And what am I going to do now?"
Comics The cover to this final Dark Horse "seasons" issue of Buffy: The Vampire Slayer neatly references their first edition back in 2007, as the slayer drops her scythe and walks away. The story isn't quite that simple. As is the case with any ongoing franchise, the demon horde are simply dormant at the close, ready to wake up and threaten the world, bringing Buffy back to the fight, weapon in hand, if required. There'll be spoilers ahead. If you ever were a fan of the tv series, please do go pick up the trades and graphic novels. It's quite the ride.After reviewing that first issue, I feel like offering a few comments on this last installment. This is the longest sustained period of by a comic book I've had. I can remember nervously visiting Forbidden Planet on Bold Street asking if I could order it and that's where I've bought every issue since, along with the various spin-offs and parallel Angel series. I can't claim to remember everything that happened and still don't really understand what the whole Twilight business was (although I am still amused by how it put IDW in a spot) but I've enjoyed almost all of it.
The best issues and stories have focused on character over spectacle. There's been more of that in recent years, especially after the excesses of Season Eight proved unpopular. Although there was nothing wrong with flirting with massive Peter Jackson style fantasy battles, the character work did suffer and the death of Giles especially was poorly handled. Thank goodness that was reversed and in an imaginative way. By season nine there was an evident realisation that just because you can draw something doesn't mean that you should.
This final four issue arc is a proper summation, self reflexively tying up loose ends and pieces of character business which have been knocking around since the television series. The future as mapped on the previous occasion when Buffy visited the future and met Frey never did quite sit right and so its gratifying that all of that has changed and since this is a reality in which magic trumps science, we're able to forgive the obvious paradoxes which occur. Time can be rewritten if a spell exists to help sustain it.
Will a continuation ever exist? Apparently the new television series is set within the mythology of the tv series so we'll see if that also includes the comics although that's unlikely. New licensees BOOM! Studios have taken the bizarre/interesting step of rebooting the original Buffy series but set in the new century, accounting for the smart phone on the artwork which, even if Joss is involved, seems like its going to be as divisive as DC's New 52 not least because cans of worms will be opened. Does Dawn exist? Is Willow gay? It feels rather in-essential.
But I do love were these characters are left at the end and wished that a Season Thirteen was going to happen. Buffy and Faith as a supernatural Cagney and Lacey. Andrew as the next generation of the Watcher's Council. Xander and Dawn making a home together. Angel and Spike finally getting along, the former already plotting on how to save Illyria and Fred from hell. It's to the script's credit that it at least references Gunn and Connor and so offer something for Angel fans even if it can't find room to offer more than grace nots to the sister series. But it's also noticable that it doesn't attempt to shoehorn in the likes of Cordelia or Anya. They're finally letting the dead rest.
Bye bye for now, Buffy.
Clea Duvall on the Invisible Girl.
Film Here's a rare thing. In this week's Random Roles at The AV Club, Clea Duvall talks about her guest appearance on Buffy: The Vampire Slayer:
"It was pretty early in my career. I’m almost positive we shot it before it had aired. Or maybe I just didn’t know they were doing that show, and when my agent told me I had an audition for it, I was like, “They’re making a TV show of Buffy The Vampire Slayer? That’s insane.” Then I went on to also become obsessed with the show, because it’s so good. But I was pretty new, and I was really young. I think I was maybe 18 or 19 when we shot it. I was nervous and very shy, but really related to that character so much because I am a shy person. I am an introvert. I was so taken with the sensitivity and the emotion in that role. When I first heard the idea they were making a show about Buffy The Vampire Slayer, I thought it was insane and then read that script and was impressed, and it’s something I’m happy I was a part of."The whole of the first season of Buffy was indeed filmed before it aired, the studio and channel were that confident about its success. The full story is in the utterly brilliant in place (illegibly wonkish in others) Season Finale: The Unexpected Rise and Fall of the WB and UPN which I reviewed here [via].
We Need To Talk About Joss Whedon.
Film Yes we do. Hey Joss. Thanks Joss. Somehow in the midst of everything you still managed to create in MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron something which is comprehensively, comprehendingly and colossally a Joss Whedon film, tonally and philosophically different to the other films in the MCU franchise and with all the Whedoneque stuff which permeates all of your work. Not that you're reading this, but thanks all the same. It's just the pick me up I needed. Now for the rest of you here's a big long list of discussion points which is full of spoilers so should be avoided if you haven't seen MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron yet.
(1) There is no end of credits sequence. There's a bit after what would have been the opening credits sequence in the olden days which now seems to be slapped on the end of films now with the actors names and so forth but no, as Joss and Kevin have widely publicised in interviews there is no Shawarma II. Not that this didn't stop the twelve of us in screen one at FACT's Picturehouse this morning sitting all of the way through the credits anyway. Just in case.
(2) Can we stop with the creating of so many brilliant characters who we know will and can only have a limited amount of screen time? Elisabeth Olson's Scarlet Witch is magnificent creation and although she'll apparently be turning up in Captain America: Civil War (along with pretty much everyone left on Earth at the end of The Avengers) at close, as with Black Widow as with Hawkeye as with the Ruffalo Hulk, you really, really want to see them in their own film. Or television series. Or whatever.
(3) Something the film does especially well is in foregrounding the characters who don't have their own film franchises without really short changing those who do. In the first film, Joss and the gang quite rightly put their stall in the excitement of seeing Iron Man, Thor and Cap in the same film together. That's especially true of Jeremy Renner whose distaste for how he was used in the first film actually becomes a plot point in the second. Giving him a wife and family grounds him and also makes him the heart and humanity of the team putting him in line with Xander or Cordelia. Plus there's the appearance of Julie Delpy (goodness) in what's essentially a version of Jeanne Moreau's character in Luc Besson's Nikita during Romanov's dream/backstory.
(4) Rolling Stone has a good interview with Joss about making MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron where he eludes to a slightly manic editing process. I think you can tell. It is a film in which potentially useful character moments and exposition aren't there. Apparently the original cut was about three hours and it's not so much that anything is underdeveloped but some of the pacing is all over the place. Just every now and then I wished it would stop so we could see more of something (see (2) above).
(5) Isn't it roughly the same plot as Buffy's Once More With Feeling? Which I'm about to spoil? At the end of Once More With Feeling it becomes apparent that all the singing and dancing and death and the emergence of Sweet is as a result of Xander dabbling in magic. As he says, "I didn't know what was going to happen. I thought there would be dances and songs. Just wanted to make sure we'd work out, get a happy ending." In MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Stark and Banner meddle with science which results in action and death and the emergence of Ultron for similar reasons. They too don't really know what's going to happen. In both cases the super teams are actually spending most of the story clearing up a mess made by one of their own number.
(6) If there's a problem, and this has nothing to do with MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron, it's that it doesn't especially change any games in the same way as MARVEL's Captain America: The Winter Soldier or MARVEL's The Guardians of the Galaxy or indeed the first film. Although the destruction of the Hydra base may have some effect on Agents of SHIELD (is Henry Goodman's Dr List dead now?) there's a business as usual feel to the thing. Of course, it's amazing business and it is important to pace yourself. But we're being wowed in the Iron Man 3 or Thor: The Dark World sense of the word.
(7) For all Joss has said about the film being complete in and of itself, it does still quite rightly feel like a middle film and also an "episode". Plenty of the story is as a result of the first film and there's a lot of 'splaining ready for Infinity War and also foreshadowing for future other installments of the franchise, not least the fractures in Rogers and Stark's relationship and that slightly odd moment in the middle when Thor buggers off and picks up Selvig so he can go and stand in a magical cave pool. There's a lot of trust put in the audience here that we understand the language of these MCU films now, the interconnectedness and that we're willing to going along with these narrative detours.
(8) What happens after 2019? It's a bit soon of course, but pretty much everything in all of these films since 2008 is leading up towards Thanos presumably visiting Earth with that glove (probably chased by The Guardians of the Galaxy for measure). My guess is that MARVEL's hedging. It knows that every genre has a cycle and that however much money these films are making now fatigue will set in, especially with so many, what could be deemed, third string characters in the Third Wave. In that case the Infinite War films could become the massive finale wrap up for the franchise as is if need be. They'll certainly presumably be the last of The Avengers films although ...
(9) Anyone know why the film has two composers? Brian Tyler's score has been augmented by Danny Elfman or vis versa. Was Elfman's contribution it just to rework Silvestri's The Avengers theme?
(10) Did anyone else with a like mind think of Doctor Who's The Sontaran Stratagem when SHIELD's Helicarrier put in its appearance?
(1) There is no end of credits sequence. There's a bit after what would have been the opening credits sequence in the olden days which now seems to be slapped on the end of films now with the actors names and so forth but no, as Joss and Kevin have widely publicised in interviews there is no Shawarma II. Not that this didn't stop the twelve of us in screen one at FACT's Picturehouse this morning sitting all of the way through the credits anyway. Just in case.
(2) Can we stop with the creating of so many brilliant characters who we know will and can only have a limited amount of screen time? Elisabeth Olson's Scarlet Witch is magnificent creation and although she'll apparently be turning up in Captain America: Civil War (along with pretty much everyone left on Earth at the end of The Avengers) at close, as with Black Widow as with Hawkeye as with the Ruffalo Hulk, you really, really want to see them in their own film. Or television series. Or whatever.
