Game Of Thrones: Bad News & Some Cool Stuff.

January 10, 2013 Adam Popovich Leave a comment

Because there’s so little to really report on about Game Of Thrones these days, what with the books being spoilers out there for anyone who wants them, and the show taking it’s long, horrible time to come back on tv, sometimes you have to make due with the little things that are out there, as you collect them bit by bit. Unfortunately sometimes those little things are really terrible and suck a big one, like the recent news that Wilko Johnson, the actor who plays Ser Illyn Payne has been diagnosed with terminal cancer.

You may remember Mr. Johnson as the guy who beheaded Ned Stark near the end of season 1, or as that guy in the background in the King’s castle who never talks, and just glowers menacingly. In the books his tongue was ripped out with burning pinchers by The Mad King, so whenever you see him he’s always silently staring. The guy did a great job emoting with the character and telling a story using just his facial expressions. As lousy and unfitting it is to such a talented actor, stupid goddamned cancer seems to go and ruin everything for everyone once again.

via [WinterIsComing]

[quote] “I am very sad to announce that Wilko has recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer of the pancreas. He has chosen not to receive any chemotherapy. He is currently in good spirits, is not yet suffering any physical effects and can expect to enjoy at least another few months of reasonable health and activity. He has just set off on a trip to Japan; on his return we plan to complete a new CD, make a short tour of France, then give a series of farewell gigs in the UK. There is also a live DVD in the pipeline, filmed on the last UK tour.

“Wilko wishes to offer his sincere thanks for all the support he has had over his long career, from those who have worked with him to, above all, those devoted fans and admirers who have attended his live gigs, bought his recordings and generally made his life such an extraordinarily full and eventful experience. Thank you.” [/quote]

Well that just bloody stinks. Fortunately, there is a lot of other community created content out there to cheer us up from that terrible news, and to help hold us over until March 31st, when the show finally returns.

Firstly, there’s the kids who play the Stark children all beatboxing the Game Of Thrones theme song:

As much fun as they’re having, british people trying to rap just makes me ill. It sounds awful always, even when it’s meant as a joke, but I hope it entertained you. Secondly, there’s a video showing what it would have been like of Game Of Thrones was a show on The CW, which is… horrifying:

Then here’s a handy dandy list of all the characters referred to by their colloquial nicknames as opposed to their character names. There’s so many, I can understand the average viewer getting confused and just calling them these in response:

This amusing collection of fake OkCupid quotes edited into pictures of GoT characters works surprisingly well. Lastly, here’s some great gifs of Tyrion being as quotable as ever:

Oh how I’d love to bro out with Tyrion. Man there’s no way this is making the wait until March 31st any easier. DAMN IT ALL!

Movie News & Opinions

Here’s the 2013 Academy Award Nominations! Let the Whining Commence!

January 10, 2013 Chris Tansuche Leave a comment

So the nominations for the 85th Academy Awards were released and admittedly, the one thing that I figured they could not mess up, they massively screw up. I’ll get to that in a second but let’s start off with who got the most nominations. Lincoln led the way with 12 nominations, with Life of Pi coming up with 11 nominations itself. Silver Linings Playbook managed to get nominations in all the acting categories, ending with 8 nominations. Argo also got 7 nominations but it should have been 8. Again I digress so before I drop into what I thought were true crimes, let’s go over which movies I thought deserved major props.

I am glad that Joaquin Phoenix did make the nominee list for best actor, despite his rant on hating the Oscar campaigning process and the idea of acting awards. Yeah it’s a political process that is kind of stupid and narcissistic but that should have no effect on how great he was in The Master. I still think he’ll lose to Daniel Day-Lewis in the end but, I mean seriously, who else can stop Lincoln‘s momentum after scoring 12 nominations? As for Best Actress, I’m happy that Jennifer Lawrence got her Oscar nomination because I thought she did a great job in Silver Linings Playbook on a role that could have gone south with any other actress. Ditto with Bradley Cooper getting his first nomination for his portrayal of the bi-polar protagonist. He’s come a pretty long way since we saw him The Wedding Crashers. Also, seeing 9 year old Quvenzhané Wallis and 85 year old Emmanuelle Riva nominated is pretty cool to see, considering it creates a record for the largest age gap in nominees in Oscar history. Supporting Actor made me happy with Alan Arkin and Robert De Niro being nominated for Argo and Silver Linings Playbook respectively. De Niro did a terrific job especially with his understated role as the father struggling to help and connect with his son.

