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!
- Anything the superheroes can do, a supervillain can do better, right? Which is why, after a parade of superhero reveals today, we now get this shot of Jared Leto on the set of Suicide Squad, donning the green Joker hair for the first time.
You may also recognize that this pic is a clear throwback to the iconic cover to Alan Moore’s “The Killing Joke”, one of the most famous Joker stories of all time.
- Did you know that contrary to popular belief, Marco Polo was not the first Western traveller to reach China? He was just the first to leave such detailed records of his travels. Did you also know that he was a wooden, whiny Dark Lord of the Sith? Yes, Hayden Christensen is set to star in a new Marco Polo fantasy-action feature film directed by Rob Cohen.
- Poster of the Day: Indiana Jones Trilogy (in chronological order, no less!)
Click to enlarge
- Well, here’s a bit of sad news. Yesterday, Badass Digest broke the story that the digital release of the Star Wars movies would see one major fan-pleasing change: Han Solo would once again shoot first. George Lucas changing the order of Han’s shootout with Greedo in the Special Edition release of the film, is one of the most maligned changes that the filmmaker ever made, so naturally people got incredibly excited by this news. Only for somebody to actually to get their hands on the digital version and see that in fact nothing has been changed. Bummer.
The interesting thing though is that Badass Digest’s Devin Faraci is fully standing behind his source, saying that “there IS a hi-def version of A NEW HOPE that has Han shooting first. 100% this exists.” Could Disney and Lucasfilm be holding back these HD versions of the original films for some big release later in the year?
- When I was a kid, I used a section of branch as a toy gun. Today’s kids on the other hand, get stuff like a set of Mad Max: Fury Road inspired Power Wheels Desert Drifters!
- I don’t know what’s better, the news that Robert De Niro is going to star as Enzo Ferrari in a biopic about the legendary Ferrari founder, or Guardian’s headline for the story: “Are you torquing to me?”
- Well this is unexpected. Usually when there’s a conversation about whether a black actor can play James Bond (as many wanted Idris Elba to do), the people dead set against it are usually, well, white. The last person I would have guessed to be anti-black Bond would be the first black Bond villain, but that’s exactly what happened as Yaphet Kotto (Dr Kananga in Live and Let Die) is totally against the idea:
“Political correctness be damned… [Bond] cannot be black. James Bond was established by Ian Fleming as a white character, played by white actors. Play 003 or 006 but you cannot be 007.”
“If I say I want to play JFK, I should be laughed out of the room. Black men should stop trying to play roles created by whites. These roles are not written for black men. We have to pen roles that no one else has established.”
It’s at this point that I would just like to point out that JFK was a real historical figure and not a made-up literary character that has already seen 16 different versions.
- Everybody knows, the book is always better than the movie, right? Unless, it’s a movie inside a movie based on a book about a book based on a movie.
- If you ever want to see just how dumb Hollywood can be, then look no further than GeekTyrant’s list of 25 Fun Facts About Back to the Future. Not only was the script for the classic pic rejected 40 times, but they wanted to call it “Spaceman From Pluto” because apparently “nobody would see a movie with “future” in the title”
- When there’s something strange in your neighbourhood, who you gonna call? Ex-Mouseketeer Ryan Gosling apparently, as the actor has signed on to star in Guillermo Del Toro’s Haunted Mansion. The Disney supernatural family movie has been in development for half a decade already and is based on the popular “Haunted Mansion” attraction at Disneyland. Yes, a movie based on an amusement park ride. Hey, it worked out great for Pirates of the Caribbean!
- With The Battle of the Five Armies, the Hobbit trilogy has finally ended. But really, they could have ended it a bit better.
If you have anything you would like to contribute to Extras, whether it be interesting stories, funny videos, or artistic photos of yourself in morally questionable poses, feel free to drop a mail to kervyn@themovies.co.za.
Last Updated: April 10, 2015