(3) Something the film does especially well is in foregrounding the characters who don't have their own film franchises without really short changing those who do. In the first film, Joss and the gang quite rightly put their stall in the excitement of seeing Iron Man, Thor and Cap in the same film together. That's especially true of Jeremy Renner whose distaste for how he was used in the first film actually becomes a plot point in the second. Giving him a wife and family grounds him and also makes him the heart and humanity of the team putting him in line with Xander or Cordelia. Plus there's the appearance of Julie Delpy (goodness) in what's essentially a version of Jeanne Moreau's character in Luc Besson's Nikita during Romanov's dream/backstory.
(4) Rolling Stone has a good interview with Joss about making MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron where he eludes to a slightly manic editing process. I think you can tell. It is a film in which potentially useful character moments and exposition aren't there. Apparently the original cut was about three hours and it's not so much that anything is underdeveloped but some of the pacing is all over the place. Just every now and then I wished it would stop so we could see more of something (see (2) above).
(5) Isn't it roughly the same plot as Buffy's Once More With Feeling? Which I'm about to spoil? At the end of Once More With Feeling it becomes apparent that all the singing and dancing and death and the emergence of Sweet is as a result of Xander dabbling in magic. As he says, "I didn't know what was going to happen. I thought there would be dances and songs. Just wanted to make sure we'd work out, get a happy ending." In MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Stark and Banner meddle with science which results in action and death and the emergence of Ultron for similar reasons. They too don't really know what's going to happen. In both cases the super teams are actually spending most of the story clearing up a mess made by one of their own number.
(6) If there's a problem, and this has nothing to do with MARVEL's The Avengers: Age of Ultron, it's that it doesn't especially change any games in the same way as MARVEL's Captain America: The Winter Soldier or MARVEL's The Guardians of the Galaxy or indeed the first film. Although the destruction of the Hydra base may have some effect on Agents of SHIELD (is Henry Goodman's Dr List dead now?) there's a business as usual feel to the thing. Of course, it's amazing business and it is important to pace yourself. But we're being wowed in the Iron Man 3 or Thor: The Dark World sense of the word.
(7) For all Joss has said about the film being complete in and of itself, it does still quite rightly feel like a middle film and also an "episode". Plenty of the story is as a result of the first film and there's a lot of 'splaining ready for Infinity War and also foreshadowing for future other installments of the franchise, not least the fractures in Rogers and Stark's relationship and that slightly odd moment in the middle when Thor buggers off and picks up Selvig so he can go and stand in a magical cave pool. There's a lot of trust put in the audience here that we understand the language of these MCU films now, the interconnectedness and that we're willing to going along with these narrative detours.
(8) What happens after 2019? It's a bit soon of course, but pretty much everything in all of these films since 2008 is leading up towards Thanos presumably visiting Earth with that glove (probably chased by The Guardians of the Galaxy for measure). My guess is that MARVEL's hedging. It knows that every genre has a cycle and that however much money these films are making now fatigue will set in, especially with so many, what could be deemed, third string characters in the Third Wave. In that case the Infinite War films could become the massive finale wrap up for the franchise as is if need be. They'll certainly presumably be the last of The Avengers films although ...
(9) Anyone know why the film has two composers? Brian Tyler's score has been augmented by Danny Elfman or vis versa. Was Elfman's contribution it just to rework Silvestri's The Avengers theme?
(10) Did anyone else with a like mind think of Doctor Who's The Sontaran Stratagem when SHIELD's Helicarrier put in its appearance?
Right then, Carol Danvers.
Final marvel release lineup #MarvelEvent pic.twitter.com/ddI2Igonhy
— Peter Sciretta (@slashfilm) October 28, 2014
Film While I was eating hoops on toast and watching North West Tonight, entirely unaware that MARVEL was having press conference, MARVEL had a press conference in which they announced what was going to be released at the cinema in the years leading up to my mid-forties. The line-up pretty much speaks for itself and confirms what I thought back when Guardians was a hit. That we're now in a place where MARVEL's three releases for 2017 are a Guardian's sequel, Black Panther and a Thor film and they're entirely confident that all three.
When DC published their list, which must surely have been one of the things which prompted MARVEL to make their plans clearer, the reaction at least from what I saw was fairly muted to vaguely bored. To an extent they're taking the greater risk, Man of Steel made a shed load, but it isn't universally liked (I hated it and I love Superman) and assuming people will turn out for a raft of films set in that version of the DCU seemed a tad arrogant. It all depends how well the first JLA film in 2016 does. Yes, in 2016. MARVEL has two whole films out before then.
What people did seem interested in was how MARVEL would react. Now we know and it's very, very exciting even if I'm going to be forty-five by the time the second half of the third Avengers film is released. The order is interesting though. Considering it's supposed to be their screen substitute for not having the X-Men, Inhumans seems late in 2018. Unless it's a placeholder in case something happens with the mutant rights. There's also the question of what happens at Sony with Spiderman or indeed FOX with the Fantastic Four. They seem to think they'll have two films at least out for them. Bless.
The lack of Black Widow is disappointing, but it's also worth noting the lack of Hulk or Hawkeye. There has to be some narrative reason for this. Hopefully, she's not going to be Jossed in Avengers 2, she'll survive and thread through the other films on the slate. It'd be fitting if she turns up in Thor for example, having turned up in the other two Avengers related trilogies, but there's nothing to say she won't cameo in the Netflix series, especially Daredevil or on SHIELD (which probably needs the lift). All depends on Scarlett Johansson's availability and fees.
The placement of the Captain Marvel film is evocative. If the third Avengers film, with that title, ends on a cliffhanger, how will Captain Marvel fit into the scheme of it? Speaking of which who'll play her? Established actress or newcomer? Not having read anything Carol Danvers since her echo was inside Rogue's head, I haven't the first clue who would fit. A quick search on the Twitters suggests Yvonne Strahovski or Alice Eve or Gwendoline Christie. Margot Robbie? Rosamund Pike? Pity Romola Garai's going to be busy with Doctor Who.
Phase Four? What'll I be watching into my fifties? Guardians 3 presumably. A sequel to at least one of these films. After Infinity Wars, Avengers could be retired in favour of something else. I'd assumed a Civil War trilogy, but that's not happening now. Secret Wars trilogy. First film scoops everyone up and plonks them on Beyonder's world. Second film has Beyonder come to Earth. Good god, I'm going to be in my mid-fifties by then. Crumbs. This is like watching the Pertwee era and knowing there'll be another three or four Doctors coming soon.
We Need To Talk About Peter Quill.
Film If you've seen MARVEL's Guardians of the Galaxy already you'll know that it ranks with Inception, Gravity and Boyhood as one of the greatest film exploits of all time, one of those epoch changing moments in cinema which can do nothing but inspire awe. Much of this has to do with both the film itself which is as spectacular a space adventure as we could hope it might be based on the trailers, but also the effect it potentially has on the film business and the nature of the blockbuster. If MARVEL's Captain America: The First Avenger was innovative in how it extemporised the narrative synergy between film and television, MARVEL's Guardians of the Galaxy has the potential to change everything.
Such hyperbole probably need some explanation and in short order, here it is. MARVEL is the shit.
Guardians made over $90m in its opening weekend in the US. It's beaten by Transformers: Age of Extinction so far in annual totals but its the second biggest opening of the year and looks to have a huge second weekend. But, whisper it, this was never a sure thing. Transformers was a sure thing because even people who hate what Bay's done to the characters will have gone and it has a wide popular appeal with children. Plus its the fourth installment in a franchise which has been massive despite the variable quality of the product. Transformers was a sure thing. Transformers was always going to be a massive opening. People will go and see Transformers.
Guardians was not like this. The trailers were excellent as was the poster marketing. Arguably it had the best marketing campaign since all of the films listed above. But it was never a sure thing. Even up to a few weeks ago I was seeing online commentary, professional and amateur which talked about it being a risk. No one was sure. This Forbes article tries to have it both ways. Nothing about the film made sense in relation to what people know about the film business. Only one of the main characters is human, and two of the others are a digitally animated talking racoon and a tree. The trailers betrayed a certain offbeat humour more akin to the cultiness of Firefly/Serenity, which have only really found an audience amongst the kind of people who like that kind of this.
Essentially it's asking the audience to accept the stuff they like about PiXAR films in a "real world" setting, in the middle of space, amongst giant alien empires filled with masses of preprepared mythology. Star Wars and Lord of the Rings accepted, these are not the sort of things popular audiences like. John Carter (of Mars) is a prime example of this kind of film, and although it's not quite as good as Guardians, it's still better than Transbloodyformers. The storylines aren't dissimilar either in some respects and toally they're not that different either. But a nervy ad campaign meant people didn't come even though that was also made by Disney. If people didn't come to that why would they to this?
People came. Boy did people come. Look at them on the Twitters talking about this being the new Star Wars, even suggesting JJ's wasting his time because whatever he's doing can't be as good as this (which would make the Star Wars studio pretty nervous if it wasn't for the fact that it's the same studio). It helps that the film itself is akin to the new Star Wars capturing quite a bit of the same humour and wonder of the original trilogy which the prequels sumerilly failed to offer. It's funny, poignant, has some jaw-dropping visual moments and more importantly you forget the racoon and tree are being animated only now and then marvelling at just how accurate Rocket's fir is.