Now to the major issues I have with the list. Number one? Why in the living crap is Ben Affleck not nominated for Best Director? This is the most mind-baffling thing in the world to see considering I thought that Argo was one of the best movies of the year. It did score 7 nominations but I felt it was massively due to the deft handling behind the camera by the actor/director. This honestly kept me in shock for a few minutes before I started writing this article. I can understand why Tom Hooper was not nominated for Les Miserables because people were either loving or hating his direction but Ben Affleck made Argo work and flow beautifully. Another surprise was that Kathryn Bigelow was not nominated for Best Director as well and that Zero Dark Thirty only scored 5 nominations. With that, I think we can predict that Lincoln will have a good chance to dominate the Oscars next month at this rate.

Also why the heck did Perks of a Being a Wallflower and Looper not get nominated for Adapted and Best Original Screenplay respectively? Looper was one of the most creative stories I’ve seen in a movie and it’s a crime that Rian Johnson did not get recognition from the Academy for this one. Stephen Chbosky, in adapting and directing his own novel, should have also got recognition for the great writing and translating to the screen. It kept the spirit of the novel and yet made it entertaining and movie ready so he deserved props for that. Also, why not nominate Skyfall or The Dark Knight Rises for Best Picture? In terms of The Dark Knight Rises, that movie gets better with every viewing and while not as strong as The Dark Knight, it should’ve gotten some sort of nomination, maybe getting Christopher Nolan on the board for Best Director. Again, that’s asking a bit much considering my earlier rant on the snubbed nominees. About Skyfall, I thought it was brilliant and deserved the recognition of being one of the smartest Bond, if not action, movies in a long while. Speaking of, why not even throw in Javier Bardem at least for his Bond villain portrayal? His stuff was great and he owned the screen. Maybe even Samuel L. Jackson or Leonardo DiCaprio for Django Unchained but that Supporting Actor list is pretty solid so I can’t argue that too much. How about Ann Dowd in Compliance? I know it was an uphill battle but man, it would have been cool to see her make the list.

I could go on and on but I’m going to provide the list, thanks EW.com for getting it organized by the way, so you can argue with me on social media about it because…man, I’m a little annoyed with some of the movies and actors not getting their due. I guess we’ll find out on February 24th who the big winners will be. Although if Paperman doesn’t win Best Animated Short, I’m going to riot.

Best Picture
Amour
Argo
Beasts of the Southern Wild
Django Unchained
Les Miserables
Life of Pi
Lincoln
Silver Linings Playbook
Zero Dark Thirty

Best Actor
Bradley Cooper, Silver Linings Playbook
Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln
Hugh Jackman, Les Miserables
Joaquin Phoenix, The Master
Denzel Washington, Flight

Best Actress
Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty
Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook
Emmanuelle Riva, Amour
Quvenzhane Wallis, Beasts of the Southern Wild
Naomi Watts, The Impossible

Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin, Argo
Robert De Niro, Silver Linings Playbook
Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Master
Tommy Lee Jones, Lincoln
Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained

Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams, The Master
Sally Field, Lincoln
Anne Hathaway, Les Miserables
Helen Hunt, The Sessions
Jacki Weaver, Silver Linings Playbook

Best Director
Michael Haneke, Amour
Ang Lee, Life of Pi
David O. Russell, Silver Linings Playbook
Steven Spielberg, Lincoln
Benh Zeitlin, Beasts of the Southern Wild

Best Original Screenplay
Amour, Michael Hanake
Django Unchained, Quentin Tarantino
Flight, John Gatins
Moonrise Kingdom, Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola
Zero Dark Thirty, Mark Boal

Best Adapted Screenplay
Argo, Chris Terrio
Beasts of the Southern Wild, Lucy Alibar and Benh Zeitlin,
Life of Pi, David Magee
Lincoln, Tony Kushner
Silver Linings Playbook, David O. Russell

Best Animated Feature:
Brave
Frankenweenie
ParaNorman
The Pirates! Band of Misfits
Wreck-It Ralph

Best Cinematography
Anna Karenina, Seamus McGarvey
Django Unchained, Robert Richardson
Life of Pi, Claudio Miranda
Lincoln, Janusz Kaminski
Skyfall, Roger Deakins

Best Costume Design
Anna Karenina, Jacqueline Durran
Les Misérables, Paco Delgado
Lincoln, Joanna Johnston
Mirror Mirror, Eiko Ishioka
Snow White and the Huntsman, Colleen Atwood

Best Documentary Feature
5 Broken Cameras
The Gatekeepers
How to Survive a Plague
The Invisible War
Searching for Sugar Man

Best Documentary Short
Inocente
Kings Point
Mondays at Racine
Open Heart
Redemption

Best Film Editing
Argo, William Goldenberg
Life of Pi, Tim Squyres
Lincoln, Michael Kahn
Silver Linings Playbook, Jay Cassidy and Crispin Struthers
Zero Dark Thirty, Dylan Tichenor and William Goldenberg

