Our weekly round-up of the latest news and talking points from the world of screen superheroes, including Batman, Wonder Woman, Justice League Dark, The Flash, Arrow, Supergirl, Gotham, Constantine, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Captain America: Civil War, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Agent Carter, Big Hero 6, The Fantastic Four, X-Men: Apocalypse and more….
It’s been a fairly quiet week in terms of superhero news this week, with the studios no doubt making way for the fever over the first trailers for Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Jurassic World. Still, we do have plenty to get through, and we’ll start things off with Christian Bale’s comments about discovering that Ben Affleck was set to succeed him in the role of The Dark Knight for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice: “I’ve got to admit initially, even though I felt that it was the right time to stop, there was always a bit of me going, ‘Oh go on… Let’s do another.’ So when I heard there was someone else doing it, there was a moment where I just stopped and stared into nothing for half an hour. But I’m 40. The fact that I’m jealous of someone else playing Batman… I think I should have gotten over it by now. I haven’t spoken with Ben, but I emailed him offering bits of advice that I learned the hard way. I would imagine he is doing everything he can to avoid anything that I did…”
…Having been rumoured as the front runner for a couple of weeks now, Michelle MacLaren (Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones) has finally been confirmed as having secured the director’s chair on Warner’s Wonder Woman solo movie. According to reports, MacLaren will “develop and direct” the 2017 release, which will mark her feature film debut…
…Despite the fact it’s absent from Warner’s (current) DC slate through to 2020, it seems there’s still hope that we may get to see Guillermo del Toro’s adaptation of Justice League Dark, with a story emerging this week which claimed that the script for the tentatively-titled Dark Universe is now in the hands of the studio, and a decision on how to proceed should be made in the next few days…
…It’s a big week for DC on the small screen as The CW brings together its two superhero shows for a two-part crossover between The Flash and Arrow, and you can check out a trailer for ‘Flash vs. Arrow’ right here, along with comments from executive producers Andrew Kreisberg and Marc Guggenheim and Grant Gustin (Barry Allen) here. You can check out of review of the previous episode of The Flash, ‘Power Outage’, here, while a new featurette has been released which focusses on Detective West (Jesse L. Martin), and it has also been revealed that Morena Baccarin (Firefly) will be following up her role as Dr. Leslie Thompkins in Gotham by lending her voice to S.T.A.R. Labs’ AI assistant Gideon…
…Following the crossover with The Flash, Arrow is set to turn its attention to Laurel Lance (Katie Cassidy), with executive producer Andrew Kreisberg teasing a “three-part trilogy” focussing on Laurel’s transformation into the new Black Canary: “Laurel appears in the Arrow episode [of the crossover]. She’s not as present in these episodes, but that is because we’ve been building up to her appearance as the Black Canary. We sort of said that Sara was the Canary, but Laurel is the Black Canary. Episodes 10, 11 and 12 are a three-part trilogy that are about her. And episode 13 I think I can spoil, is called ‘Canaries.’ For fans of Laurel and for fans of Katie, they’re going to get more than their fill after the winter break…”
…Although The CW opted against picking up Greg Berlanti’s Supergirl TV series, allowing CBS to step in with a series commitment, it seems there’s still a chance that Kara Zor-El could inhabit the same universe as Oliver Queen and Barry Allen, with Berlanti quoted as stating that the show could take place in the world of Arrow and The Flash…
…Gotham aired its midseason finale ‘Lovecraft’ this past Monday, and you can read our review here, as well as checking out a few images of Lesley-Ann Brandt as the debuting DC villain Copperheard here. Gotham is off the air now until January, but FOX has given us a taste of what’s to come in the New Year with a promo for the as-yet-untitled midseason premiere, which you can watch here…
…Another DC show that will soon be off the air is Constantine, with NBC confirming that it is halting production on the show following its original 13 episode order. At this point, it’s unclear whether the series has been cancelled, with reports indicating that it could still be renewed for a second season. Take a look at a promo and images for the seventh episode ‘Blessed Are the Damned’, and check out our review of episode five ‘Danse Vaudou’ here…
…Click below to continue on for Avengers: Age of Ultron, Captain America: Civil War, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Agent Carter, Big Hero 6, The Fantastic Four, X-Men: Apocalypse and more…