And in coming, they disproved the expectations of what we'll call the mass audience are tolerant of. The humour in this is offbeat and like I said the trailers told the audience that it was offbeat. But they came and they came some more and social media suggested their friends come too. Right up until I went yesterday, people I wouldn't imagine in a hundred years would see Guardians signalled their intention to go and afterwards tweeted how awesome it was in some way or other. Having seen it myself I still can't quite believe this has happened. This is a cult film. It has all the elements of a cult film. It's practically a remake of Space Truckers. Yet there we are. Over $90m opening weekend.
Now the previous MARVEL films will have something to do with this, what with MARVEL being a PIXAR like brand now. But Captain America and Guardians are such different films you can't imagine there would be much crossover. Tonally, Guardians is effectively a Troma film (as it would be given the career origins of the director) on a massive budget. It's the kind of film which you'd find unheralded at Blockbuster in the mid-90s with c-list actors including Stephen Dorff directed by an auteur whose next film is The Incredible Ice Cream Suit but which more than lives up to your low expectations and which you know must have looked even better in widescreen before the studio panned and scanned the thing on the cheap. Actually, no, that is Space Truckers. $90m.
Amazing. Game changing.
It's game changing for a number of reasons.
Not too long ago one of the blogs I read joked when seeing the plans DC has for their characters in cinema that MARVEL should just make a Squirrel Girl film to rub their faces in it, which was became even funnier when it emerged that MARVEL had copyrighted the character meaning that she's likely to turn up in film or on television in some capacity. But the point is whereas before Guardians no one would think it possible that a character whose main power is the control of squirrels, who has cameoed in a Fantastic Four cartoon as a visual joke to demonstrate how low down the pecking order their recruitment process for a team replacement had sunk now looks like a sure bet.
Even Ant-Man looks like it could be a sure thing at this point even though in no way should they even be making it. But Guardians gives them the flexibility to and make it another massive release. Apparently yet more screenwriters are taking a pass at it, which is what happens when you have to replace your director. If anything even at this point Ant-Man looks like about as appetising as the failed Gen 13 pilot with Alicia Witt but even turned out to be pretty good. All Ant-Man needs to be now is pretty good and it'll open huge or at least huge enough for the whole thing not to have seemed like the massive waste of time it currently looks like. Edgar Wright might even agree to direct the sequel, though probably not.
Right now, Disney's MARVEL could pluck any of the characters they have the rights to and turn it into a film and people will go. They're still being cautious and they have every right to be. They're not greenlighting projects left right and centre even though Black Widow has to be on the cards now, especially when you add in Lucy's opening weekend. The trailer for Lucy ran before Guardians at FACT yesterday and as much as I enjoyed it and can't wait to see it, there's not one moment when I didn't wish it was a trailer for Black Widow. Never mind Squirrel Girl, MARVEL at this point could probably make a Captain Barracuda film work and he's a pirate. Obviously.
As a sidebar, Kevin Feige is still prevaricating on the point, but Guardians's screenwriter says on Twitter that she worked on a treatment in 2010/2011 for a film, the kind of statement someone only makes on the Twitters if they've been given the go ahead from someone to make that kind of statement even if she says that its not in active development, like a governmental leak designed to sound out some new policy. At 80 odd retweets and fifty-five favourites its not exactly gone viral, but the news sites picked up on it, and you can imagine someone at MARVEL development is watching the reaction. My guess is they're waiting for Captain America to have its threequel before offering Black Widow up as a replacement.
Sorry, second indulgence, but that's my theory about what MARVEL's doing here. They're not thinking about the market in terms of characters but tones. Now that Iron Man 3's shuffled through they're launching Ant-Man another film about a technoscientist. Black Widow or even Hawkeye won't be launched until Cap is done because it would be strange to have another SHIELD agent based film series on the go. I'm not sure what will happen after Thor, although you could argue the Doctor Strange film carries on the fantasy/horror element. Guardians truly is offering a different genre to all of them. But don't be surprised if in ten years when that's done, and after Fantastic Four tanks and they reintegrate the rights that we'll get Silver Surfer.
Anyway, they're sticking to two or three films a year which is a shame but probably all they can usefully produce without the quality dipping. When the MCU was originally announced I remember one thought being that there would be a series of prestige films based on the bigger characters then smaller budget projects for the c-listers. Arguably these smaller budget projects have migrated to television. But think on that. Agent Carter and the Daredevil series exist in the same universe as Guardians and Thor, which they do in the comics of course, but this is unprecedented in film and television. But I've already covered that at some length elsewhere, so let's not do that again.
Because audiences turned up for Guardians, it means that studio expectations, notably at MARVEL but also elsewhere should widen, hopefully widen, and they'll take more risks with the kind of films they'll produce and the projects which look slightly offbeat may well get greenlit now [see this io9 piece]. My hope has been that MARVEL in particular will range out into other genres but set in the MARVEL universe and there's been some of that on television in the Netflix deal but I'd love to see a cop drama or rom com set in the MCU for the big screen. I expect the question they'd ask is exactly why they would but if nothing else Guardians proves that a MARVEL film doesn't have to have superheroes in it in the traditional sense, even aliens, to be successful.
But what does that mean for the other studios? Given their idiotic decision to not fall in with MARVEL and attempt to construct their own cinematic universes around the characters they have (though I still wonder if Disney and Sony attempted a proper deal over Spider-man which fell through) Guardians will either have a positive effect on them or it won't. It depends on the percentage of the audience who went because it was the next installment of the films set in the MCU or simply with the MARVEL logo on the front. That I simply don't know.
The other game change is in how DC reacts. Up until this point they've been pottering along knowing that MARVEL's doing well but straight on with their plans. But Guardians has to have given them pause not least because of comments like this found on Youtube under a copy of the trailer for Guardians:
Yes, exactly. Superman and Batman are top draw characters which is why DC are so desperate to make films about them even though there have already been plenty of films about them and now MARVEL have come along and turned the equivalent of their Legion of Superheroes into a film and made it one of the most successful films of all time. This shouldn't happen. If DC are pinning their hopes on the same-olds it certainly wasn't even on their radar. After writing that sentence, now I would be more excited to see a Legion of Superheroes film that Batman again even starring Ben Affleck.
But no one is excited about Superman v Batman that I can see. Despite the release of the various images at Comic Con and the teaser footage with the glowy eyes and some ensuing excitement, I simply don't see the same level of excitement about that film than for pretty much every MCU release. Everyone has something to say about everything, but people are already talking about Guardians 2 and what might happen in Guardians 2 in ways which I simply don't see with SvB or whatever it's called this week amongst the non-geeks, or should I say the people who would identify as geeks in the old usage. That's a problem for DC and its unsolvable.
The other problem DC has is that its only making one film for release in 2016 [correction: actually two see below]. MARVEL will have at least four or five films out in the meantime not including the other version of MARVEL from the other studios. Which will either mean that audiences are sick of superheroes anyway by 2016 and will simply shrug in the face of Kal-El and Bruce or the intervening films are so awesome they'll still shrug and wonder why they should care. As Man of Steel shows, they will make money, but purely from a business perspective, taking into account the television series, in film terms they're sitting on a whole universe full of characters and still doing nothing with them. HAHAHAHAHAHA.
Updated 07/08/2014 No sooner had I posted this and gone to bed had it been announced that DC have effectively blinked and moved Batman v Superman from its original release day of the 25th March 2016 opposite the third Captain America film to late March. Deadline also reports they've offered up release dates for a raft of projects through 2020, none of which have titles yet but which exists to show that they aren't sitting on these characters and they do have some ideas.
Neither Variety or Deadline make the connection but I find it inconceivable that this announcement which has come under a week after the release of Guardians has nothing to do with Guardians. The release dates will already have been decided but the fact of their announcement has to be connected, doesn't it? Either way, in just ten years we've come to the point were DC actively believe a Captain America threequel would beat a film starring Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman at the box office. MARVEL is the shit.
Such hyperbole probably need some explanation and in short order, here it is. MARVEL is the shit.
Guardians made over $90m in its opening weekend in the US. It's beaten by Transformers: Age of Extinction so far in annual totals but its the second biggest opening of the year and looks to have a huge second weekend. But, whisper it, this was never a sure thing. Transformers was a sure thing because even people who hate what Bay's done to the characters will have gone and it has a wide popular appeal with children. Plus its the fourth installment in a franchise which has been massive despite the variable quality of the product. Transformers was a sure thing. Transformers was always going to be a massive opening. People will go and see Transformers.
Guardians was not like this. The trailers were excellent as was the poster marketing. Arguably it had the best marketing campaign since all of the films listed above. But it was never a sure thing. Even up to a few weeks ago I was seeing online commentary, professional and amateur which talked about it being a risk. No one was sure. This Forbes article tries to have it both ways. Nothing about the film made sense in relation to what people know about the film business. Only one of the main characters is human, and two of the others are a digitally animated talking racoon and a tree. The trailers betrayed a certain offbeat humour more akin to the cultiness of Firefly/Serenity, which have only really found an audience amongst the kind of people who like that kind of this.