Best Foreign Language Film
Amour, Austria
Kon-Tiki, Norway
No, Chile
A Royal Affair, Denmark
War Witch, Canada

Best Makeup and Hairstyling
Hitchcock, Howard Berger, Peter Montagna and Martin Samuel
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Peter Swords King, Rick Findlater and Tami Lane
Les Misérables, Lisa Westcott and Julie Dartnell

Best Original Score
Anna Karenina, Dario Marianelli
Argo, Alexandre Desplat
Life of Pi, Mychael Danna
Lincoln, John Williams
Skyfall, Thomas Newman

Best Original Song
“Before My Time” from Chasing Ice, music and lyric by J. Ralph
“Everybody Needs A Best Friend” from Ted, music by Walter Murphy; lyric by Seth MacFarlane
“Pi’s Lullaby” from Life of Pi, music by Mychael Danna; lyric by Bombay Jayashri
“Skyfall” from Skyfall, music and lyric by Adele Adkins and Paul Epworth
“Suddenly” from Les Misérables, music by Claude-Michel Schönberg; lyric by Herbert Kretzmer and Alain Boublil

Best Production Design
Anna Karenina, Production Design: Sarah Greenwood; Set Decoration: Katie Spencer
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, production Design: Dan Hennah; Set Decoration: Ra Vincent and Simon Bright
Les Misérables, Production Design: Eve Stewart; Set Decoration: Anna Lynch-Robinson
Life of Pi, Production Design: David Gropman; Set Decoration: Anna Pinnock
Lincoln, Production Design: Rick Carter; Set Decoration: Jim Erickson

Best Animated Short
Adam and Dog
Fresh Guacamole
Head over Heels
Maggie Simpson in “The Longest Daycare”
Paperman

Best Live Action Short
Asad
Buzkashi Boys
Curfew
Death of a Shadow
Henry

Best Sound Editing
Argo, Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn
Django Unchained, Wylie Stateman
Life of Pi, Eugene Gearty and Philip Stockton
Skyfall, Per Hallberg and Karen Baker Landers
Zero Dark Thirty, Paul N.J. Ottosson

Best Sound Mixing
Argo, John Reitz, Gregg Rudloff and Jose Antonio Garcia
Les Misérables, Andy Nelson, Mark Paterson and Simon Hayes
Life of Pi, Ron Bartlett, D.M. Hemphill and Drew Kunin
Lincoln, Andy Nelson, Gary Rydstrom and Ronald Judkins
Skyfall, Scott Millan, Greg P. Russell and Stuart Wilson

Best Visual Effects
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon, David Clayton and R. Christopher White
Life of Pi, Bill Westenhofer, Guillaume Rocheron, Erik-Jan De Boer and Donald R. Elliott
The Avengers, Janek Sirrs, Jeff White, Guy Williams and Dan Sudick
Prometheus, Richard Stammers, Trevor Wood, Charley Henley and Martin Hill
Snow White and the Huntsman, Cedric Nicolas-Troyan, Philip Brennan, Neil Corbould and Michael Dawson

Uncategorized

Comic Rack: Guillermo del Toro’s DC Movie, Marvel’s New Teasers & More!

January 10, 2013 Adam Popovich Leave a comment

Welcome to Comic Rack! My pick of the top five comic news stories in no particular order…

Guillermo del Toro IS Working On A DC Movie

After a bunch of flip floppy wish wash from PR executives that we’ve previously touched on, lots of rumors and hearsay, it’s finally been confirmed that Guillermo del Toro is actually working on a DC Comics film. Or plans to anyway, I wouldn’t hold my breath for it to come out. Not that I wouldn’t love it, because his idea of a dark supernaturally themed DC movie with Constantine (Pronounced Constan- TYNE), sounds totally awesome and something right up his alley.

[box_light]“The movement for this happened before [The Avengers],” del Toro adds about DC building its own cinematic universe. “They were already galvanized to launch ‘Justice League’ and they were galvanized to make their universe cohesive… They are really, really, with ‘Superman’, very, very confident with what they have. They are now feeling they have two pillars. Batman and Superman… There’s a foundation that now they can build on.”[/box_light]

I’ve long been a fan of Guillermo’s, and think he’s one of the most creative and crafty directors out there that knows how to tell supernatural stories in a way that’s neither cheap nor boring. If Man of Steel is a big hit and the Justice League movie does in fact get made, you better believe I’ll be counting down the days until this project comes to fruition.

Find out more here.

