…20th Century Fox has unveiled its plans for the next instalments of the X-Men franchise, announcing three movies for 2018: First up, we have director Josh Boone’s X-Men: The New Mutants set to arrive on April 13th 2018, while Deadpool 2 will follow on June 1st 2018, and X-Men: Dark Phoenix – which had previously thought to be titled X-Men: Supernova – rounding out the year on November 2nd 2018…
…The X-Men franchise will be back on the big screen this May for one-night only, with Logan director James Mangold revealing that the black and white cut of Hugh Jackman’s X-Men swansong – dubbed the “noir edition” – is set to screen on May 16th, before being included on the home-entertainment release…
…Deadpool star Morena Baccarin has been speaking abou the film’s seasonal sex montage, revealing that much of it found itself on the cutting room floor: “It took about two days to shoot because it was us making sweet love for an entire calendar year. So it was all the holidays, you know? We dressed differently for every one. Believe me, there’s a lot left on the cutting room floor, because there’s a lot of holidays. And I feel good about that — the part that was left out. That was enough sex. Nobody needs to see more than what was in the movie…”
…Stan Lee is set to make his return to the X-Men franchise, with Bryan Singer revealing that the Marvel legend has shot a cameo in the upcoming Fox and Marvel TV pilot Gifted…
…Turning to the DC Extended Universe now and amid criticism that Warner Bros. is skimping on the marketing campaign for Wonder Woman, this week has brought us three new TV spots for the upcoming solo movie, which includes our very first brief glimpse of the villain Ares [watch them here]. Along with that, we got a new image of Gal Gadot’s Diana on the battlefields of World War I, along with a photo of some toy packaging once again teasing Ares [see here] and a 70s-style throwback trailer [watch it here] , while director Patty Jenkins spoke about what she’d like to see in the sequel: ““I’m excited for her to come to America and become the Wonder Woman we are all familiar with from having grown up around her as an American superhero. I’d like to bring her a little farther along into the future and have a fun, exciting storyline that is its own thing. Wonder Woman 1 is so much about her becoming the person she is. I can’t wait to spring forward with who she is and have another great standalone superhero film…”
…Warner Bros. also kept the promotion for Justice League ticking over with the release of an international trailer [watch it here], while a promo image arrived online which sees Henry Cavill’s Superman alongside his fellow Justice Leaguers [see here] and Funko unveiled its upcoming Pop! Movies vinyl figures for Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Cyborg, and Aquaman [see here]…
…Visual effects wizards at ImageworksVFX have released two VFX breakdown videos for last year’s Suicide Squad, which showcase their work on the Enchantress, as well as the climactic showdown between her brother Incubus and Diablo [watch it here]. Meanwhile, Guardians of the Galaxy star Chris Pratt shared his thoughts on the supervillain team-up, stating that: “I really like all the Warner Bros. movies. I think they’re really cool and I’m not a real tough critic on those movies. But one of the flaws might have been they were introducing too many characters in Suicide Squad. They spent 10 minutes telling us why should we care about these characters, rather than creating trilogies for each character and convincing us to care about the characters…”
…A rumour surfaced online this week claiming that Back to the Future and Forrest Gump director Robert Zemeckis is in talks with Warner Bros. to helm The Flash movie. Whether true or not, it has since been announced that Zemeckis will be helming his remake of the 2010 documentary Marwencol as his next film, so it looks like the search for a director on the Scarlet Speedster’s solo movie continues…
