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Would've popped in sooner but I've been out of town on a work trip for the last week.

Anyway, there's a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth over the lack of Wachowski involvement in this. And, um, am I the only one who remembers people griping for the last twenty years about every single Matrix sequel that's ever been made?

But since we're on the subject anyway, I also seem to recall Star Wars fans getting called "toxic" for objecting to new Star Wars movies being made without George Lucas's involvement.

So, which is it? Do fans have the right to bemoan the original creator(s) choosing not to be involved? Or is it okay for fans to voice concerns and criticisms?

All I'm asking is that whatever standard we choose for this, let's at least make sure it gets applied evenly to everybody, mmkay? If Star Wars fans are evil for reacting like they did, then surely Matrix fans are as well, right? But if those Matrix fans are legit, then I have to wonder what anybody ever had against Star Wars fans.

Will Reeves and Moss return? I have no idea. But it seems to me like both of them need SOMEthing in their careers. I'm not prepared to discount their involvement. But if they refuse to participate, then I would attribute that to loyalty to the Wachowskis.

It could be that Stoltz is typecast in my mind as playing scumbag characters. Maybe that's why I've never been able to picture him as Wally. Guy Gardner, maybe. But not Wally.

Christian Slater as Zauriel is pretty inspired tho. Ditto Gina Gershon as Huntress. In fact, those are probably the two best choices in either article.

Stan Lee was a comic book visionary. But he was also frequently absolutely full of it. As much as I respect the man, there's simply no denying that he was part writer, part huckster, part professional self-promoter.

I, for one, have always been skeptical about X-Men as an allegory of anything, frankly. Or if Lee was telling the truth, if X-Men truly was allegory, then it's racist as hell.

But to the degree that I have to treat that seriously in order to argue the premise, the defining feature of X-Men is that they truly are superior to homo sapiens. They have powers and abilities that regular humans do not.

By any sane and objective standard, that makes them more than/better than humans, at least as far as their ability to survive and adapt to their environment is concerned.

So, if we apply that back to POC (or any other alphabet acronym you care to mention), the comparison falls apart. Most POC (or other alphabets) don't believe they're better than anyone else. Which is a good thing because they're not measurably better than or in any way superior to anyone else.

But, for example, Wolverine IS. He can survive virtually anything, not least of which being as much as two entire centuries of brutal combat and/or warfare, without a mark to show for it.

When people object to modern X-Men's woke tendencies, particularly what I know of the Krakoa era, I can totally see their point of view. I can also see where previous X-Men creators preferred understating the metaphor. Because there's SOME applicability (however imperfect) to civil rights issues. Some. But less than the progressive bunch want to say.

Thing is, previous creators also allowed others the interpretive flexibility to develop their own interpretations. Up to a certain point, I see the human/mutant struggle in X-Men as having very little metaphor going on at all. Rather, mankind realizes they're on the verge of being replaced. And so, they've decided (whether consciously or unconsciously) to persecute the genetically superior mutants out of existence while the numbers still favor humans. Because four or five generations of mutants will be virtually impossible to eliminate. But the first generation or two MIGHT be defeatable... if they're defeated early enough.

For me, what I always enjoyed about X-Men was the complicated morality (if that's even the word to use) at play in the comic books. In most other comic books, the morality is usually very clearly and very simplistically defined. Good Guys vs. Bad Guys. But the X-Men (eventually) didn't necessarily regard the Mutant Brotherhood as evil.

Rather, the differences between the two groups (Professor X and Magneto) were more philosophical and/or ideological in nature. Separation vs. integration. Because I've never found the comic book where Professor X disagrees with Magneto's thesis that mutants will eventually become the dominant lifeform on Planet Earth. Homo superior is the next step in human evolution. Afaik, Professor X and Magneto agree on that.

Their disagreement lies in how to respond to that reality. Should mutants attempt peaceful coexistence? Or should they build their own communities and/or overthrow the human race?

There are X-Men who utterly despise Mutant Brothers. But those are usually more personal rivalries. There's no love lost between Wolverine and Sabretooth. But their mutual enmity has nothing to do with which side of the debate they came down on and everything to do with their personal histories with each other.

Emma Frost was introduced as an X-Men villain but has been a member of the team since at least the Nineties. Characters can change sides. They can change their minds. Conflict in X-Men comic books isn't always Good Guys vs. Bad Guys. I mean, sometimes it is. But probably more often, conflict comes from differences of opinion or differences of methods rather than differences in morality.

For that reason, X-Men offers a level of literary sophistication that very few mainstream superhero comic books seem capable of matching.