Essentially it's asking the audience to accept the stuff they like about PiXAR films in a "real world" setting, in the middle of space, amongst giant alien empires filled with masses of preprepared mythology. Star Wars and Lord of the Rings accepted, these are not the sort of things popular audiences like. John Carter (of Mars) is a prime example of this kind of film, and although it's not quite as good as Guardians, it's still better than Transbloodyformers. The storylines aren't dissimilar either in some respects and toally they're not that different either. But a nervy ad campaign meant people didn't come even though that was also made by Disney. If people didn't come to that why would they to this?
People came. Boy did people come. Look at them on the Twitters talking about this being the new Star Wars, even suggesting JJ's wasting his time because whatever he's doing can't be as good as this (which would make the Star Wars studio pretty nervous if it wasn't for the fact that it's the same studio). It helps that the film itself is akin to the new Star Wars capturing quite a bit of the same humour and wonder of the original trilogy which the prequels sumerilly failed to offer. It's funny, poignant, has some jaw-dropping visual moments and more importantly you forget the racoon and tree are being animated only now and then marvelling at just how accurate Rocket's fir is.
And in coming, they disproved the expectations of what we'll call the mass audience are tolerant of. The humour in this is offbeat and like I said the trailers told the audience that it was offbeat. But they came and they came some more and social media suggested their friends come too. Right up until I went yesterday, people I wouldn't imagine in a hundred years would see Guardians signalled their intention to go and afterwards tweeted how awesome it was in some way or other. Having seen it myself I still can't quite believe this has happened. This is a cult film. It has all the elements of a cult film. It's practically a remake of Space Truckers. Yet there we are. Over $90m opening weekend.
Now the previous MARVEL films will have something to do with this, what with MARVEL being a PIXAR like brand now. But Captain America and Guardians are such different films you can't imagine there would be much crossover. Tonally, Guardians is effectively a Troma film (as it would be given the career origins of the director) on a massive budget. It's the kind of film which you'd find unheralded at Blockbuster in the mid-90s with c-list actors including Stephen Dorff directed by an auteur whose next film is The Incredible Ice Cream Suit but which more than lives up to your low expectations and which you know must have looked even better in widescreen before the studio panned and scanned the thing on the cheap. Actually, no, that is Space Truckers. $90m.
Amazing. Game changing.
It's game changing for a number of reasons.
Not too long ago one of the blogs I read joked when seeing the plans DC has for their characters in cinema that MARVEL should just make a Squirrel Girl film to rub their faces in it, which was became even funnier when it emerged that MARVEL had copyrighted the character meaning that she's likely to turn up in film or on television in some capacity. But the point is whereas before Guardians no one would think it possible that a character whose main power is the control of squirrels, who has cameoed in a Fantastic Four cartoon as a visual joke to demonstrate how low down the pecking order their recruitment process for a team replacement had sunk now looks like a sure bet.
Even Ant-Man looks like it could be a sure thing at this point even though in no way should they even be making it. But Guardians gives them the flexibility to and make it another massive release. Apparently yet more screenwriters are taking a pass at it, which is what happens when you have to replace your director. If anything even at this point Ant-Man looks like about as appetising as the failed Gen 13 pilot with Alicia Witt but even turned out to be pretty good. All Ant-Man needs to be now is pretty good and it'll open huge or at least huge enough for the whole thing not to have seemed like the massive waste of time it currently looks like. Edgar Wright might even agree to direct the sequel, though probably not.
Right now, Disney's MARVEL could pluck any of the characters they have the rights to and turn it into a film and people will go. They're still being cautious and they have every right to be. They're not greenlighting projects left right and centre even though Black Widow has to be on the cards now, especially when you add in Lucy's opening weekend. The trailer for Lucy ran before Guardians at FACT yesterday and as much as I enjoyed it and can't wait to see it, there's not one moment when I didn't wish it was a trailer for Black Widow. Never mind Squirrel Girl, MARVEL at this point could probably make a Captain Barracuda film work and he's a pirate. Obviously.
As a sidebar, Kevin Feige is still prevaricating on the point, but Guardians's screenwriter says on Twitter that she worked on a treatment in 2010/2011 for a film, the kind of statement someone only makes on the Twitters if they've been given the go ahead from someone to make that kind of statement even if she says that its not in active development, like a governmental leak designed to sound out some new policy. At 80 odd retweets and fifty-five favourites its not exactly gone viral, but the news sites picked up on it, and you can imagine someone at MARVEL development is watching the reaction. My guess is they're waiting for Captain America to have its threequel before offering Black Widow up as a replacement.
Sorry, second indulgence, but that's my theory about what MARVEL's doing here. They're not thinking about the market in terms of characters but tones. Now that Iron Man 3's shuffled through they're launching Ant-Man another film about a technoscientist. Black Widow or even Hawkeye won't be launched until Cap is done because it would be strange to have another SHIELD agent based film series on the go. I'm not sure what will happen after Thor, although you could argue the Doctor Strange film carries on the fantasy/horror element. Guardians truly is offering a different genre to all of them. But don't be surprised if in ten years when that's done, and after Fantastic Four tanks and they reintegrate the rights that we'll get Silver Surfer.
Anyway, they're sticking to two or three films a year which is a shame but probably all they can usefully produce without the quality dipping. When the MCU was originally announced I remember one thought being that there would be a series of prestige films based on the bigger characters then smaller budget projects for the c-listers. Arguably these smaller budget projects have migrated to television. But think on that. Agent Carter and the Daredevil series exist in the same universe as Guardians and Thor, which they do in the comics of course, but this is unprecedented in film and television. But I've already covered that at some length elsewhere, so let's not do that again.
Because audiences turned up for Guardians, it means that studio expectations, notably at MARVEL but also elsewhere should widen, hopefully widen, and they'll take more risks with the kind of films they'll produce and the projects which look slightly offbeat may well get greenlit now [see this io9 piece]. My hope has been that MARVEL in particular will range out into other genres but set in the MARVEL universe and there's been some of that on television in the Netflix deal but I'd love to see a cop drama or rom com set in the MCU for the big screen. I expect the question they'd ask is exactly why they would but if nothing else Guardians proves that a MARVEL film doesn't have to have superheroes in it in the traditional sense, even aliens, to be successful.
But what does that mean for the other studios? Given their idiotic decision to not fall in with MARVEL and attempt to construct their own cinematic universes around the characters they have (though I still wonder if Disney and Sony attempted a proper deal over Spider-man which fell through) Guardians will either have a positive effect on them or it won't. It depends on the percentage of the audience who went because it was the next installment of the films set in the MCU or simply with the MARVEL logo on the front. That I simply don't know.
The other game change is in how DC reacts. Up until this point they've been pottering along knowing that MARVEL's doing well but straight on with their plans. But Guardians has to have given them pause not least because of comments like this found on Youtube under a copy of the trailer for Guardians:
Yes, exactly. Superman and Batman are top draw characters which is why DC are so desperate to make films about them even though there have already been plenty of films about them and now MARVEL have come along and turned the equivalent of their Legion of Superheroes into a film and made it one of the most successful films of all time. This shouldn't happen. If DC are pinning their hopes on the same-olds it certainly wasn't even on their radar. After writing that sentence, now I would be more excited to see a Legion of Superheroes film that Batman again even starring Ben Affleck.
But no one is excited about Superman v Batman that I can see. Despite the release of the various images at Comic Con and the teaser footage with the glowy eyes and some ensuing excitement, I simply don't see the same level of excitement about that film than for pretty much every MCU release. Everyone has something to say about everything, but people are already talking about Guardians 2 and what might happen in Guardians 2 in ways which I simply don't see with SvB or whatever it's called this week amongst the non-geeks, or should I say the people who would identify as geeks in the old usage. That's a problem for DC and its unsolvable.
The other problem DC has is that its only making one film for release in 2016 [correction: actually two see below]. MARVEL will have at least four or five films out in the meantime not including the other version of MARVEL from the other studios. Which will either mean that audiences are sick of superheroes anyway by 2016 and will simply shrug in the face of Kal-El and Bruce or the intervening films are so awesome they'll still shrug and wonder why they should care. As Man of Steel shows, they will make money, but purely from a business perspective, taking into account the television series, in film terms they're sitting on a whole universe full of characters and still doing nothing with them. HAHAHAHAHAHA.
Updated 07/08/2014 No sooner had I posted this and gone to bed had it been announced that DC have effectively blinked and moved Batman v Superman from its original release day of the 25th March 2016 opposite the third Captain America film to late March. Deadline also reports they've offered up release dates for a raft of projects through 2020, none of which have titles yet but which exists to show that they aren't sitting on these characters and they do have some ideas.
Neither Variety or Deadline make the connection but I find it inconceivable that this announcement which has come under a week after the release of Guardians has nothing to do with Guardians. The release dates will already have been decided but the fact of their announcement has to be connected, doesn't it? Either way, in just ten years we've come to the point were DC actively believe a Captain America threequel would beat a film starring Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman at the box office. MARVEL is the shit.
Joss Whedon on Speed.
Film Joss hasn't talked about Speed much across the years. Here's probably about as definitive an interview as we'll get in the Huff Post. As you might expect, some of the best things about the film came from him:
What were some of the biggest changes you saw in reworking those other drafts that weren't great?Note on release dates. It might be 20 years old in the US, but it didn't turn up in the UK until October of that year. I know because it was the film I saw at the Lounge Cinema in Leeds on my 20th birthday [via].
