Welcome to The Extras! A daily dose of all the smaller movie related news, clips and just plain cool stuff that you might have missed!
If you’re a fellow Whovian, and you had plans for this Sunday evening then I suggest you change them – you can go visit your Gran some other time. Don’t worry, she’s stronger than she looks – as the BBC have announced that one this Sunday, August 4 at 7pm (that’s 6pm local time) they will be unveiling who will be replacing Matt Smith as the Doctor in Doctor Who, the greatest sci-fi show this universe has ever seen. Here’s the tweet and video announcement to prove that I didn’t just make all this up to toy with your emotions.
*NEWS* We will be exclusively revealing the next Doctor in a special one-off live television event this Sunday at 7pm on @BBCOne. #DoctorWho
— BBC One (@BBCOne) August 1, 2013
It was with a heavy heart and soon to be stuffed belly, that I greeted the news earlier in the year that Showtime had decided to pass on a live-action adaptation of one of my utmost favourite comics, the wacky Eisner Award winning Chew, even after a pilot had been produced. But – and it’s a rather nice but – it’s now been revealed that Quality Transmedia are looking to turn the kooky tale of Det. John Chu, a cibopath (he gets psychic impressions from things he eats) in a world where a virulent strain of bird flu has outlawed all fowl, into a new animated feature for VOD and home video. And if the animated film gains enough popularity, a live-action TV option will then be revisited.
Er, is it just me, or does Chris Hemsworth have an even bigger hammer than previous on this new poster for Thor: The Dark World?
Let’s face it, Samuel L. Jackson would make an awesome Secret Service agent: “That’s it! I’ve have had it with these motherf@#$ing terrorists on this motherf@#$ing White House lawn!” Alas, it seems he prefers playing for the Dark Side – also its not quite the same type of Secret Service, but I couldn’t come up with another joke – as he’s joined Matthew Vaughn’s Secret Service as the film’s main villain. Based on Mark Millar’s comic book of the same name, the film will see Colin Firth as secret agent Uncle Jack, showing a young boy (newcomer Taron Egerton) the clandestine ropes while trying to thwart a villainous plot involving kidnapped sci-fi movie stars and the murder of an entire town.
And now prepare yourself for some eye-candy served up by some eye-candy-masters, as Empire have assembled this brilliant list of Cinema’s Greatest VFX Shots Picked By Hollywood’s Top VFX Artists.
We’ve seen a lot of stuff from the X-Men: Days of Future Past camp over the last two weeks, but I think we’ve just found our winner for the coolest. Director Bryan Singer has tweeted this pic of him standing next to a full scale Sentinel robot to be used in the film. Yeah, that’s definitely big enough.
As you may recall, once upon a time The Lone Ranger star Armie Hammer was set to play Batman in George Miller’s aborted Justice League movie. And now that the search is on for a new Batman to play opposite Henry Cavill’s Superman in the recently announced Batman vs Superman movie, Hammer’s name has appeared on top of fan’s list of choices everywhere. There’s just one problem. Hammer isn’t interested in donning the cape and cowl. The reason? Superman.
Hammer will next seen in Guy Ritchie’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E. remake, in which he co-stars with none other than Henry Cavill, which is a bit of a problem for him. That and the fact that he’s not a fan of this whole superhero business.
“I think if Henry and I did that film and then a superhero film straight after, people might start to wonder about us …”
“I’m not actually a big fan of superhero films. If you have a guy who is supposed to be invulnerable, then what’s the point?”
Mike Fleming JR over at Deadline has gone on a bit of a rant on why studios are stuck in the remake cycle instead of trying new things. These are arguments we’ve heard before but feel free to give it a read again. Just look out for this little nugget buried in all the vitriol. Apparently Denzel Washington was offered a small role in Fast & Furious 7 which would be expanded on in Fast & Furious 8, but he turned it down. Based on how that’s the same deal given to [SPOILER ALERT] Jason Statham who showed up in the last film’s post-credits scene, and will be the villain in the 7th installment, you have to think that Washington was being primed as a series baddie as well.
Michael Bay’s Transformers 4 is currently busy filming in Detroit, which has been turned into a China set. And always one to stay true to himself, Bay is blowing it up. Also Mark Wahlberg has a big sword (which is probably not the first time that sentence has been typed), as can be seen in this new set video and pic for the robotic sequel.
I’d prefer to not type the words “Jack Black”, “Rob Cordry” and “Sex Tape” in the same sentence for fears of the images they conjure, but alas, I am forced to as the two homely funnymen have joined Jason Segel and Cameron Diaz in the new comedy Sex Tape. Black will be reteaming with his long-time friend and Orange County director Jake Kasdan, who will also be helming the film that will see Segel and Diaz as a couple who decide to spice up their marriage by making a sex tape, only to somehow lose it.
I hope Chris Evans has better like with trains than he used to – the last one he caught led to his best friend being blown off and him frozen in ice for a couple decades – as the Captain America star is set to make his directorial debut with 1:30 Train. The Ron Bass scripted film will be a small-scale romance about “two strangers who meet in Manhattan and spend one night together as the conflicts in their own lives become the basis for their exploration of each other and themselves.”
Evans is set to shoot and wrap the film later this year, before reprising his role as Captain America in The Avengers: Age of Ultron.
Once upon a time there was a plan to make a live-action feature film adaptation of cult-classic manga/anime Akira with Jaume “Unknown” Collet-Sera at the helm. It looked very expensive and sounded kind of bad. Eventually Collet-Sera left for a career of making Liam Neeson punch people, and the project fell apart.
But now according to new reports, Warner Bros is looking to revive the adaptation and have called Collet-Sera – who’s just wrapped filming on his second Neeson thriller, Non-Stop – in for discussions to get back into the director’s chair. The director is about to shoot the thriller Run All Night with – who else? – Neeson, and apparently will then look to start production on Akira in early 2014 with “a new way to approach the adaptation that would meet the studio’s budget request.”
Yay! Everybody’s favourite mean-mugging sidekick is back! Mary Lynn Rajskub is set to reprise her role as the sour-faced CTU Agent Chloe O’ Brien opposite Kiefer Sutherland in 24: Live Another Day, the new “event series” from Fox that continues the nerve-jangling adventures of CTU Agent Jack Bauer.
It’s also been confirmed that while the new series will only be a 12-parter, it will still maintain the show’s format of depicting 24 hours in a day in “real-time”, but now they will just skip over certain hours. You know what that means? It means that 8 seasons later, Jack Bauer might finally get a potty break!
I don’t care what you’ve seen this week that you thought was cool, it officially takes second place to this piece of movie editing genius. Taking 3 months to complete, using 280 different movies, this fan made music video of Vanilla Ice’s classic track “Ice, Ice Baby” is the greatest thing you’ll see this week.
Last Updated: August 2, 2013