If I seem rather animated about this subject, that would be because I've spent most of the past week reading bunches of X-Men comics. Claremont/Byrne, House Of M (and related tie-ins), the first several issues of Generation X, the first several issues of The New Mutants, etc.

Probably should've mentioned this sooner. But Cinema Wins did a video about this movie back in December. Very enjoyable.

I continue to be captivated by Farrell's performance.

Also, I'd like to take a moment to applaud the effort that someone is taking to make the show resemble TB's atmosphere, aesthetic and cinematography. The trailer (at least) looks absolutely of a piece with the film.

I'll give it a shot. Looks interesting.

Snyder was on Rogan a few days ago. Haven't seen this posted anyplace else. But there it is.

There's some discussion about Snyderverse topics, tho less than you might expect. This is more of a wide-ranging discussion about Snyder's history, personality, etc.

I thought the discussion was enjoyable enough. But those hoping for a protracted discussion about the DCEU may come away disappointed.

Two years later, but I want to come back to this.

Yeah, I couldn't tell you how many times I imagined a live action Spider-Man movie in my head as a kid growing up in the 1990's. Basically fan casted (which would change regularly) not just a imaginary '90's Spider-Man movie, but a line of sequels as well.

Same. Many were the evenings where my friend and I would spend the night at each other's houses dreaming about what a Spider-Man movie COULD be.

My friend usually came up with super elaborate plots. Something happens in Movie #1 which doesn't get fully paid off until Movie #3 and so forth. He was pretty knowledgeable about Spider-Man lore (which, back then, meant that he had a pretty good idea of what happened in Spider-Man comics from the early Eighties up through the mid Nineties) so a lot of his ideas were pretty interesting. For a thirteen year old.

I was more fixated on Spider-Man himself. I wanted the character to be done RIGHT. He can't be all dark like Batman. But at the same time, he also can't be a champion like Superman. He needs to be the Everyman who can't win for losing but who also never gives up. The movie version of the character needed to retain the comic book purity.

There's the quips with his villains and all that stuff. But more than anything, I wanted Spider-Man swinging around New York to be PITCH PERFECT. I always imagined that if you do Spidey's moves in slow mo, it would look like Super Olympics mixed with ballet. Very elegant, very beautiful and very agile.

None of the Spider-Man movies have quite nailed it for me. But Mark Webb has come the closest. Raimi isn't a slouch tho.

That's a pure perfect Keaton Batman reaction there.

Also, that moment is kind of interesting since you'd think DeVito and Arnold on the same stage would lead to a reference to Twins. Interesting that they settled on Batman references.

[Halloween TV series: "A creative reset"]

So, there's been an update about the proposed Halloween TV series. It says quite a bit but at the same time, it doesn't say much at all.

Halloween TV series: "A creative reset"

Miramax Television in October signed a deal with Trancas to develop and co-produce a Halloween TV series, which is envisioned to potentially launch a cinematic universe spanning film and television. (Miramax and Blumhouse collaborated with Trancas on the successful recent Halloween movie trilogy.)

"We're on a fast track, it's a big priority for us. We've had lots of exciting conversations in recent months with a number of really talented people, and I think we'll have a pretty good idea of what we're going to be doing very soon," Helwig said, adding, "We're hoping to lock down the creative team very soon."

While the search for a writer is still ongoing, the idea for the TV series already has been identified.

"It's a big world," Helwig said of the 13-movie franchise. The most recent trilogy culminating with Halloween Ends provided a fitting conclusion to the story, "so I don't think that is an opportunity to go off the back of that."

So the series is going back to the Halloween franchise's origins.

"The foundation of it is the original film, the John Carpenter movie, the characters of that film, and perhaps a group of characters that we haven't really focused on that much in recent film versions or even in a number of them," Helwig said. "It's a creative reset completely and going back to the original film, as opposed to spinning out of any of the more recent film adaptations."

https://deadline.com/2024/03/miramax-the-gentlemen-tv-season-2-halloween-series-1235848616

I have no idea what it is about media types that they'll use the word "reboot" in every gd possible context except the CORRECT one.

So, is this a reboot? Is it a continuation of something else? Good luck trying to figure it out based on all that verbal diarrhea. "It's a creative reset completely and going back to the original film". Wtf does that even mean??

3C Films is being a lot more charitable about all this than me.

It's early days yet. Maybe a little too early for me to get as annoyed as I am right now. But when these media dickwipes talk out of both sides of their mouths like that, it's frustrating. If they're going to issue a public statement, then the absolute LEAST they can do is make it coherent. "Yeah it's a reset which directly ties in with the original!" Whaaaa??

Hopefully, the rest of you aren't as cranky tonight as I apparently am.