The biggest change for me came for me came from Keanu. The whole "Pop quiz, hot shot," was not me. There was this idea of Jack as this cop on the edge, who plays by his own rules, you know, "He's a maverick! He's out of control!" Apart from “Die Hard,” which really made room for a thoughtful action hero, everybody had been that sort of thing. So, when we sat down with Keanu, Walter Parkes, Laurie MacDonald and Jan, I think, they said, “Keanu, these guys are not mavericks. They’re whole thing is diffusing the situation, and they’re unfailingly polite, and they always say sir or ma’am.” And I was like, “I know exactly what to do! That’s it, that’s the whole meeting, we’re there.”
The Torchwood Problem.
Film You will have seen the Latino Review piece about why Edgar Wright left Ant-Man. Go read it now, if you haven't.
Here's my random speculation. It's the Torchwood problem.
Edgar Wright & Joe Cornish are working on the film within the MARVEL Universe and with the aid of Kevin Feige, who's said that he's only still making the thing because of Wright.
The film is tonally of a piece with Wright's other work and because of the vision Feige has for the MARVEL Universe, that it should be able to encompass all kinds of genres and tones it's continued to be a go project.
Anomalous in relation to everything else because it began development before Iron Man, but like Guardians of the Galaxy, a way for MARVEL to say that they're willing to experiment happy that it'll attract a smaller audience.
Except, this is Disney. Disney who for all their experiments with Miramax and Touchstone, have their own particular vision for the kinds of films they want to make and they're at most PG-13. Is Ant Man R-rated?
Plus Captain America: The Winter Soldier happens in the meantime and now Disney expect all of MARVEL's films to have massive blockbuster openings.
In other words, Disney expect MARVEL to produce films which attract something in the region of Doctor Who's wide demographic, Wright was offering them Torchwood and while the BBC are quite happy to be in that business, Disney isn't.
So essentially some higher-up, a Disney exec, overrules Feige (though it's also possible there's a contractual mandate), says they want something called Ant Man to be skew younger than Wright and Cornish's script and be more connected to the other MARVEL universe films and with greater scale.
A rewrite is ordered.
Wright keeps faith because he's been on the thing for over a decade and perhaps there's the promise that if it doesn't work out, they'll revert to the script which was the reason for the given cast and start dates and everything that's already been announced.
Script comes back and it's terrible, or at least it's not what Wright had signed up on to make which is something of mature quality, whereas this is family friendly. But if he wants to stay on the project, he's stuck with it.
So he can either walk or spend the next two years working on something in which he's essentially become a director for hire on a project he initiated.
He walks and probably good for him.
Two things. At least.
(1) The general sense until now has been that like Who in the Davies era, the MCU was being designed to encompass a range of different types of programmes and films for different audiences. Could we indeed be seeing the first signs of Disney now wanting to increase the homogeneity? That might explain why the Black Widow film suddenly seems like a shaky proposition. To be done properly it has to be R-rated.
(2) Joss's still perplexing tweet and now James Gunn's obviscating statement. If, as it seems, he's showing solidarity for Wright, what are the implications? That the directors within this verse are starting to feel even less in control of their own projects?
In other news, Drew Goddard's walked from the Netflix Daredevil. Again, this could be a Torchwood problem, but it could equally just be his commitment to the Sinister Six. Whedon alumni Steven S. DeKnight has taken over and the transition seems pretty clean. As Jeffrey Stepakoff's memoir, Billion Dollar Kiss: The Kiss That Saved Dawson’s Creek and Other Adventures in TV Writing describes, shows change showrunners all the time for different reasons but if this is also due to some Disney exec muscling in on MARVEL's model and like the WB way back when attempting to micro-manage go projects so they fit a particular tone then battlelines are going to be drawn and there will be casualties.
Here's my random speculation. It's the Torchwood problem.
Edgar Wright & Joe Cornish are working on the film within the MARVEL Universe and with the aid of Kevin Feige, who's said that he's only still making the thing because of Wright.
The film is tonally of a piece with Wright's other work and because of the vision Feige has for the MARVEL Universe, that it should be able to encompass all kinds of genres and tones it's continued to be a go project.
Anomalous in relation to everything else because it began development before Iron Man, but like Guardians of the Galaxy, a way for MARVEL to say that they're willing to experiment happy that it'll attract a smaller audience.
Except, this is Disney. Disney who for all their experiments with Miramax and Touchstone, have their own particular vision for the kinds of films they want to make and they're at most PG-13. Is Ant Man R-rated?
Plus Captain America: The Winter Soldier happens in the meantime and now Disney expect all of MARVEL's films to have massive blockbuster openings.
In other words, Disney expect MARVEL to produce films which attract something in the region of Doctor Who's wide demographic, Wright was offering them Torchwood and while the BBC are quite happy to be in that business, Disney isn't.
So essentially some higher-up, a Disney exec, overrules Feige (though it's also possible there's a contractual mandate), says they want something called Ant Man to be skew younger than Wright and Cornish's script and be more connected to the other MARVEL universe films and with greater scale.
A rewrite is ordered.
Wright keeps faith because he's been on the thing for over a decade and perhaps there's the promise that if it doesn't work out, they'll revert to the script which was the reason for the given cast and start dates and everything that's already been announced.
Script comes back and it's terrible, or at least it's not what Wright had signed up on to make which is something of mature quality, whereas this is family friendly. But if he wants to stay on the project, he's stuck with it.
So he can either walk or spend the next two years working on something in which he's essentially become a director for hire on a project he initiated.
He walks and probably good for him.
Two things. At least.
(1) The general sense until now has been that like Who in the Davies era, the MCU was being designed to encompass a range of different types of programmes and films for different audiences. Could we indeed be seeing the first signs of Disney now wanting to increase the homogeneity? That might explain why the Black Widow film suddenly seems like a shaky proposition. To be done properly it has to be R-rated.
(2) Joss's still perplexing tweet and now James Gunn's obviscating statement. If, as it seems, he's showing solidarity for Wright, what are the implications? That the directors within this verse are starting to feel even less in control of their own projects?
In other news, Drew Goddard's walked from the Netflix Daredevil. Again, this could be a Torchwood problem, but it could equally just be his commitment to the Sinister Six. Whedon alumni Steven S. DeKnight has taken over and the transition seems pretty clean. As Jeffrey Stepakoff's memoir, Billion Dollar Kiss: The Kiss That Saved Dawson’s Creek and Other Adventures in TV Writing describes, shows change showrunners all the time for different reasons but if this is also due to some Disney exec muscling in on MARVEL's model and like the WB way back when attempting to micro-manage go projects so they fit a particular tone then battlelines are going to be drawn and there will be casualties.
Cornetto.
Film I really have to go to work now, but what does one make of this?
Is Edgar Wright back? Is Joss showing solidarity for a fellow director in the MARVEL machine and does that mean that none of them really have any control? Could Joss put his foot down? It's classic Joss really, though of course you can't really disregard the possibility that it's part of MARVEL's process of keeping the fans on side.
pic.twitter.com/2vpeRIZNWH
— Joss Whedon (@josswhedon) May 24, 2014
Is Edgar Wright back? Is Joss showing solidarity for a fellow director in the MARVEL machine and does that mean that none of them really have any control? Could Joss put his foot down? It's classic Joss really, though of course you can't really disregard the possibility that it's part of MARVEL's process of keeping the fans on side.
Agent Carter continues.
TV Well this is excellent news and demonstrates just how complex and multi-platform MARVEL really want to go with the the cinematic universe. As well as renewing Agents of SHIELD, which is a thing in and of itself given the uptick in quality since it's found something to do with itself, ABC have ordered a series of Agent Carter starring Doctor Who's Hayley Atwell which will apparently be run in the SHIELD slot in the US somehow so that there won't be as many repeats or some such with the two series feeding off one another storywise.
Quite how Channel 4 will deal with this, assuming they bother to purchase the rights, is anyone's guess, unless the two are sold as a package to be transmitted in a block. Plus you might wonder as someone at Whedonesque does, if in fact we'll get thirteen SHIELDs and thirteen CARTERs, sorry Carters which would seem like a good move. One of the problems with SHIELD has been that it feels like a thirteen episode type series stretched out to twice its length, perhaps because of the need to play time and weave between the three cinema films.
Since we're on this, I did consider the other day how journalists have tended to think of the various MARVEL phases in terms of The Avengers films and how they'll be sustained once the first wave of heroes reach the end of their trilogies. What they've not considered is the possibility that The Avengers itself will only have three films and beyond that MARVEL will move on to some other way of sustaining the momentum like a clearer crossover-type event that allows for any number of characters without a particular affiliation to appear.
Imagine perhaps three tentpole Secret Wars, Civil War or Secret Invasion films that feed into and out of films about other newly introduced characters or the "old guard" that haven't yet been given a name in the title like Black Widow, Falcon or Hawkeye. Or some of The Avengers appear in some capacity, or characters which might not be able sustain a whole film given cameos. Or from tv, Daredevil or the SHIELD agents. Instead of a superteam, we're branching out into a hyperlink drama, ensemble film or disaster movies set in the MARVEL universe.
