Our weekly round-up of all the latest superhero news and talking points, including Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Gotham, The Flash, Arrow, Constantine, Justice League: Throne of Atlantis, Guardians of the Galaxy, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Captain America 3, Iron Man 4, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Agent Carter, Daredevil, Avengers Assemble, Big Hero 6, The Fantastic Four, X-Men: Apocalypse, X-Men: Days of Future Past and more…
…As a new low-quality look at the Dark Knight arrives online, Ben Affleck has been speaking about his role in 2016’s big DC superhero ensemble Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice during a promotional interview for his latest film Gone Girl, although he wasn’t prepared to give much away: “I can tell you that I’m very excited and it’s very exciting. I can tell you that in my entire career, I haven’t had so many people come up to me and say how much they’re looking forward to the movie. Naturally, that’s a lot of pressure, but I love the script, I love the director, I love the studio. I’m very much looking forward to it, but it’s two years away so it probably doesn’t bear talking about anymore.” Meanwhile, in a couple of other bits and pieces from Batman v Superman, some set photos have arrived online featuring anti-Superman protesters, while it has also been announced that the production will shift to Chicago in a few weeks, with the Windy City doubling for parts of Metropolis and both Affleck and Henry Cavill expected to be involved in the shoot…
…Gotham’s second episode aired this week [read our review here], with FOX’s Batman prequel series suffering only a slight drop in ratings of 13%, with ‘Selina Kyle’ pulling in 7.3 million viewers. The episode also included an Arrow Easter egg, with the Queen Consolidated logo spotted among the Gotham City skyline, not to mention reference to a villain who has already featured on The CW show in The Dollmaker. Naturally this sparked speculation about a potential crossover between the two shows, although the chances of that happening seem slim given that they’re on two different networks, and potentially two different timelines. Still, it gets fans talking! Looking further ahead, this week has given us a new trailer that includes our first look at Victor Zsasz and Sal Maroni, a promo and two clips from Monday’s episode ‘The Balloonman’, a batch of promotional images from the fourth episode ‘Arkham’, and an official synopsis for the fifth episode ‘Viper’. Oh, and it’s also been announced that Gotham has found its Harvey Dent, with Nicholas D’Agosto (Masters of Sex, Heroes) signing on to portray the future District Attorney who ultimately goes on to become the supervillain Two-Face…
…The CW kicks off its Arrow spin-off The Flash this coming Tuesday with the pilot episode ‘City of Heroes’, which has received a rather detailed synopsis this week; meanwhile, a batch of promotional images from episode 2 ‘The Fastest Man Alive’ has also arrived online [see here], along with a synopsis for the third episode ‘Things You Can’t Outrun’, which is set to introduce another DC villain in Kyle Nimbus, a.k.a. The Mist [see here]…
…One day after the premiere of The Flash, sister show Arrow will return to The CW for its third season, and we have a clip from the pilot episode here which sees Oliver (Stephen Amell) going up against the new Count Vertigo, played by Peter Stormare. Meanwhile executive producers Marc Guggenheim and Andrew Kreisberg have been talking about the tone of the new season, as well as their take on Ra’s al Ghul, with Kreisberg promising that Arrow’s incarnation of the Demon will be more “comic booky” than Liam Neeson’s portrayal in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy: “Now that the Arrow/Flash universe contains people with powers and contains the Mirakuru serum, it gives us a bit more license to be a little more ‘comic book-y’ than certainly even Christopher Nolan set out to do. A lot of the themes for Oliver’s journey that we were discussing this season are wrapped up in identity. Can he be both Oliver Queen and the Arrow? A lot of that turned out to get tied up with what we thought of Ra’s al Ghul and who he was and where he came from and what his ultimate goals are. All of those things lined up perfectly.” Meanwhile, in other Arrow news, The CW has also given us a batch of images from episode 2 entitled ‘Sara’ [see here] and a synopsis for the following episode ‘Corto Maltese’ [see here]…
…Superman Returns star Brandon Routh is set to make his debut as Ray Palmer in Arrow, but according to executive producer Marc Guggenheim, if we see him suiting up as The Atom it will likely be on The Flash: “I think anything is possible. My instinct is that if Ray Palmer’s going to shrink, he’ll probably shrink on another show. With The Flash in existence, there’s no real compelling reason for us to do super powers on Arrow. We can bring characters to The Flash to have super powers. We have plans for Ray that don’t involved shrinking, but our plans for Ray are actually really cool…”
…With Gotham, The Flash and Arrow stealing most of the DC TV headlines, NBC has moved to remind us about its own upcoming DC show by releasing a comic book-style poster and new behind-the-scenes featurette for Constantine, as well as a huge batch of images from the pilot episode of the show, which is set to air on October 24th…
…On the DC animated front, Warner Bros. has released a new trailer for the next DC Universe Animated Original Movies title, Justice League: Throne of Atlantis, which we have for you here…
…Last weekend saw Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy overtaking the domestic box office gross of 2008’s Iron Man ($318.3 million) – not to mention fellow franchise starters Transformers ($319.1 million) and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone ($317.6 million) and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring ($314.2 million) – and the film has now surpassed the worldwide haul of Thor: The Dark World ($644.8 million) to become the fourth-highest grossing instalment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The James Gunn-directed space opera currently sits on $645.4 million and with its Chinese release set for next weekend, it looks likely that Guardians will challenge Captain America: The Winter Soldier ($714.1 million) for third spot…
…With Guardians of the Galaxy now confirmed for a DVD and Blu-ray release on November 24th in the UK and December 9th in the States, a list of the special features has arrived online, and while a Marvel One-Shot is sadly absent once more, we will get an “exclusive look” at Marvel’s next release, Avengers: Age of Ultron. Furthermore, it’s also been rumoured that the first trailer for the Joss Whedon-directed sequel will arrive in theaters alongside Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar on November 7th (although personally I think we’ll see it some time this month), while The Disney Channel has also given us a behind-the-scenes ‘On the Set’ look at Age of Ultron with a short featurette which gives nothing away, but does feature Chris Hemsworth in costume as Thor…
…On the subject of Age of Ultron, Jeremy Renner has been speaking about his role as Hawkeye in the hotly-anticipated sequel: “It was fun to finally kind of discover who Clint Barton is a little bit. We have some good secrets revealed. I think everything that was great about the first Avengers, is exponentially expressed in this one. From the action, to the making fun of itself, and there’s a lot more time spent with the Avengers together, after being so separated in the first one. We’ve got some great new goodies, and some good baddies.” Meanwhile, he also addressed his possible involvement in Captain America 3, calling it a rumor (and conveniently forgetting that he’s been the one spreading it): “Oh, that’s a rumor all right! I don’t know what’s going to happen. I know it’s going to start shooting in March. I haven’t had any official conversations about doing it or not…”
…Click below to continue onto the next page for Iron Man 4, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Agent Carter, Daredevil, Avengers Assemble, Big Hero 6, The Fantastic Four, X-Men: Apocalypse, X-Men: Days of Future Past and more…