…WWE Superstar The Miz has thrown his hat into the ring to play a superhero, and with Deadpool unavailable, he’s set his sights on a DC character: “My dream project? I mean, I think anyone’s dream project right now is how amazing the Marvel/DC comic book era is really coming together and really blowing up the scene. Anytime you have a movie, it’s breaking records, it’s doing great things, so obviously I’d want a Marvel character. Obviously, Deadpool is already taken and Ryan Reynolds did an absolutely fantastic job. That was always my dream role ever since I saw the video game seven years ago, I was like ‘Oh my god, I want to play this guy!’ But, Ryan Reynolds took it and knocked it out of the park and did an absolutely incredible job, so I can’t fault him at all. But I think anyone would want to do Marvel or DC, maybe WWE can combine with them and do something, but you never know. I mean a lot of the main ones are kind of taken. I’ve always wanted to play Booster Gold…”
…Gotham returned to Fox this past Monday with the fifteenth episode of season three, ‘How The Riddler Got His Name’. You can read Martin Carr’s review here, while we also have a promo and images for this Monday’s sixteenth episode ‘These Delicate and Dark Obsessions’ [see here and here], a batch of images for the seventh episode ‘The Primal Riddle’ [see here], and a synopsis for the eighteenth episode ‘Light the Wick’ [read it here]…
…Monday also saw the return of Supergirl season two to The CW, and you can read Martin’s review of ‘Ace Reporter’ here. We also got a new poster [see here] and a spring recap video [watch it here], along with a trailer, promo and images for the nineteenth episode ‘Alex’ [see here and here], a synopsis for the twenty-first episode ‘Resist’ featuring the return of Calista Flockhart’s Cat Grant [see here], and some set photos from the season finale featuring Mark Gibbon’s General Zod and Tyler Hoechlin’s Superman [see here]…
…You can read Jessie Robertson’s review of Tuesday’s nineteenth episode of The Flash season two ‘The Once and Future Flash’ here, while we also have a spring recap video [watch it here], a poster of Barry Allen facing off against Savitar [see here], a trailer, promo and images for Tuesday’s twentieth episode ‘I Know Who You Are’ [see here and here], and a synopsis for episode twenty-two ‘Infantino Street’ featuring the return of Wentworth Miller’s Captain Cold [see here]…
…Jessie also reviewed this week’s episode of Arrow ‘Dangerous Liaisons’, which you can read here, while you may also want to check out a trailer, promo and images for the twentieth episode ‘Underneath’ [see here and here], as well as a synopsis for episode twenty-two ‘Missing’ featuring the return of Katie Cassidy as Black Siren [see here]…
…It looks like the breaks haven’t helped the various DC shows in the ratings, with Gotham and Supergirl both returning to series lows with 2.99 million viewers / 1.0 rating and 1.8 million views / 0.5 rating respectively. Arrow also fell to 1.36 million viewers and a 0.5 rating, although The Flash did see a bump however, up to 2.67 million viewers and a 1.0 rating (compared to 2.39 million viewers / 0.9 rating for the previous episode),
…One series that certainly isn’t fairing well is Powerless, and it looks like the end may be near for the DC workplace comedy, with NBC pulling the show from its schedule with three episodes to go. Apparently, the remaining episodes will air, although it’s unclear when, but it seems like a cancellation is now just a matter of time…
…Having failed to make it to pilot at TNT, it looks like Warner Bros. is dusting off its plans for the live-action Teen Titans show Titans, albeit as the centrepiece of a new digital DC service which will launch in 2018, offering ““an immersive experience designed just for DC fans.” The Titans series will follow “a group of young soon-to-be super heroes recruited from every corner of the DC Universe. The action-packed series revolves around Dick Grayson who emerges from the shadows to become the leader of a fearless band of new heroes, including Starfire, Raven and many others.” In addition to Titans, the digital service will be home to the third season of Young Justice, and will presumably also offer a range of programming from the DC back catalogue…
…And finally, Amazon has announced that the big blue superhero The Tick will return on August 25th when the Peter Serafinowicz-headlined TV reboot hits the streaming service. Take a look at the first teaser here.
Gary Collinson is a writer and lecturer from the North East of England. He is the editor-in-chief of FlickeringMyth.com and the author of Holy Franchise, Batman! Bringing the Caped Crusader to the Screen.