In Your Eyes. The future of film?
In Your Eyes from Bellwether Pictures on Vimeo.
Film Find above an embed for the In Your Eyes which as you can see was written and executive produced by Joss Whedon and directed by Brin Hill. I'll talk some more about it in the proper time and place, but will offer the spoiler that it's easily in my top five films of the years so far. Which does rather mean I have to have a top five now. Um, in no particular order then:
In Your Eyes
Captain America: Winter Soldier
Safety Not Guaranteed
Stories We Tell
The Broken Circle Breakdown
Maybe? Dunno. Given the fact that I've only been to the cinema once this year and I'm not sure what "counts" I expect that's it. Oh well anyway, the point is that given the variety of films I have seen so far, this is the little one that could and does a lot.
It's was also another one of those surprise releases which are becoming common amongst artists with a following. Though I'd been following its production somewhat on Whedonesque, I had little idea that it was going to be released this weekend and mores to the point that I'd be able to watch it on the release date.
The process was astonishingly simple. Visited the Vimeo website, paid via Paypal, the film was added to my "Watch Later" list then streamed it through Vimeo's app on my Roku 3 box. This service is available worldwide. No messing about with timezones, no worry about region coding, none of that. Just sent them the $5/£3.06 and there it was in HD.
Of course without an app in a streaming device and enough bandwidth (eg) me at this point last year, the whole thing would have been impossible and I would have been willing for a dvd release to come soon. But nevertheless, the ease of this process makes this feel like another paradigm shift, especially since this hasn't seen a cinema yet.
Will it see a cinema? Dunno. The point I suppose it whether it needs to. Like A Field In England and the various Soderbergh experiments before it, we're in the experimental territory what constitutes a film's release. Unlike those, this is just a pay-per-view release but with the ability to embed the thing, to share its existence, it feels different.
We Need To Talk About Steve Rogers.
Film Or more accurately I do. I was going to wait until the weekend, but the whole thing is still fresh in my mind's eye. So if you are planning on watching Captain America: The Winter Soldier at any time in your life and frankly why wouldn't you, it's a very strong entry in an epic superhero franchise, then stay away. I'll even put a Scarlett Johannson song, or Scarlett Johansson singing a cover version of a Tom Waits song in between this and the next block of text so your eyes can look away.
Review 2013: Not The Doctor: My Fan Fiction.
TV Back in the late 90s when I didn't have this blog as a distraction, I was under the delusion I could write fiction and after reading many, many My So-Called Life continuation scripts decided it was about time I attempted to write my own. Me being me, and not being able to decide on anything, I chose to simply crossover what were all of my favourite tv shows of the time and some more. Looking back through what's here it's about what you'd expect. This isn't the first time I've eluded to this epic on the blog, but it is the first time I'm posting the whole damn thing, with all the fragments and whatnot having been inspired by Dr Brooke Magnanti's defense of the form. Here's an illustrative graphic which should give some indication of what's to come.
Yes, indeed.
Yes, indeed.
Review 2013: Not The Doctor: Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing.
Film The other reason I was pleased to complete my self-imposed Shakespeare embargo was seeing this utterly charming, entirely beautiful version of one of my favourite plays (which is I know a bit like saying coffee is one of my favourite drinks but nevertheless). As if you didn't already know the story, Joss shot Much Ado About Nothing in his two week holiday during the making of The Avengers in his own house and mostly cast friends from other projects, most of whom having attended his monthly play-reading parties. A passion project in other words, like a professional YouTube video with global release dates. As the director has said, he hasn't set out to make the "definitive" film of the play, just his interpretation of it in much the same way as hundreds of theatre companies each year. But it will no doubt be used in classes alongside the "Branagh version", the "BBC version" and the "one with Sam Waterston" so what does this bring to play the other might not? For one thing, as is so often the case with Whedon, it gives minor characters like Borachio and Conrade credible motivations and back stories (in the latter case by changing "his" gender and putting "him" in a relationship with Don John). Plus he's carefully thought through how to make the unfunny in the wrong hands Dogberry scenes hilarious by placing them in the recognisable contemporary environment of a cop tv show with actual Nathan Fillion. There's also the matter of the leads, making us fan people happy by giving Fred and Wesley from Angel an artsy black and white afterlife (something he says he didn't realise until after the film was shot). Even as I type I wish I was enjoying Amy Acker' and Alexis Denisof's sparring and also wishing that come The Avengers: Age of Ultron, Joss might consider filling his time with a Measure for Measure featuring these two as Isabella and Angelo (with Fillion as Lucio of course) (Clark Gregg as the Duke).
Kate Nash & Emmy The Great: Once More With Feeling.
Music How did you spend your Halloween? My night was spent in the company of overinflated rent erotic thriller Chloe (and trying to work out what happened to Atom Egoyan's career) (and Julianne Moore's for that matter).
Some humans were lucky enough to spend it in the company of Kate Nash, Emmy The Great and their band as they played their way through live versions of the Buffy musical, Once More With Feeling.
In other words, the scribes behind Caroline's a Victim and We Almost Had A Baby cover I'll Never Tell:
The rest of the videos are here.
Kate has a new EP out soon, but if she really wanted to mint it, she should release this as covers album, with I'll Be Mrs from s7's Selfless as a bonus track.
Some humans were lucky enough to spend it in the company of Kate Nash, Emmy The Great and their band as they played their way through live versions of the Buffy musical, Once More With Feeling.
In other words, the scribes behind Caroline's a Victim and We Almost Had A Baby cover I'll Never Tell:
The rest of the videos are here.
Kate has a new EP out soon, but if she really wanted to mint it, she should release this as covers album, with I'll Be Mrs from s7's Selfless as a bonus track.
the Video Recordings Act 1984
Film Despite all of my plans to save it until after completing various other viewing projects and displacement activities, I finally watched The Avengers (Assemble) this evening and can categorically state it's my favourite film of the year, leapfrogging over The Dark Knight Rises which looks decided po-faced in comparison and Margaret's extended version which held the title in the week since I've seen it, despite its own release slippage.
Conscious that there may still be a few people who haven't seen the thing I'll not talk too much more because it's best experienced with the visceral surprise of not quite believing how good it is, except to say that it's a tragedy Phase Two doesn't have a Black Widow film in its mix (even though it could be made comparatively cheaply an Elektra sized budget) and that all the other studios with Marvel licenses are stupid not to jump on its coat tails.
Of course the more curious element on the BD release is the whole extras situation which I previously muttered about here. The ensuing box set is indeed a collection of the previously released blu-rays without their supplementary discs (some of which were just 3D or dvd editions anyway) but it is rather gorgeous as a piece of merchandise and seeing all of those films together does still feel like "mission accomplished".
There isn't a commentary. Sainsburys does indeed have the monopoly on the longer documentary, what amounts to an extended trailer for which is on the Avengers disc along with a really funny new One Shot, an extremely funny gag real and some deleted scenes which for once are entirely superfluous to the main feature and explain for themselves why they were cut, mainly because they're character beats which should be in sequels.
But there is hope, and in an unlikely form. It turns out that one of the scenes has been cut or at least has an alternative version of a scenes, something which will immediately jump out at those of you who've seen it once, twice or more times than me. It appears that while the BBFC passed the film without cuts not all European countries did and that's the version which has been released across the continent and to us.
Which means that the version that's in the shops hasn't been seen or passed by the BBFC which means it could be in contravention of the Video Recordings Act 1984, ironically because it's less full on than the cut that appeared in cinemas. According to this tweet, the BBFC are investigating which indicates that this isn't something they were aware of until they presumably received a barrage of communications today.
As I see it there are a two options or results:
(1) The fantasy: Disney are in contravention of the Video Recordings Act 1984 and have to remove the discs from sale, a potential option being to replace them with the US version which is being released next week, the upside for the consumer being more extras including the commentary which apparently wasn't being included due it "not being recorded in time" with those of us who have the illegal disc being offered replacements of that edition.
Problem: the extra extras also haven't been passed by the BBFC including said commentary so that would have to wait. In addition the discs would still have to be manufactured to reflect the BBFC certification rather than the MPAA which will be hugely expensive and wouldn't necessarily be much quicker than producing the same bog standard disc but with a different transfer on it.
(2) Reality: Disney submit the new cut to the BBFC for rushed reclassification. The BBFC decide that the current 12 certificate is still valid so Disney can just keep on selling the same discs. Problem solved, for them at least. Unless the BBFC decide to fuck 'em and award it a PG because it's less violent. I can't imagine Loki's use of colourful metaphor is likely to have much relevance and the swearing is surprisingly low key.
At this point it looks like I'll be hanging around around a bit for the US version (assuming its multi-region) to filter onto ebay at cheaper prices. Or the inevitable UK double dip edition when it turns up in Amazon's sale in a few year's time ... [many links via]
Again we ask, does Joss know about all of this?
Updated! Disney's line (as linked from this Whedonesque thread) is that the censored version on the disc is the same as the one in the cinemas which is pretty bizarre given that people who saw the film multiple times in auditoriums will remember full well what they saw so they're trying to convince a couple of hundred thousand people that they didn't see what they thought they saw. Plus the BBFC includes it as part of their assessment.
