The Week In Geek: Spidey & Cap Show Their Stuff, 007 Returns, Wicked Comes To TV, and More!
Plenty of news and rumors in this post holiday season for all my fellow geeks out there…including our first look at the new Spidey. But first, the bad news…
No Wonder Woman TV Series For You
It ain’t easy bein’ an amazon princess and trying to make it in Hollywood; earlier this week it was reported that all five major networks had passed on David E. Kelley’s proposal for a new Wonder Woman TV series for the Fall 2011 season. The most likely candidate for the show, the CW, said the show was “too expensive”, and ABC’s ties to Disney, and therefore Marvel, made them a no go for them as well (not to mention that they are making a new Charlie’s Angels show, so one “hot chicks kick ass show” is enough for them I imagine). NBC, CBS and Fox all said “no thanks” too. It seems Diana can’t catch a break in film or on television.
What many don’t know is that this is not the first failed attempt to bring Wonder Woman back to the small screen. As far back as 1990, Warners was pitching a return to television for Diana Prince, then a mere ten years since her Lynda Carter glory days. They even asked artist/writer George Perez (who is to Wonder Woman what Frank Miller is to Batman) to be a consultant on the show. But he was quoted as saying his meeting with the suits was frustrating; they wanted the name Wonder Woman, but little else about the character. “they didn’t want to use the Gods, they didn’t want to use Paradise Island. They seem to be afraid of fantasy. Then why pick Wonder Woman? Why are they afraid to take chances?” twenty years later, not much has changed in that regard, sadly.
Oh well…this week it was announced that there would be a new line of Wonder Woman cosmetics by Mac.
Yay?
Our First Look At Spidey (And Cap!)
This week brought geeks everywhere their first partial view of Andrew Garfield as Spider-Man (sans mask) for the 2012 reboot directed by Marc Webb. The suit looks more stylized, and is even further from the comics than the Sam Raimi one, although it appears at least one aspect from the original comics that the Raimi movies ignored, the classic web cartridge shooters, might in fact be back. Certainly Andrew Garfield has that Peter Parker “Why does God hate me?” look down pat in this pic.
I can only hope this new proposed trilogy of movies doesn’t rehash too much stuff from the Sam Raimi directed flicks that are not yet even a decade old. I don’t wanna see a MJ/Peter/Harry Osborn love triangle, or Dock Ock and Sandman and Venom (I could live with a better Green Goblin though…as long as they slowly work up to him). The Raimi flicks pretty much covered the first ten years or so of Stan Lee Spidey stories in the broad strokes; hopefully we’ll see some characters that didn’t make the cut the first time around. Oh…and I really hope this movie isn’t called something like Spider-Man: Reborn or Spider-Man: The Claws of the Lizard or some shit. How about this for a title: The Amazing Spider-Man. Just puttin’ it out into the universe and hoping someone is listening…
Also shown this week (although not in pretty high res) was the most complete shot of Chris Evans as Captain America that we’ve seen so far, and I think he looks pretty good. Hopefully we won’t have to wait forever to finally see a trailer for this flick.
Christian Bale Screen Tests With A Ton Of Potential Bat Chicks
Apparently, the search is now hot n heavy for two female leads for The Dark Knight Rises. One character is all but confirmed to be Talia al Ghul, daughter of Ras al Ghul and, in the comics, the mother of Bruce’s son Damian. The other appears to be….Vicki Vale?? Ok…kinda left field there. One thing is for sure…a lot of major and not so major actresses have been screen testing against Christian Bale for the parts. The shortlist includes Eva Green, Naomi Watts, Keira Knightley, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Biel, Kate Mara, Charlotte Riley, Gemma Arterton, and probably a dozen or so more whose names have not leaked yet.
While I am all for Talia making her big screen debut, I am less excited for Vicki Vale. Essentially created in the early 50’s (along with the original Batwoman) as a wanna be Lois Lane love interest for Batman (and to dispel all those nasty rumors that he and the Boy Wonder were gettin’ it on), after the early 60’s she more or less disappeared, except for a few scattered appearances. If not for her role in the Tim Burton 1989 Batman movie played by Kim Basinger, few would even know who she is today. So here is hoping Vicki is nothing more than a rumor and we get Selina Kyle instead.
Bond 23 Finally A Go
Finally, after months of speculation, MGM announced this week that Daniel Craig would return for his third, and likely final, turn as James Bond for the 23rd 007 movie on November 9th, 2012. (Remember when Sean Connery and Roger Moore both played Bond seven times each? Now we’re lucky to get three turns from an actor as any one character…tops). American Beauty and Road to Perdition director Sam Mendes is still going to direct, as was reported a few years ago when this flick was originally announced. The film is going to be a part of a year long celebration for the 50th anniversary of Dr. No and the Bond franchise, which will see the release of the remaining Bond films to Blu Ray as well.
Anyone wanna bet the new movie had the word Gold somewhere in the title? Goldfinger, Man with the Golden Gun, Goldeneye…007 might as well be a hip hop artist, he’s got such a thing for gold. And 2012 is the golden anniversary of the series after all. Don’t be surprised when they announce Goldenshower or Golddigger or some shit like that. Just sayin’…
Wicked Mini Series Comes To ABC
Nearly ten years before it was a Broadway smash, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West was first imagined as an amazing novel by author Gregory Maguire. While the musical got the basic core of the story right, there were many, many elements that had to be left out, many of them political and some even sexual. Now ABC Television, along with producer Selma Hayek, is bringing the non singing, non dancing, slightly more adult version of Elpheba, the “Wicked” Witch of the West, to the small screen as a lavish 8 hour mini series. It has been over a decade, if not more, since any network tackled what was once a network TV staple: the Epic Mini Series Event. While cable still does fairly epic mini series like The Pacific, the epic mini series hasn’t really been seen on network TV since the early 90’s. The writer for this new mini series is Erik Jendresen, who was partially responsible for the acclaimed cable mini series Band of Brothers, so at least so far, this show is in good hands.