Jeff Lemire Is Doubling Down On DC Projects

I’m such a huge fan of Jeff Lemire that simple, quick news like this can get my imagination running in a thousand different ways. The news is basically that he’s hinted at bringing some old school DC characters back into the modern fray. Which ones you ask? Well, they would consist of Kamandi: The Last Boy On Earth, Jemm: Son Of Saturn, Red Tornado, and even The Spectre. Right now it’s all conjecture based on some images he tweeted, so It could all be for naught. I’m sure there’s always the possibility he was being a comics nerd and sharing some cool pictures with his fans, in the same way I share pictures of my cats with my fans. All zero of them. Regardless of my pathetic nature, if Lemire does end up doing something with these projects, you’ll definitely be informed right here the moment it does.

Find out more here.

Marvel Teaser Season Is Back, And One Features Brian Wood!

In yet another teaser released by Marvel to make us all speculate endlessly until we don’t, we’ve got the vague hint at some new book that will be possibly related to X-women. The teaser released shows a picture of two X’s, with a DNA double hellix behind them, along with Brian Wood and Olivier Coipel’s names. It’s a bit obvious it’s referring to women in some way, what with the XX chromosome being referenced, but the question is who exactly? We all know Brian Wood is pretty familiar with writing women so it’s a question of who he’ll be writing about, rather than if. A solid speculation could be that the DNA helix hints at the genetic code that leads to mutants, and along with the X being such a famously mutant related letter at Marvel it’s a safe bet to make that it’s gonna be an X-Men related title. Some say it could even be called X-Women? I personally think that’s a corny title, but I’m positive it’ll be an interesting book nonetheless.

Along with that came another teaser announcing Phil Noto’s arrival as artist of the new Thunderbolts series. It’s titled Explosive and the image is certainly that:

As always there are more teasers from Marvel, some of which are utterly baffling, like this “Birth” one:

And this trio of obvious ones for Hulk, Deadpool, and Spider-Man, respectively:

Find out more here, here, here, here and here.

Dan Slott Keeps Pumping Out The Spider-Man Craziness By Bringing In Spider-Man 2099

Listen, I haven’t read a Spider-Man book in years. I think the last time I did was when they switched Amazing to 3 times a week. I decided that was way more BS than I could handle at any given time, along with all of the One More Day nonsense that was going on. It pretty much put me off of Spider-Man forever, which hasn’t been remedied by the terrible movies and it’s subsequent reboots and forced sequels. He’s by far always been my least favorite character, and seeing all the wacky stuff Dan Slott has been doing to Spider-Man has done little to raise my interest in that book. Sometimes something is done when it’s done for you, and that’s that. That being said, I do find it interesting he’s bringing back Miguel O’Hara into the current continuity. That’s right, Spider-Man 2099 is going to be integrated into The Superior Spider-Man somehow. I remember reading issues of Spider-Man 2099 in the late nineties and being really stoked when I found his action figure because I thought it was rare. Regardless, the amount of novel things Dan Slott seems to be trying with Spider-Man these days, without getting into spoiler territory, is pretty interesting. It almost makes me wish somebody as gutsy and ballsy as him would try something like that with Batman or Superman, but he’s already gotten death threats and whatnot for stinkin’ Spider-Man, so I wouldn’t blame him for avoiding any other superhero properties for a while.

Find out more here.

Titan Comics Launches A Creator-Owned Based Imprint!

I’m a pretty huge fan of creator owned comics. They’re by far what I read the most of nowadays, and to me are always the more personally rewarding stories. I love me a good superhero book, don’t get me wrong, but there’s nothing like a perfectly made mini-series that takes chances with its story and uses the medium of comics itself to tell a more effective story than any of the Big Two could. While I’m not very familiar with Titan, I always applaud another indie publisher throwing their hat into the ring and I’m especially fond of the plan to focus on creator owned content. It’d be pretty great if we got another big creative owned hit from them the way Image did with The Walking Dead or Invincible. It’s unlikely, but not impossible.

Find out more here.

Grizzly Bomb

Daily Archives: January 10, 2013

Game Of Thrones: Bad News & Some Cool Stuff.

Here’s the 2013 Academy Award Nominations! Let the Whining Commence!

Comic Rack: Guillermo del Toro’s DC Movie, Marvel’s New Teasers & More!

Welcome to Comic Rack! My pick of the top five comic news stories in no particular order…

Guillermo del Toro IS Working On A DC Movie

Jeff Lemire Is Doubling Down On DC Projects

Marvel Teaser Season Is Back, And One Features Brian Wood!

Dan Slott Keeps Pumping Out The Spider-Man Craziness By Bringing In Spider-Man 2099

Titan Comics Launches A Creator-Owned Based Imprint!

That’s all for this week’s edition! We’ll see you next time at the Comic Rack!

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