It's not uncommon for people to be convinced of having seen gruesome scenes in films. Someone did a survey once of what people thought was the most gruesome moment in cinema and many listed the ear reduction in Reservoir Dogs during which, crucially, Tarantino pans away so we're left imagining the act. Psycho's shower scene has a similar effect during which we don't see the knife enter Janet Leigh.
The really odd thing is that the story broke today after presumably the check discs went out to magazine and website reviewers and they don't seem to have clocked anything because if they had we would have heard about it before people went into shops to buy a copy. More to come on this presumably and a shame because its overshadowing the film as a piece of art in a similar way to the Let The Right One In subtitle debarkle of a few years ago ... I'm off to bed.
Updated 18/09/2012 Just to complicate matters a bit more the BBFC have issued a statement saying the information for the DVD/BD on their website accidentally replicated the ones for the theatrical release and that the DVD/BD version was the one resubmitted, which knocks out out the VRA issue sadly. But the "censor" details say that it was "passed without cuts" which suggests it was this edited version that was submitted, the edited version which Disney are still saying was the version in the cinemas even through the BBFC website helpfully mentions that exact scene in its theatrical notes related to the original 12A certification and there are thousands of fans who all can't be wrong about the evidence of their eyes.
Updated 19/09/2012 Speargate tumbles on. Bleeding Cool reports a new statement from Disney which says that "another region’s elements were inadvertently used to create the UK in home release which minimally altered this scene in the film". So indeed it's not the same film on the BD as appeared in cinemas as was previously stated. "We thank our fans for their vigilance in recognizing this and apologize for the mix up" before saying nothing about whether the title's going to be withdrawnor whether we'll all be able to get a replacement with the correct version of the film on. Or the US version with the commentaries and so forth by way of apology [via].
Conscious that there may still be a few people who haven't seen the thing I'll not talk too much more because it's best experienced with the visceral surprise of not quite believing how good it is, except to say that it's a tragedy Phase Two doesn't have a Black Widow film in its mix (even though it could be made comparatively cheaply an Elektra sized budget) and that all the other studios with Marvel licenses are stupid not to jump on its coat tails.
Of course the more curious element on the BD release is the whole extras situation which I previously muttered about here. The ensuing box set is indeed a collection of the previously released blu-rays without their supplementary discs (some of which were just 3D or dvd editions anyway) but it is rather gorgeous as a piece of merchandise and seeing all of those films together does still feel like "mission accomplished".
There isn't a commentary. Sainsburys does indeed have the monopoly on the longer documentary, what amounts to an extended trailer for which is on the Avengers disc along with a really funny new One Shot, an extremely funny gag real and some deleted scenes which for once are entirely superfluous to the main feature and explain for themselves why they were cut, mainly because they're character beats which should be in sequels.
But there is hope, and in an unlikely form. It turns out that one of the scenes has been cut or at least has an alternative version of a scenes, something which will immediately jump out at those of you who've seen it once, twice or more times than me. It appears that while the BBFC passed the film without cuts not all European countries did and that's the version which has been released across the continent and to us.
Which means that the version that's in the shops hasn't been seen or passed by the BBFC which means it could be in contravention of the Video Recordings Act 1984, ironically because it's less full on than the cut that appeared in cinemas. According to this tweet, the BBFC are investigating which indicates that this isn't something they were aware of until they presumably received a barrage of communications today.
As I see it there are a two options or results:
(1) The fantasy: Disney are in contravention of the Video Recordings Act 1984 and have to remove the discs from sale, a potential option being to replace them with the US version which is being released next week, the upside for the consumer being more extras including the commentary which apparently wasn't being included due it "not being recorded in time" with those of us who have the illegal disc being offered replacements of that edition.
Problem: the extra extras also haven't been passed by the BBFC including said commentary so that would have to wait. In addition the discs would still have to be manufactured to reflect the BBFC certification rather than the MPAA which will be hugely expensive and wouldn't necessarily be much quicker than producing the same bog standard disc but with a different transfer on it.
(2) Reality: Disney submit the new cut to the BBFC for rushed reclassification. The BBFC decide that the current 12 certificate is still valid so Disney can just keep on selling the same discs. Problem solved, for them at least. Unless the BBFC decide to fuck 'em and award it a PG because it's less violent. I can't imagine Loki's use of colourful metaphor is likely to have much relevance and the swearing is surprisingly low key.
At this point it looks like I'll be hanging around around a bit for the US version (assuming its multi-region) to filter onto ebay at cheaper prices. Or the inevitable UK double dip edition when it turns up in Amazon's sale in a few year's time ... [many links via]
Again we ask, does Joss know about all of this?
Updated! Disney's line (as linked from this Whedonesque thread) is that the censored version on the disc is the same as the one in the cinemas which is pretty bizarre given that people who saw the film multiple times in auditoriums will remember full well what they saw so they're trying to convince a couple of hundred thousand people that they didn't see what they thought they saw. Plus the BBFC includes it as part of their assessment.
It's not uncommon for people to be convinced of having seen gruesome scenes in films. Someone did a survey once of what people thought was the most gruesome moment in cinema and many listed the ear reduction in Reservoir Dogs during which, crucially, Tarantino pans away so we're left imagining the act. Psycho's shower scene has a similar effect during which we don't see the knife enter Janet Leigh.
The really odd thing is that the story broke today after presumably the check discs went out to magazine and website reviewers and they don't seem to have clocked anything because if they had we would have heard about it before people went into shops to buy a copy. More to come on this presumably and a shame because its overshadowing the film as a piece of art in a similar way to the Let The Right One In subtitle debarkle of a few years ago ... I'm off to bed.
Updated 18/09/2012 Just to complicate matters a bit more the BBFC have issued a statement saying the information for the DVD/BD on their website accidentally replicated the ones for the theatrical release and that the DVD/BD version was the one resubmitted, which knocks out out the VRA issue sadly. But the "censor" details say that it was "passed without cuts" which suggests it was this edited version that was submitted, the edited version which Disney are still saying was the version in the cinemas even through the BBFC website helpfully mentions that exact scene in its theatrical notes related to the original 12A certification and there are thousands of fans who all can't be wrong about the evidence of their eyes.
Updated 19/09/2012 Speargate tumbles on. Bleeding Cool reports a new statement from Disney which says that "another region’s elements were inadvertently used to create the UK in home release which minimally altered this scene in the film". So indeed it's not the same film on the BD as appeared in cinemas as was previously stated. "We thank our fans for their vigilance in recognizing this and apologize for the mix up" before saying nothing about whether the title's going to be withdrawnor whether we'll all be able to get a replacement with the correct version of the film on. Or the US version with the commentaries and so forth by way of apology [via].
rewatching all of the television series on which Joss Whedon has had overall creative control
TV Earlier in the year, perhaps Easter time, perhaps before, I embarked on rewatching all of the television series on which Joss Whedon has had overall creative control (Buffy, Angel, Firefly and Dollhouse) in preparation for finally seeing The Avengers (Assemble) on its blu-ray release. Watching the original unaired Buffy presentation with the wrong Willow and Stephen Tobolowsky as Principal Flutie, it’s not completely clear that Whedon would go on to produce some of the best loved television series of all time. But slowly after a few episodes, the series built its own unique identity, addiction set and here Whedon is over a decade later as the director of the biggest film of all time and I am attempting to review all of them in three paragraphs each.
My expected appreciation curve for Buffy: The Vampire Slayer was that after a barnstorming first three seasons, the show would become a rather patchier affair in which individual piece of classic television usually written and directed by Whedon himself (Hush, The Body, Once More With Feeling) provided a scaffold for less compelling overall story arcs and baddies, with the Nerd Trio in Season Six, and Season Six actually the nadir. Some of which is true, but watched in concentrated form, its notable how even the worst episodes (Beer Bad, Doublemeat Palace) still contain some cracking dialogue and characterisation or a subplot which manages to utilise the horror genre as a metaphore for the human condition.
Indeed, notably it’s at its weakest when pandering to the fans. The interminable love triangle between the slayer and her two vampires, as well as prefiguring Twilight is often about as interesting, especially in the latter stages when Buffy and Spike are throwing each other against the supporting walls of houses. Whedon’s work excels only when he’s cruel, replacing Angel with a figure who’s the exact opposite but arguably more likeable and killing Tara, breaking up one of the great television romances. Even Dawn, the previously non-existent sister for Buffy manages to sidestep the Scrappy-Doo potential by not making her a Potential, just a normal kid that Buffy must learn to protect eventually by letting go.
If something weakens the show latterly it is the shift away from the core group and it’s only when the Buffy returns to the school and the Scoobys it finds its centre of gravity again. What I wasn’t prepared for was choosing Anya as my favourite character thanks to Emma Caulfield’s fearlessly layered performance. If there’s a tragedy in the ensuing comics, it’s that Anya’s not still in there, saying the things no one dares to. Watching again I was reminded too that the demon in one of the show’s worst episodes, Hell’s Bells, in which Xander witlessly leaves Anya at the alter has my name, or at least in his original human form. If only it had been Conversations with Dead People or some such.
If I say that Angel’s my least favourite of Whedon’s series, it’s because creatively it’s the least certain (which is quite something considering the first five episodes of Dollhouse). The premise is excellent, the atoning vampire helping the helpless, but as the series continues, perhaps for budgetary reasons, the show finds its story playing out across just a few sets and the sense of a metropolis in which the supernatural intermingles is replaced with the kind of narrative navel gazing which can become quite old pretty quickly. Which it does, until the middle seasons in which most of the characters are unlikeable and there’s an apocalypse too many played out across the foyer of a hotel which becomes greyer as time goes on.
Borrowing this viewing order from the web I worked through Angel and Buffy enmeshed together and it is noteworthy how often a story element from one series is so seamlessly passed to another, either through mystical amulets or characters like Faith, unrelated story arcs running in parallel yet able to resonate, like the flashbackpalooze of Fool for Love and Darla with its moments in which the same events are viewed from the viewpoints of characters from different series. Only by watching both together are we able to see the dramatic character development in Cordelia and Wesley, even if arguably in the former case its pissed up a wall by the old stand-by of demonic possession and wilful blindness of the other characters. How could they not know it wasn't her?
Remarkably Angel the series is at its best when it’s at its dopiest, when Angel the character’s dancing, Wesley’s drunk or Fred’s being kick-ass. But also when it’s willing to take risks with those characters like a testing ground for the moral ambiguity which would be the lifeblood of Dollhouse. When Angel locks a group of lawyers in a basement knowing it will mean certain death at the fangs of his historical cohorts it’s all the more shocking because it’s the so-called lighter version of the character and not his utterly evil Angelus form. Like Buffy it’s also in the closing stages that the show becomes watchable again, when it largely ditches the story arcs and returns to a largely stand alone format.
It’s also remarkable that while making both of these series Whedon was also able to produce what’s arguably his greatest achievement, the fourteen episodes of Firefly. Buffy’s Buffy of course, but of all Whedon’s shows, its his space western which from the opening episodes has the most likeable characters, simultaneously unbelievable yet plausible reality and dynamite storytelling. Like all of his series, it’s also rich with language, but unlike the others actively challenges the listener’s ears requiring multiple viewings for us to completely understand every conversation (and being versed in Chinese) and is refreshingly lacking in pop culture references, beyond visual and narrative influences. Cancellation came too soon. I would gladly have sacrificed Angel's later seasons for more of this. Except Smile Time.
Except, like My So-Called Life and others, its brevity makes it all the more precious not least because unlike other series it was never left to go off the boil or repeat itself. There are few clunkers with only Shindig ever spoken of as being sub-par even though it’s a master class for Nathan Fillion’s comic timing and Jewel Staite’s general adorableness. The final episode, Objects in Space is the highlight with its poetic imagery and dialogue and a star-making (or should have been) performance from Summer Glau. If the show hadn’t had the benefit of its film spin-off Serenity to somewhat close out its storyline, the final shot of River’s jack becoming a planet would have still been perfect.
If we hadn’t been gifted the film what would the latter seasons be like? I always imagine Christina Hendricks’s con artist joining the crew just before she would have taken the Mad Men gig and presumably the story of Summer would have been a constant undercurrent. We would have discovered who Shepherd Book really was and what Inara had in her syringe. Zoe and Wash would have had kids or divorced. Simon and Kaylee would have married and Mal would remain stoic through out. In my darkest moments I even imagine a season five shocker of Serenity being destroyed leaving the crew alone on a planet, the rest of the season a battle to gain a new ship, Serenity II. But the show could never be that dark somehow.
Unlike Dollhouse which is all about the darkness. Lacking the linguistic ingenuity of Firefly but even more network interference, this is perhaps creatively Whedon’s most troubled show but certainly his thematically and intellectually most rewarding. Hobbled from the off by Fox’s prudity in relation to what the Dollhouse was made for, it is still able by the close of its second season to tell an exciting and narratively self contained story which somehow manages to even make its notoriously shaky first five episodes a benefit. From a show without a protagonist it became a show with multiple protagonists and all of them played by Eliza Dushku, even if arguably all of them are also Faith with “wicked kung fu moves”.
Ironically its in these latter stages that the show finds what would have been a network pleasing premise at the beginning which would also have had just as many interesting things to say on the nature of identity. Imagine instead if the show had begun with Echo accidentally absorbing all of those personalities and skills able to switch between them as the mission requires. Those first five episodes might have played out in much the same way but with added benefit of a central character w could immediately cheer for especially if she was hiding her condition from Adelle and the rest of the Dollhouse. A bit Alias perhaps but that’s no bad thing and certainly more coherent than the unaired pilot included on the dvd.
But the bravery of the series is that ultimately none of its characters are really heroes. With the exception of some of the dolls, all of them have a morally ambiguous core, even Echo as she usurps her body's former occupant, and it’s a rare occasion when an entire series is filled with characters we love to hate, something not even Galactica achieved. It’s like a Shakespearean problem play, twenty-six episodes of tragicomedy ultimately topped off with a hopeful apocalypse. That Topher, the best character, is arguably the architect of that apocalypse demonstrates the risks the show was taking in its birth on network television. That it was still given the opportunity to complete its story is a testament not just to Joss’s fans but also their buying power when faced with the completed box set.
So having watched nearly fifteen years worth of television in just over six months I can absolutely see why Whedon inspires in us such devotion. His ability to create characters within ensembles all of which could be capable of starring in their own shows and sometimes do, consistently wanting to challenge the audience and self critical enough to know when he’s not succeeded, but also with such an utter love for his own material, rarely showing a that’ll do attitude to what’s being produced in his name. When his shows almost fall apart in someone else’s hand, its often because he’s creating perfection elsewhere. Lord knows what’ll happen now that he’s in control of the Marvel universe. Now, I’ll be in my bunk.
or The Avengers if you're outside the UK
Film Here's some somewhat inevitable comments on the ongoing situation in regards to the home release of Joss Whedon's Avengers Assemble (or The Avengers if you're outside the UK). Or ten minutes of head-shaking converted into a few paragraphs of text. These are the facts:
For the past ten years I haven't been buying any of Marvel's superb superhero films in a home format on the assumption that once the Avengers film came out there would be a box set. This was a shaky assertion since some of the films were distributed by Paramount, one by Universal and the rest by Disney who now own Marvel.
But sure enough a box set is going to available from Amazon and I managed to pre-order it at a price cheap than it is now. Yeh me. It's not quite as busy as the US version which has TEN discs instead of SIX with extra copies in threed and a bonus disc of extras which is probably what's already available in one handy place but it is all the films on blu-ray for a cheaper price than they would have been.
But a glance at the Amazon UK listing shows a lack of director's commentary on Avengers Assemble (or The Avengers if you're outside the UK) when the US version most certainly does. With an added comment about the entertainingly specific section on Amazon US's listing which describes what's on which version like the sites been taken over by DVD Beaver. Bitrate graphs will surely be added soon.
Cue recent interest at Whedoneque in which it became apparent that Tesco.com does have a commentary listed and that it may be an exclusive. I'm sorry, wait what? Also that Sainsburys has no commentary but an exclusive 90 minute documentary and Asda neither of those but a comic, sorry "graphic novel".
In other words, the US edition has been filleted and the extras spread across a group of retailers. Poorer fans will actually have to make a choice as to which of the extras they'd prefer when US fans will be getting them anyway and rich fans will have to fork out for multiple versions to get everything.
With the box set in an uncertain position.
Interestingly SFX's written a much longer blog post on the subject and they don't know. Which is odd because you'd think they'd be able to contact Disney's press office and ask. The BBFC hasn't rated a commentary either which makes you wonder if Tesco might have an erroneous listing anyway.
How did we come to this? Does Joss know? Joss?
For the past ten years I haven't been buying any of Marvel's superb superhero films in a home format on the assumption that once the Avengers film came out there would be a box set. This was a shaky assertion since some of the films were distributed by Paramount, one by Universal and the rest by Disney who now own Marvel.
But sure enough a box set is going to available from Amazon and I managed to pre-order it at a price cheap than it is now. Yeh me. It's not quite as busy as the US version which has TEN discs instead of SIX with extra copies in threed and a bonus disc of extras which is probably what's already available in one handy place but it is all the films on blu-ray for a cheaper price than they would have been.
But a glance at the Amazon UK listing shows a lack of director's commentary on Avengers Assemble (or The Avengers if you're outside the UK) when the US version most certainly does. With an added comment about the entertainingly specific section on Amazon US's listing which describes what's on which version like the sites been taken over by DVD Beaver. Bitrate graphs will surely be added soon.
Cue recent interest at Whedoneque in which it became apparent that Tesco.com does have a commentary listed and that it may be an exclusive. I'm sorry, wait what? Also that Sainsburys has no commentary but an exclusive 90 minute documentary and Asda neither of those but a comic, sorry "graphic novel".
In other words, the US edition has been filleted and the extras spread across a group of retailers. Poorer fans will actually have to make a choice as to which of the extras they'd prefer when US fans will be getting them anyway and rich fans will have to fork out for multiple versions to get everything.
With the box set in an uncertain position.
Interestingly SFX's written a much longer blog post on the subject and they don't know. Which is odd because you'd think they'd be able to contact Disney's press office and ask. The BBFC hasn't rated a commentary either which makes you wonder if Tesco might have an erroneous listing anyway.
How did we come to this? Does Joss know? Joss?
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